For the first time in six years, Sony became the leading ILM camera brand

Sony has always emphasized that it is the top brand  in the world (ILM (mirrorless camera with interchangeable lens)); But the company’s statistics typically refer to the full-frame product market. Over the past decade, among all ILM brands, Canon and Olympus have been the top brands in the Japanese market, while according to statistics, Sony has just managed to take the first place.

According to Petapixel , BCN recently hosted the BCN Awards to identify the top ILM brands. BCN winners are based on store data from all over Japan. This statistic is very accurate; Because BCN Retail chain stores are active in most parts of Japan.  The BCN Awards seeks to reflect the current state of information technology and home appliances.

Canon still ranks first in the field of fixed lens cameras and DSLR cameras; The company has been the number one manufacturer of this type of camera for about a decade. But in the field of mirrorless cameras with replaceable lenses, Sony has managed to overtake Canon and Olympus, for the first time in the last 6 years. 

Mirror cameras equipped with Olympus interchangeable lenses are generally more popular in Japan than any other brand, and Olympus is said to have 36.6% of the market share of this type of camera in the Japanese market since 2012. Canon surpassed Olympus in sales with a 31.6% stake in 2019; In that year, the share of Olympus and Sony was 23.5% and 22.7%, respectively. In 2020, Canon once again managed to rely on the first place with a share of 30.9%; That year, Sony accounted for 25.9 percent and Olympus for 23.4 percent of ILM camera sales. 

ILM camera sales changed in the new year. According to BCN, De Sony topped the market with 27.4% market share. Canon and Olympus are in second and third place with 23.8% and 23.4%, respectively. Sony’s 2% increase compared to Canon’s 7% drop in the new year is the main reason for the difference between the companies’ share of the ILM camera market.

Another important point is that all three companies have a smaller market share than in previous years. The main reason for this is probably related to the success of other brands in this field, such as Panasonic and Nikon. This is the first time in the last six years that Sony has taken the top spot, and analysts say this is not limited to increasing the quality of Sony products; But Sony owes the better performance of other brands such as Panasonic and Nikon. 

In the category of cameras equipped with fixed lenses and DSLR, we do not see much change. Canon continues to dominate this segment of the Japanese market. With the exception of 2019, Canon has always been the top brand of fixed-lens camera in the last decade. In 2019, Nikon had reached the first place with a noticeable leap. In 2020, Nikon ranked second after Canon and before Sony. However, in 2021, Nikon is out of the top three brands. This is the first time this has happened since 2012.