Canon Is the Most-Rented Photo Company at Lensrentals Yet Again

It has been a busy year for new photo and video gear, and many excellent new cameras, lenses, and other gear hit store shelves in 2024. A lot of this gear is, admittedly, pricey and sometimes niche. Renting gear is a great way for artists to get their hands on the best tools without breaking the bank, and every year, the biggest photo rental company, Lensrentals, shares info on which gear was most popular that year.

Lensrentals’ complete “Top Rented Photo and Video Products of 2024” includes rich data, all broken down in the company’s annual blog post. Instead of discussing every aspect of the info — Lensrentals does it best — it’s worth taking a peek at interesting inclusions and trends.

This year, an especially notable pattern across all the major camera and lens categories is that Canon remains extremely popular, even more popular than last year. Of the top 20 most popular pieces of photo and video gear, cameras, and lenses, Canon had the top seven items and 12 overall. The other eight? All Sony.

Credit: Lensrentals

It isn’t just mirrorless gear, either. The Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II lens was the most popular gear of the year, and the Canon EOS 5D Mark IV even cracked the top 10. Lensrentals notes the EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II was the most-rented lens by “100 or so orders.”

Compared to last year, there are many familiar faces. The RF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS was number three last year and number two in 2024. Canon’s RF 28-70m f/2L, number three in 2023, was number five in 2024.

Last year’s top 20, for reference | Credit: Lensrentals

While there are few seismic shifts in consumer behavior from one year to the next, one rather noticeable change emerged in 2024. In 2023, all cinema-oriented cameras, the Sony a7S III, Sony FX6, Canon EOS C70, Sony FX3, and Sony FX3 kit made the top 20. However, in 2024, only the Sony a7S III and FX3 remained.

By rental revenue, Canon was the number one brand in 2023 with 23.96 percent revenue share. In 2024, its position is even stronger, up to 25.68 percent. In the number two position, Sony grew its share, too, moving from 19.15 to 20.44 percent. Bronze medal-winning Nikon grabbed a more significant piece of the pie in 2024, moving from 4.88 to 5.91 percent. The rest of the top seven are DJI, Sigma, Blackmagic, and Fujifilm, all bunched up.

Credit: Lensrentals

Unsurprisingly, Canon and Sony continue to perform well and remain the two biggest players by a significant margin. However, as PetaPixel has written about quite a few times over the last couple of years, Nikon is on a warpath. With a 21 percent increase in its revenue share year-over-year, it saw the most significant leap of any company at Lensrentals in 2024.

Lensrentals’ complete breakdown includes many more companies than have been discussed above and looks at rentals specifically by lens maker and mount. It should come as little surprise, but Canon was the most popular lens manufacturer, and both its mounts, RF and EF, were in the top three, with RF showing impressive growth.

Image credits: Charts provided courtesy of Lensrentals. The featured image was created using an asset licensed via Depositphotos.