There’s life in the ol’ digital camera yet. Despite phones being our number one photo-snapping devices in 2024, both interchangeable-lens cameras and compact cameras enjoyed a fruitful 2023 in Japan, with sales volume increasing for the first time since 2010 – the year Apple launched its first iPad, One Direction burst onto the pop scene, and the Burj Khalifa, which remains the world’s tallest building, opened its doors. 

According to research conducted by GfK Japan and shared by Nikkei Japan, digital camera sales in 2023 hit 1.2 million units in Japan alone, with a 9% increase for interchangeable-lens camera and a 6% increase for digital compacts, for a combined 7% increase. In even better news for the makers of the best cameras, sales of lenses grew by 4% too.  

The numbers buck a downward trend in camera sales since 2010, when the market peaked in Japan at 10.4 million units, and before smartphones came to prominence. The sales growth comes despite an overall 4% increase in the price of cameras between 2022 and 2023, plus the wide availability of phones with highly capable camera hardware and software, such as the iPhone 15 Pro Max, Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra and Google Pixel 8 Pro.

A modest recovery, or a new hunger for dedicated cameras? 

What can we learn from this positive news? Despite the positive growth, digital camera sales are still a long way from the glory days of 2010, when more than 10 times the number of units were flying off the shelves as in 2023. Year-on-year sales steadily fell from 2010 to where we find ourselves today, with a little over one million units sold in Japan. However, an upturn is only a positive thing for photography in a smartphone-dominated cameras market. 

So what gives? In recent years we’ve seen an increased demand for retro tech and analog photography, plus digital cameras trending on TikTok, including the Nikon Coolpix S6900 and Fujifilm X100V. The X100V’s successor was launched this year and enjoyed unprecedented pre-order numbers, which suggests 2024’s overall sales numbers could exceed 2023’s. 

All of this points to a seemingly renewed hunger for dedicated cameras. Yes, our phones are better than ever for snapping everything from punchy portraits to convincing long-exposure effects, and enhanced with impressive AI editing tricks; but somehow, our multi-purpose, computational photography devices don’t compare to the ‘real’ thing.

We want to use a dedicated camera for photos instead of a phone because it offers focused creativity and better handling for photography. We’re also sucked in by influencers who can make super-cool looking pictures with super-cool looking cameras. Of course, the other point here is that camera sales are still massively outnumbered by phones, and these figures only represent a modest uptick from an all-time-low, so let’s not get too excited. However, the romantic in me likes to think that we’re falling in love with cameras all over again. 

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