Video is similarly impressive, with a host of tools to support high-quality video capture. While video industry-standard features such as waveforms are absent, the a7 IV makes solo shooting easier by extending its impressive AF capabilities to video mode. Only the slightly jerky stabilization counts against what is otherwise a very powerful camera. Autofocus is such a broad subject, with different subjects requiring different modes and different photographers preferring different approaches, that it's almost impossible to give a comprehensive and definitive assessment of its performance. We have used the camera in a variety of situations and with different lenses but cannot cover every aspect of the camera's performance. Social and everyday photography

IV Mirrorless Camera Body (Open Box) - CameraWorld Sony A7 IV Mirrorless Camera Body (Open Box) - CameraWorld

The Sony A7 IV has twin UHS-II SD card slots, but the top slot can also take the latest CFexpress Type A cards (not shown here) which are needed to exploit the full range of this camera's burst shooting capabilities. (Image credit: Rod Lawton/Digital Camera World) Perhaps the most spectacular advance, however, is the least obvious. The A7 III brought 10fps continuous shooting and an above-average buffer capacity for a general-purpose camera – but the A7 IV’s buffer capacity is just extraordinary. The combination of the new sensor, BIONZ XR processor and CFexpress Type A storage, give the A7 IV an essentially unlimited buffer capacity. It does have a limit of 828 consecutive uncompressed raw+JPEG files (828!) – but it's effectively unlimited with a CFexpress Type A card. Effectively, this camera can keep going until the card fills up, the battery runs out or everyone else has gone home… A menu option lets you decide which settings carry over from stills to video and which maintain independent values. You can choose from: Aperture, Shutter Speed, ISO, Exposure Comp, Metering Mode, White Balance, Picture Profile and Focus Mode. It's well worth setting this up when you first start shooting with the camera, so you can just flip the Stills/Video switch when you want to jump between shooting styles. Live streaming In the space of eight years, the a7 series has gone from being a low-cost full-frame camera with rough edges and autofocus that lagged its DSLR peers to producing one of the most all-around capable cameras we've ever used. There are few photo or video activities the a7 IV can't turn its hand to, comfortably. The Sony A7 IV might look like a clone of its predecessor, but there are quite a few subtle upgrades that collectively make it a much more enjoyable camera to use.If you'd hoped the Sony A7 IV's new 33MP sensor might dramatically improve its image quality from the A7 III, you may be disappointed. However, we did find that the a7 IV can tend to very slightly front-focus when using Face/Eye detection, leaving the eye-lashes perfectly in focus but the pupil very slightly soft. This isn't going to be an issue for everyday social photography, but if you're trying to shoot portraits with shallow depth-of-field, the a7 IV doesn't seem to be quite as dependably accurate as the previous generation of Sony cameras.

Sony Alpha 7 IV Full-frame Mirrorless Interchangeable Lens Sony Alpha 7 IV Full-frame Mirrorless Interchangeable Lens

The Sony A7 IV boasts faster connectivity all round than the A7 III. Its USB port supports 10Gbps USB 3.2 Gen2 transfer, as opposed to the 5Gbps USB 3.1 on the older A7 III. The new camera also offers a 5GHz LAN connection rather than the 2.4GHz maximum on the A7 III, and the A7 IV has an HDMI type A connector rather than the A7 III’s type D. Sony A7 IV vs A7 III: conclusions Nikon has the Z 6 II and Z 7 II which have 24.5 and 45.7-megapixel sensors respectively. While they can’t record 4K 10-bit 4:2:2 internally like Sony and Canon, they at least both have much improved rear LCD screens with 2.1 million dot resolutions. Plus, the Z 6 II can shoot up to 14 frames per second when speed matters. Should You Buy It? For our lab data comparison, we compared the Sony a7 IV to its main full-frame mirrorless rival cameras at a similar price point: the Canon EOS R6, Nikon Z6 II, and Panasonic Lumix S5.

Scoring

Both of the a7 IV's slots accept SD cards (up to UHS-II type), with the top slot also having an inner recess that accepts CFexpress Type A cards. There's only one slow-mo video mode that requires the use of CFexpress cards: everything else can be written to V90 SD cards. As always, these figures are more useful for comparing cameras, rather than getting an idea of exactly how many shots you'll get (in our experience, getting double the rated number isn't unusual with a new battery). We tend to find a rating of over 500 shots per charge means not really having to worry about battery life in anything but the most intensive pro sports or wedding shoots.