There is a very long history behind the 35 mm f/2.0 Leica lens from the Summicron series. The first version of this lens, a model consisting of 8 elements positioned in 6 groups, was produced in 1958-1969.
In 1969 the successor was launched with a simpler optical construction, consisting of 6 elements in 4 groups. Already in 1971 they offered a slightly modified version of this model, produced mainly in Canada. In 1979 another version was shown, this time a 7-element system.
2016's Leica Summicron 35 mm f/2 ASPH
The fifth lens from this line appeared in 1996 and it consisted of 7 elements positioned in 5 groups but this time its optical construction featured one aspherical element. In 2016 it underwent a slight boost – a metal hood was added along with an aperture with 11 diaphragm blades.
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The next change was introduced very quickly, because already in 2021, with the launch of the APO-Summicron-M 35 mm f/2, consisting of 10 elements positioned in 5 groups. In this case the producers weren't skimpy with special elements: in the construction you can find two aspherical elements, one double aspherical, three elements made of high refractive index glass, and six elements made of anomalous dispersion glass.
All the lenses mentioned above were manual constructions designed to cooperate with the Leica M rangefinder system. Since 2015, the company has been developing their full frame mirrorless system with the L-mount and lenses equipped with autofocus, in which case there is no such great emphasis on the miniaturization of physical dimensions and weight. What's interesting, the 2/35 class APO-Summicron lens was launched as the first in that system exactly and shown already in 2019. What's even more interesting, the cheaper and optically simpler Summicron-SL 2/35 lens, without the APO prefix, was launched later in this system, only in 2023.
Our loyal Readers know very well that in July 2025 we started L-mount/SL-mount system optics tests. The heavy and big Panasonic Lumix S Pro 50 mm f/1.4 was put through our testing routine as the first. In order to determine the maximum possible performance of the new system, I admit we indulged ourselves by ordering the best and the most expensive, top-of-the-range Leica lenses and the APO-Summicron-SL 75 mm f/2 ASPH was the first model from this group we took a closer look at. Now we want to check its 35 mm brother.
We would like to thank the Leica Store in Warsaw for lending us one specimen of this lens.
