New Pentax Lens Compatibility Tool

Check the compatibility of any lens with your DSLR

By PF Staff in Site News on Sep 11, 2018

If you're a Pentax shooter, you probably already know that most K-mount lenses work with most digital K-mount cameras.  One of the Pentax system's key strengths is indeed exceptional backwards-compatibility, even with the very first Pentax lenses ever made.

However, there are some camera-lens combinations which carry specific prerequisites in order to function properly.  Others are outright incompatible, or suffer from limitations.  To help you verify that a lens will work with your camera, we're happy to officially unveil our new lens compatibility checker!

The system currently supports all Pentax digital cameras (including the K, 645, and Q lines), all genuine Pentax lenses, and all current third-party K-mount lenses (i.e. those available new worldwide).  We plan to continue supporting all future lenses as well.

Let's take an example: will the Pentax K-1 work with the newly-launched D FA* 50mm F1.4?  The answer is of course yes, but did you know that the aperture will only be controllable if you're running firmware version 1.20 or newer?


K-1 and D FA* 50mm F1.4 Compatibility Example

You can access this information directly from the lens compatibility checker, but links are also conveniently available throughout our lens finder and the specification tables in our lens databases.

For example, here you can quickly check the compatibility of any Pentax M-series lens:


Lens search listings for M-series lenses, with new compatibility links

To ensure that all the listings shown are compatible with a particular camera, simply select it from the dropdown in the sidebar; here's an example of current lenses compatible with the K100D:

Showing lenses compatible with a specific camera or cameras

You'll find links to the new lens compatibility tools under the Resources navbar heading throughout the homepage, or under Lenses within the forum.  If you bookmark the main "Resources" page, there's also a quick link there alongside links to our other handy tools.

If you believe there is any missing or incorrect information in the new system, please don't hesitate to get in touch.  We hope you enjoy it!

Film Cameras

Although we are considering adding film camera support to the compatibility checker, currently only digital cameras are supported (the system already includes all film-era lenses of course).  If you do want to check the compatibility of a lens with your film Pentax, you may refer to our compatibility table; a rule of thumb is that most DA and D FA lenses will either be problematic or incompatible, while other lenses will generally be compatible.

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