5 Photography Gear Regrets and 5 Purchases You Will Never Sell

The gear with the best reviews is not always the gear photographers keep. I pulled data from Reddit threads, DPReview owner reviews, MPB's used-market reports, and Lensrentals rental logs to answer one question. Which items do photographers buy and regret, and which do they buy and never sell?

I ended up with 10 items in total. 5 of them are the most flagged photography gear regrets of the past decade. 5 of them are the items photographers keep recommending seven, ten, even twenty years after launch.

If you are about to spend real money on a new camera, a lens, or an accessory, this is the list I wish I had seen before my first real purchase. Every placement here is backed by at least three independent public sources. Not one reviewer's bad day. Not one forum post. Three outlets minimum, all landing on the same verdict.

The regret list starts mild and ends on the biggest buyer's remorse story in modern consumer photography. The beloved list ends on the one body photographers have kept buying used for three years straight. In between, a pattern cleaner than any spec sheet.

How the list was ranked

This is not my opinion. That is the point.

I used four public data sources. Each placement had to clear a three-source minimum before it landed on the list.

Reddit regret and love threads

Long-running threads on r/photography, r/AskPhotography, and brand-specific subs like r/fujifilm, r/sonyalpha, and r/canon_photography. I scanned recurring "what do you regret buying" and "what would you never sell" threads, tallied the most-mentioned items, and noted which bodies or accessories earned hundreds of upvotes for the same complaint or the same endorsement.

DPReview owner reviews and forums

Each camera body has owner reviews attached to its DPReview product page, plus years of forum discussion. I looked for pattern language. Third repair, done. I have had this seven years and still reach for it. Should I buy this used in 2025.

MPB and KEH used-market reports

Behavioral data beats self-reported data. MPB publishes annual most-popular-used reports. KEH does the same less formally. If a camera shows up three years running as the most-bought used body, that is stronger evidence than any review.

Lensrentals rental data

Roger Cicala at Lensrentals publishes rental trends and long-term reliability posts. Rental-house data is a second behavioral layer. Pros vote with their money on what they want to hold for a weekend.

An item only made the list if it appeared in at least three of these sources, flagging the same verdict. Mild mentions were cut. One-off positive reviews were cut. What was left was the signal.

The 5 biggest photography gear regrets

Ordered from mild to catastrophic.

5. Cheap variable ND filters, sub-$40 generic

The cross-polarization X-pattern in every sunset. DPReview's long-running thread, PetaPixel's comparison explainer, and Fstoppers' explainer all confirm it. Sub-$40 generic variable NDs will produce an X-shaped brightness artifact on wide lenses past roughly 5 stops. The flaw is physics, not brand defect. If you need variable ND, a hard-stop design like H&Y Nova avoids most of it. For most hobbyists, a fixed ND kit is the honest answer.

4. Counterfeit SanDisk and Lexar SD cards from Amazon

The regret is not the card. It is the files you lost. PetaPixel's investigation found that between 1 in 3 and 1 in 4 SanDisk cards sold through Amazon's commingled inventory tested as counterfeit. Photography Life and DIYPhotography both published how-to-spot-a-fake guides in response. Counterfeit cards report 256GB or 512GB capacity, but the controller chip lies. Files silently corrupt past the real 8 to 16 GB of actual memory. Wedding and event photographers have been the loudest to surface this, and Amazon has not fixed the commingled-inventory problem that lets fakes slip into "Ships from Amazon" listings.

3. Fujifilm X-Pro3

A design choice became a design defect. The hidden rear LCD was the marketing hook. The flex cable connecting the LCD was the problem. Phoblographer, Tom's Guide, and PetaPixel all covered the class-action lawsuit filed over premature LCD failures on low-shutter-count bodies. Some owners went through board-level service within 18 months of buying. The camera still has loyalists, but "my LCD is dead, again" threads are the most-flagged body-specific regret on r/fujifilm.

2. Nikon D750 shutter recall saga

A great sensor wrapped in a broken shutter. Nikon issued an official Service Advisory for shutter monitor failures across expanded serial-number ranges. PetaPixel reported the recall expanded twice as more units surfaced. DPReview's Nikon forum still has threads answered with "only buy a used D750 if recall work is documented." Many owners sent the same body in three times.

1. Canon EOS M50 and the EF-M mount

The biggest documented buyer's remorse story in modern consumer photography. Canon officially abandoned the EF-M mount. Fstoppers called it out, Digital Camera World listed EF-M as a dead mount in its 2024 system guide, and Canon Community and Reddit filled with "what do I do with my M50" threads after the R50 launched on a completely different mount. Every M50 buyer bought into a system Canon walked away from within five years. The regret is not the camera itself. It is the orphaned accessory drawer that came with it.

