Pentax Q7 Review!

The Pentax Q7 is still (2023) the smallest interchangeable lens camera, even smaller than the micro four thirds system and of course it's not the camera that defines the size of a system is actually the lenses.

Compared to the micro four thirds system the Pentax Q system has much much smaller lenses.
For example, the 01 standard prime lens on the Pentax Q system next to the equivalent which is the 20 millimeter F 1.7 on the micro filter system as you can see just by the size of the lenses the Pentax Q lens is quite a bit smaller.

Specs
Let's quickly go over some basic specs on this camera.
It does have a flash.
It's has a Hot-Shoe mount on the top.
It has a 12 megapixel 1/1.7" sensor which is really really nice.
On the front you have a quick access mode dial and you can set the up in the settings with the multiple options.
The SD card slot is on the right side of the camera and on the left side you do have the battery slot.
You can pop up the flash with the lever on the top.
The drive mode is on the front and and it has a dial on the top which is the main dial to change all the settings in the camera.

Display
The display on this camera is very nice but it's not amazing, you'll want to use focus peaking which if you use manual lenses which is one of the things this camera is famous for.
Being able to use different lenses on this camera, the display resolution is small so you will want to use focus speaking.
You can go ahead and set that up in the settings and I've got it set to the mode dial on the front so I can have it on and off.

Lenses

01
My favorite lens is for the Pentax Q are the 01 standard prime lens this is like your nifty 50.
The Pentax Q7 has a slightly bigger sensor than the original Q so the field of view is a bit wider instead of being a nifty 50 it's 45mm equivalent which is also a very nice focal length.

02
My Q7 came with the kit lens which is in the yellow color. This is the 02 standard zoom lens which is equivalent to a 24 to 75 millimeters.
It has an aperture of f 2.8 on the wide end which is really really cool compared to the micro four thirds lens the Panasonic 14-42mm, it's brighter and it's also a bit smaller as well.

03
I do have the 03 fisheye which you can use and defish in post-processing. You can get a really wide field of view.
The Fisheye lens is very very cool it does have a bulgy element on the front and you're going to want to cover that the lens cover that comes with

04/05
I've got the other toy lenses in my collection but I don't really use them much. They are very fun to use mainly because of the size, they are really small.

06
The 06 tele zoom lens is amazing. it's a continuous F 2.8 aperture from a wide all the way to the long end and it's an equivalent to a 70 -200mm.
With this, you've got a 70-200mm in your bag and it's light. It's my favorite lens to use with this camera because I really like to zoom in and get detail shots.

08
The Pentax Q's lenses are really cool I've got all the lenses except the 08 and that's because the 08 is about £700 and it's not worth me spending that much money on a lens on this camera.
Now to be fair it's a rectilinear lens with 15mm of field of view on a Pentax Q system which is amazing.
Compared to even the smartphones in this day and age it's a really wide angle lens and it's a high quality lens. That's why it's really expensive.

Video
The Pentax Q7 also has 1080p video and it does have image stabilization in the video as well. I wouldn't recommend this for video but the video is actually pretty nice.

Battery Life
The battery life on this camera is not the best, I would recommend picking up another battery or two just to get through the day if you want to carry this around for the whole day.

Now I'm going to go over what I like about this camera.
1. Size
I love the size of it. It's very small. It's one of the smallest cameras and that's what I love about it.
2. Build quality
It is an absolute solid camera, it may be a small camera but Pentax still made this out of good material and it feels great! Mine looks almost brand new even though I've had this for years which is very very cool and I do take care of my products.
3. IBSI
Now one of the other things I love about this camera is that it has IBIS. It makes a huge difference, you could argue that with the Panasonic cameras you do have Optical image stabilizer in the lenses and from my experience I'm going to be honest with you even with the IBIS in this system you can use a slower shutter speed on the Panasonic cameras so you will get a better image quality out of them. But I have used other lenses on the GM5 and because it doesn't have Optical image stabilizer, it's just very hard to use in the low light conditions whereas with the Q7, if you use the 01 standard prime lens you can walk about at night doing some street photography so I love the fact that it has an IBIS.
4. Grip
Another thing I love about this camera is the grip. The the Pentax Q7 has an amazing grip you can hook your fingers around it which is very very nice and it's an excellent grip.
It is a very small camera so you're not going to be holding it like a DSLR. The texture on the grip with the leather surface adds to the grip so it's very nice.
5. Image Quality
Finally the one of the other things I love about this camera is the image quality! it might be a tiny sensor and it might be only 12 megapixels but that's actually my favorite setup. A small sensor with enough megapixels to get a decent sized image, the Pentax Q7 does all of that and it's just amazing. You can't expect medium format 50 megapixel level images but if you want a shallow depth of field, you can actually get solid depth of field on this camera.
Just move in closer (especially with the zero one standard prime lens) and it gives you a very very beautiful out of focus area.

Now we're gonna have to go over to some of the things I don't like about this camera.
1. Size
I know what you're wondering but I like the size of this camera. However, this being am interchangeable lens camera I wouldn't call this the most pocketable camera and I like a camera that I can fit in my pocket because then it's with me all the time.
Now the Pentax Q with the 01 standard prime lens is a very small setup but it's not slim, especially compared to some of the other pocket cameras that I've got.
You can see even with a standard Zoom range (02 lens) it's not a pocketable camera it's like a putting a cube in your pocket.
With the toy lenses you can't retrieve it in the pocket but the thing is you're using f7.1 or f8 apertures which is not good and that's not the worst thing which I'm fine with I don't mind but the toy lenses have this weird Focus like they really are toy lenses. I mean you put them in your pocket and the focus is just gone way off and that's the most annoying thing about the toy lenses.
If you do carry this in the handbag this is perfect. You can put a 70-200mm F2.8 equivalent in your bag which is awesome and compared to the other systems it's going take up much less space. Even compared to the micro four third system it takes up much less space.

2. No Custom Modes
I know that there is a dial on the front which is very cool but that's just for one option. Having an actual custom mode is something that I've got into recently and all my other cameras have at least 1. Even the Sigma SD1 Merrill has custom modes so I can have a night mode and a daylight mode and shoot differently.

Conclusion
The Pentax Q system is really cute. It's very small and has IBIS. The Q system gives users an experience like that of a full features camera. While the Q7 is small, make no mistake it has all the features of a workhorse camera.