# Point and Shoot Cameras are Basically Dead



## dolina (Aug 29, 2022)

https://petapixel.com/2022/08/08/point-and-shoot-cameras-are-basically-dead/







Almost every major camera manufacturer has either openly discontinued its point-and-shoot line of cameras or has not produced a new one in many years, according to a new report. In short, smartphones have all but totally replaced compact cameras. 

The compact camera market, colloquially known as point-and-shoot cameras, has been experiencing a massive collapse in worldwide shipments over the last decade and a half. Since 2008, when worldwide shipments reached 110.7 million cameras, the market has significantly shrunk and fallen to 3.01 million units as of 2021 — a 97% drop.

_Nikkei_ reports that in response to the market’s contraction, Canon, Nikon, Panasonic, Fujifilm, and Sony have all either dramatically scaled back productions or outright admitted that there will be no further compact cameras. 
“Although we are shifting to higher-end models, we have strong support for lower-end models, and will continue to develop and produce them as long as there is demand,” Canon tells _Nikkei_. 

Canon denies that it isn’t planning to make new compact cameras, but it hasn’t released a new one since 2019.
Sony’s response echoes Canon’s and the company says that it is not discontinuing new product development in the compact camera space, although _Nikkei_ notes the company hasn’t made a new “Cyber-Shot” camera — its compact camera line — since 2019.

_Nikkei_ reports that Nikon has stopped developing cameras that would fall under its “Coolpix” line, the company’s branding for compact point-and-shoot style cameras. Nikon tells _Nikkei_ that it still sells two high-magnification models and that future production volume will be determined by the market, which as noted, isn’t growing. 

Panasonic, which at one point owned the top share of Japan’s compact camera market, tells _Nikkei_ that it has been reducing the volume of point-and-shoots that it has been producing over the last several years in response to the shrinking market. Additionally, while it plans to keep making current compact cameras for the time being, it will focus on developing high-end mirrorless cameras aimed at enthusiasts and professionals, including a camera that it plans to release next year that it is developing in conjunction with Leica. 

_Nikkei_ claims Fujifilm has ceased production on its compact camera line “FinePix” and is not actively developing new models for it, instead focusing its efforts on higher-end models like the X100V and above. 

Ricoh, which owns the Pentax brand, and OM Digital aren’t mentioned in the story, but Ricoh seems unfazed by the market contraction and has notably released two point-and-shoot cameras in the last year: the WG-80 and the GR IIIx (and later along with its special edition). Ricoh seems immune to making decisions in line with market trends, as it has also stubbornly refused to make a mirrorless Pentax camera, going so far as to say that the brand “cannot go mirrorless.” 

It has been a long, slow process, but the death of the point-and-shoot appears all but complete at the hands of the smartphone, whose imaging capabilities manufacturers continue to improve.


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## dolina (Aug 29, 2022)

Click here for the point & shoot cameras released in the last 5 years.

Below are the number of models released per year

2022

- 0

2021

- 1

2020

- 6

2019

- 11

2018

- 18

2017

- 10


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## LogicExtremist (Aug 29, 2022)

I think they just evolved into mobile phone cameras, or got displaced by them, however you want to view it.

Smartphone cameras are really just point and shoot cameras, with narrow fixed apertures, small sensors, where the camera does all the decision making, but also adds the element of HDR and computational photography, which is just automatic AI image post-processing where the camera makes the decisions once again. It's just a high tech point and shoot with a powerful micro-computer that can use its AI to make any snapshot look more like its programmed presets.

Think about it, who owned P&S cameras before? The general public who just wanted to just press the shutter button and get a photo, without being into the hobby of photography. It's the same people using smartphones as their P&S cameras these days too. Since smartphones have come later then the old P&S cameras, like any other newer cameras, they can produce better quality images, and they can do decent video these days too. This allows them to be used by people starting in photography of videography, so there's a small subset of that group amongst the P&S snapshot photography general public.

The compact high end cameras are a completely different beast to the P&S cameras, and produce better images (and sometimes video) than the best smartphones at present.


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## dolina (Aug 29, 2022)

I'd agree with you that point & shoots evolved into smartphones if Canon, Nikom FujiFilm, Panasonic, Olympus, Ricoh, Pentax, etc offered their own Android smartphone today.

Only competitive selling point of these brands are

- larger image sensors
- lenses to match these larger image sensors
- speicalization and focus on photography & video.


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## Czardoom (Aug 29, 2022)

Badly hurt.. but not quite dead. As many compact point and shoots were shipped in 2021 as mirrorless ILCs (3.1 million), making up approx. 37% of all digital cameras sold according to CIPA numbers


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## unfocused (Aug 29, 2022)

Not a surprise to anyone. The next target will be action cameras. Current iPhone can withstand 6 meters underwater for up to 30 minutes. GoPro has got to be worried.


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## dolina (Aug 30, 2022)

Czardoom said:


> Badly hurt.. but not quite dead. As many compact point and shoots were shipped in 2021 as mirrorless ILCs (3.1 million), making up approx. 37% of all digital cameras sold according to CIPA numbers



Last 6 years worldwide shipments of digital still cameras.


Year201720182019202020212022 forecastTotal Cameras24,978,48619,423,37115,216,9578,886,2928,361,5217,850,000Point & Shoot13,302,7978,663,5746,755,4673,578,6433,013,2502,560,000Total SLR & Mirrorless11,675,68910,759,7978,461,4905,307,6495,348,2715,290,000SLR7,595,7086,620,9994,504,9872,374,5692,241,772-Mirrorless4,079,9814,138,7983,956,5032,933,0803,106,499-

Some interesting camera shipment stats

Smartphones vs film & digital still cameras






Digital camers: dSLR vs Mirrorless vs Point & Shoots (no smartphone)






Digital camers: dSLR vs Mirrorless (no smartphone or point & shoot)


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