The 5 purchases photographers never sell

Ordered from least beloved to most.

5. Canon EF 50mm f/1.8 STM, the "nifty fifty"

Cheapest lens Canon makes. One of the most-kept lenses in photography. Y.M.Cinema Magazine listed the nifty fifty family among the best-selling lenses of 2025. Digital Camera World's best-beginner-lenses guide defaults to it every year. Expert Photography and The-Digital-Picture both rank it as the highest value-per-dollar lens Canon sells. The Nikon 50mm 1.8G, Sony FE 50mm 1.8, and Canon RF 50mm 1.8 follow the same pattern. A sub-$200 prime that stays in a photographer's bag for a decade. [Amazon affiliate link pending]

4. Peak Design Everyday Backpack

The Kickstarter that made Peak Design a verb. The Everyday Messenger was the most funded bag on Kickstarter in 2015. The Everyday Backpack broke that record in 2016 at $6.5M from 26,000 backers. DPReview called the V2 "a backpack you will really use every day." PhotographyTalk's 2026 buying guide still names it best camera bag of the year, nine years after launch. Pack Hacker notes it is probably the most common camera bag in any major city. [Amazon affiliate link pending]

3. Godox V1 and AD200 flash ecosystem

The flash system that made Canon and Nikon strobe pricing indefensible. SLR Lounge's one-year AD200 review called it "the best flash you never knew you needed" after 75 weddings. Fstoppers credited Godox with shaking up the industry to the point that Profoto and Westcott built compatibility. The V1 on-camera speedlight still leads DPReview threads as "far and away the best Godox speedlight" for on-camera use. For most photographers doing portraits or events, this is the cheapest path into pro-level lighting. [Amazon affiliate links pending]

2. Nikon Z8

The body Nikon photographers waited 15 years for. Photography Life said it can do almost anything well. DPReview forum consensus is that used prices barely dropped 18 months after launch. Nikon Cafe's long-term thread fills with "I will keep using this until it breaks" comments. No upgrade chatter. No buyer's remorse. A rare combination in the flagship-adjacent tier. [Amazon affiliate link pending]

1. Sony A7 III

The most beloved camera of the mirrorless era. DPReview awarded it 89% and Gold at launch and called it the new benchmark for full-frame mirrorless. Phoblographer's April 2026 retrospective called it the camera that defined the category. MPB's used-market data listed the A7 III as the most-purchased used full-frame camera in 2023, 2024, AND 2025. No other body has held that position more than one year. Across Fred Miranda, DPReview, and Reddit, long-term owner threads are still net-positive seven years in. It is not close. [Amazon affiliate link pending, link both new body and MPB used listing]

The one rule that separates regret from love

Ten items. Two lists. One pattern that held across both halves.

Every regret was a promise that was not kept. Canon promised EF-M had a future. Nikon promised the D750 shutter was fine. Fuji promised the X-Pro3's hidden LCD was a feature. Amazon promised the SD card was real. Filter brands promised variable NDs worked on wide lenses. Every regret item was bought because of what it said on paper, and abandoned because paper fell apart in practice.

Every beloved item earned its place by showing up quietly for years. The Sony A7 III kept working. The nifty fifty kept going in the bag. The Peak Design backpack kept commuting. The Godox system kept firing through 75 weddings. The Nikon Z8 kept earning its spot on the shelf. None of these items were marketed on a single headline spec. They were bought, used, kept, and recommended by people who lived with them for years.

Regret is what you bought because of the ad. Love is what you kept after the ad wore off.

Reframe the whole filter before your next purchase. The real gear test is not the unboxing. It is whether you still have it two years later, and whether you would recommend it without qualification to a friend asking what to buy. Any camera or lens or accessory that cannot meet that bar is a candidate for regret, no matter how well it reviews on launch day.

What to buy and what to avoid

If you are reading this before a purchase, here is the shortlist. Skip the sub-$40 variable ND filters, the counterfeit SD cards, the bodies trapped on dead mounts, the models under active recall, and the cameras sold on a gimmick the manufacturer could not engineer. Those are the five regrets.

Keep the nifty fifty, the Peak Design bag, the Godox system, the Nikon Z8, and the Sony A7 III near the top of any shortlist. Those are the five keepers. All five clear the three-source minimum by a wide margin. All five have passed the two-year test the regret list could not.

Watching the full video is the fastest way to see each placement with the data on screen.

If you want more on the craft behind the gear, the next video in this series covers 30 things photographers do not learn until they have been at it for a decade. Watch: 30 Things They Don't Teach You About Photography. Gear is the eas