Today I’m reviewing the Yongnuo F2N 35mm ƒ/2 for Nikon full-frame F mount, and this design is also made for Canon EF mount. It’s a very cheap lens, so it begs the question, how good can it possibly be?

I got this lens because I’m curious about the 35mm focal length, and I didn’t want to spend a lot of money to try it out. I bought this lens from B&H Photo (non-affiliate link) for $106 dollars, and I’ve seen it as low as $90 for Canon EF on Adorama’s website (non-affiliate link). There’s a newer version for the Canon RF mount and Sony E mount, but that’s a different design than this, beyond just the difference in mount.

Bottom line upfront, I think this lens is more than worth the money, but it does have some quirks you should be aware of that we’ll talk about. It’s not as good as the name brand 35mm ƒ/1.8 lens, but the recurring theme of this review is going to be that it’s better than you’d expect from a hundred dollar lens, but not mind-blowing compared to more expensive and name brand options.

In Nikon’s case, the Nikon 35mm ƒ/1.8G is over $500 new, and almost always more than $300 used, so for about $100 the Yongnuo 35mm ƒ/2 will give you something like 80-90% of the performance. So if you just want to dabble in the 35mm focal length, or you don’t have a lot of money to throw around, then this is going to be a great option for you.

I’m going to making a lot of comparisons to Nikon’s 50mm ƒ/1.8 because they’ve got a lot of physical similarities, and since they’re much closer to the same price point compared to the Nikon 35mm ƒ/1.8, I can make more meaningful statements relative to price. The Nikon 50mm is currently $217 new and often $175 or less used. For background information, I shot both lenses with my Nikon D750.

Physical build and specs

The Yongnuo 35mm ƒ/2 is an autofocus lens with a 58mm filter thread, and the lens body is almost the exact same dimensions of the Nikon 50mm ƒ/1.8. It looks like Yongnuo made a mold of the Nikon 50mm, because even the width and placement of ridges and seams are nearly the same, and they’re even within about an ounce of the same weight.

Yongnuo does NOT include a lens hood with this lens, which may or may not be a problem for you, but I like to have them to protect the front element of the lens. I’ll tell you more how I solved this problem later. They did not include a lens pouch, which I never use anyway, and it’s also not weather-sealed, so no rainstorms or deserts with this one. I’d be pretty iffy about bringing it to the beach too.

The Yonguo’s got 7 elements in 5 groups, so make of that what you will. I’m no kind of optical engineer so that’s pretty meaningless to me. The description on B&H says that they are multi-coated elements, so… 🤷‍♂️

You should know that it has 7 aperture blades, so where 9 blades would get a little bit nicer and rounder bokeh, 7 will give you a bit straighter edged bokeh. The Nikon 50’s also got 7, so again very similar.

It has a minimum focus distance of just under 10 inches, so while you can’t get true macro shots with this, you can get pretty close to your subject and get some detail. But remember, at 35mm focal length, you’re going to get some distortion of your subject when you’re that close, where the parts of your subject that are farther away are going to look really far away compared to the parts of your subject that are closer.

We also have an autofocus/manual focus switch on the side that you’d expect, but I was surprised by the way it works:

On a Nikon lens and most autofocus lenses, when you set the switch on “AF” for autofocus, you can still turn the manual focus ring on the lens and adjust your focus manually. But with the Yongnuo 35mm, the manual focus ring does nothing when the switch is set on “AF”. When they say “AF”, they really do mean just autofocus; manual focus doesn’t engage at all until you switch it to “MF”.

Like I mentioned a minute ago, there’s no lens hood in the box with this lens. But since I saw how physically similar the Yongnuo 35mm and the Nikon 50mm are, I popped off the lens hood from the Nikon 50mm and put it on the Yongnuo 35mm, and it fit perfectly!

So I went searching on B&H for the same hood, it’s Nikon’s HB-47, and I was shocked to see it was $35! Even the Vello knockoff was $20, and I was not a fan of those prices for a simple piece of injection molded plastic. I searched Amazon for an HB-47 replacement and found the cheapest one, which was $5.89 from Fotasy, a brand I’ve never heard of. Some things I don’t want to cheap out on, but considering how cheap this lens is in the first place and how completely simple a lens hood is anyway, I figured a cheap lens hood is a good bet for this situation.

