The Nikkei Industry Map Financial Yearbook includes detailed shipment data for Japanese mirrorless camera manufacturers, offering an exact breakdown of the global camera market:

This figure is for mirrorless camera shipments, so it does not include shipments of digital SLRs or compact digital cameras. Looking at the trend in mirrorless camera shipments from 2021 to 2025, it appears that the mirrorless camera market is expanding. Nikon's shipments appear to be steadily increasing by roughly 100,000 units.

2024

1. Canon: 2.05 million units

2. Sony: 1.63 million units

3. Nikon: 760,000 units

4. Fujifilm: 490,000 units

5. Panasonic: 160,000 units

6. OM Digital: 130,000 units

2023

1. Canon: 1.96 million units

2. Sony: 1.53 million units

3. Nikon: 630,000 units

4. Fujifilm: 380,000 units

5. Panasonic: 140,000 units

6. OM Digital: 120,000 units

2022

1. Canon: 1.54 million units

2. Sony: 1.25 million units

3. Nikon: 530,000 units

4. Fujifilm: 360,000 units

5. Panasonic: 140,000 units

6. OM Digital: 140,000 units

2021

1. Sony: 1.4 million units

2. Canon: 1.17 million units

3. Fujifilm: 400,000 units

4. Nikon: 290,000 units

5. OM Digital: 200,000 units

6. Panasonic: 180,000 units

Source: https://dclife.jp/camera_news/article/etc/2025/0902_01.html

Sobering numbers for us micro 4/3 types. I wonder why Fuji doesn't have more of a presence underwater (or maybe they do and I just don't know about it).

54 minutes ago, d2b said:

Sobering numbers for us micro 4/3 types. I wonder why Fuji doesn't have more of a presence underwater (or maybe they do and I just don't know about it).

The situation for M43 for underwater use is quite dramatic. Generally, it's not doing well because the worldwide trend is Full Frame. It's not enough to repeat a thousand times that for 90% of users, the cropped format has huge advantages underwater.

OM is just scraping by, and there are rumors of a new financial crash. The new models after Oly seem to be the finalization of products that were already partly started by Olympus.

Panasonic didn't manage to repeat the success of the GH5, having delayed the move to PDAF for too long. Now the GH7 is practically perfect, but it seems to be too late. It doesn't help that Nauticam is the only one to produce a housing and sells it at absurd prices, even though it's not a top-of-the-line model.

Panasonic has renewed its entire Full Frame lineup and has nice cameras on par with the other manufacturers. By the way, due to economies of scale, today almost all Panasonic FF cameras have the same body. A true unicorn for us, since we have to change housings every time. Yet I discovered purely by chance that Nauticam has Panasonic FF housings and also a port chart.

The L-Mount consortium is starting to have the largest lens lineup of all. But we divers know that the devil is in the details and that the lens choice for our purposes is very limited. But we know how restrictive lock-in is. It's difficult to break old habits and common beliefs, and it's very expensive to switch from one system to another.

Fuji really has some nice cameras in its catalog, but here too, I think only Nauticam has a model in its catalog. The fact is that all the manufacturers have practically remained artisans, and Nauticam is the only one that has scaled up to an industrial level. So it's able to steer the market. No criticism, just to be clear. It's the market, baby!

I have to say that Nikon is the most active brand of all. Although it has always been the go-to brand for underwater photography, it lost a lot of clients (towards Sony) for having delayed the move to mirrorless for a very long time. Now, however, it seems to have a second youth, and its Z models are very solid, and it's gaining ground not only in underwater photography.

I shoot video, and we'll see if anyone offers valid alternatives in a cropped format.

It’s almost hypocritical of me to say this b/c i jumped ship from M4/3 to Canon (APS-C, though) - but i really do hope OM Systems gets its act together and keeps things going. There is very much a market for a camera system, that is smaller/lighter/easier to travel with than APS/FF but more functional than a compact system.

Sadly, underwater photographers are likely not a large enough market to keep the OM line afloat - and given that no housing has been released for the OM3, it is a little worrying what the future holds for MFT.