So here’s my 10-second review of the Fotasy replacement for the Nikon HB-47: it works, it’s fine, it’s very slightly bendier than the Nikon hood, but it fits on both the Nikon 50mm and the Yongnuo 35mm just as securely as the HB-47 hood.

I did notice that the Nikon lens hood and the Fotasy one were more secure on the Nikon 50mm, and both were less secure to an equal degree on the Yongnuo 35mm, which tells me that lens hood connection on the Yongnuo lens isn’t built quite as well. I still have no worries that either lens hood would be in danger of falling off the 35mm accidentally.

Image quality

Wide open at ƒ/2, the sharpness on the Yongnuo 35mm ƒ/2 isn’t going to blow you away when you zoom in, but when you’re looking at the whole photo without zooming in, it looks good. Again, not mind blowing, but better than I’d expect out of a hundred dollar lens.

As you’d expect, as you start to close the aperture and increase the depth of field, whatever you’re focused on gets sharper and sharper. By ƒ/4 it’s pretty good and by ƒ/8 it’s gratifyingly sharp.

I noticed some flaring when shooting directly or nearly directly into the sun, but not too bad for being just a hundred dollar lens. I did lose a good bit of contrast from the flaring, and I could only recover some of it in editing. In addition to the typical flare you’d expect, I also saw some odd additional flare in the bottom corners in some of my images.

When shooting more normally (as in not stabbing my eyes out by pointing the lens into the heart of the sun), I found the contrast and colors to be similar to the Nikon 50mm. I won’t say I’m such a sophisticated photographer that I can detect minute differences between lenses, but I personally do not see a major difference between the Yongnuo 35mm and the Nikon 50mm.

Autofocus for photos

I found the autofocus to be pretty slow, even a bit slower than the Nikon 50mm, which itself is not speedy.

In low-light situations it struggles a lot and wouldn’t always lock focus on the subject, even with the autofocus assist light on my camera. If you’re a wedding photographer taking pictures on the dance floor, this isn’t going to be a great experience, and the same if you’re taking pictures at night or in the late evening. Of course, if you’re a wedding photographer and considering this lens, I’d say raise your rates until you can afford quality lenses for your client’s sake!

My copy tended to front-focus a bit, which I corrected by adjusting the autofocus bias a bit in the menu. This is something you should at least check for all your lenses, especially in the DSLR world, so I’m not upset or surprised about having to do it.

After the adjustment, when the Yongnuo did lock on, it was generally pretty accurate. I just wouldn’t trust it to track a fast moving subject like cars or sports.

Autofocus for video

I won’t talk a lot about using this lens for video. I don’t recommend using Nikon’s DSLR autofocus during recording a clip in video anyway, because it hunts back and forth and that’s annoying to watch.

I just get the autofocus locked in before recording, then leave it on manual so it doesn’t change (if it’s a static shot). If you have to change focus during the shot, even mildly-skilled manual focus is better than relying on the autofocus.

This lens does make autofocus noise that’s audible in the on-camera mic, so watch out for that if you do choose to autofocus, and it does have quite a bit of focus breathing, cropping in as you focus closer.

Who is this lens for?

Overall I’d recommend this lens for a beginner who wants to try out prime lenses. If you have a crop sensor camera, like a Nikon d3500, 5500, or 7500, then this lens will give you a similar composition to a 50mm lens on a full-frame camera, which is my favorite focal length.

Another person I’d recommend this lens to is someone like me, who doesn’t have a lot of money to throw around but still wants to try the 35mm focal length. So far I’ve liked it to give me some variety for family sessions alongside the 50mm.

I wouldn’t recommend this lens to you if you need it for low-light conditions, fast focusing situations, or reliability in all weather conditions. It’ll be okay in fair weather, but if you’re a professional photographer, I’d keep looking.

The Yongnuo F2N 35mm ƒ/2 lens is a great lens for $106, but doesn’t compare favorably to the Nikon 35mm ƒ/1.8 G.