Sticking things in your ear canals is dangerous. Not like BASE jumping dangerous. Or bull riding dangerous. But dangerous nonetheless. At minimum, it might impact existing earwax. At worst, you’re one hand-slip away from rupturing your eardrum, which could lead to permanent damage. Please look away from the TikTok creators who are rolling through with videos amassing millions of views showing how they clean out their earwax using cheap ear canal cameras, as if they’re cotton swabs on steroids. Dismiss ..read more

Nikon has been a powerhouse in the camera industry since the earliest days of single-lens reflex models, and it’s famous for the quality and breadth of its lens lineup. It offers perhaps the deepest lens roster of any manufacturer, with legacy-lens compatibility going back to the 1950s, and with the introduction of the Z-mount mirrorless system, it has produced some of the sharpest, fastest-focusing, and most well-rounded lenses it has ever made. If you’ve recently bought into Nikon’s mirrorless Z system—either DX (APS-C) or FX (full-frame)—you have a wide variety of lenses to choose from, an ..read more

A total solar eclipse is one of those moments when the seen and unseen forces of nature converge to create an event that stupefies the senses. It’s something that feels as though it shouldn’t be happening, and yet it is. On April 8, a total eclipse will be visible across a large swath of North America, and it will be the last chance that most people in the US will have to experience one until 2044. Dismiss ..read more

Black-and-white photography puts you in touch with the basics of still imagery: the primacy of light, the intersections between shadows and highlights, and the stark, graphic nature of composition. Photographers have been limiting themselves to monochrome as a way to learn and relearn core photographic principles ever since color film was unleashed upon the masses, and that remains true in the digital age. Dismiss ..read more

Cell phone cameras are out. Vintage digital cameras are in. I don’t make the rules, but apparently Gen Z does. Dismiss ..read more

The biggest holidays of the year aren’t complete without the snap of firecrackers and booming flourishes of colorful sparks dancing through the sky. When I’m mesmerized in these moments, my natural reaction is to take a photo in hopes that the image of this night will live on forever. Dismiss ..read more

Let’s be real—camera gear is expensive. And the hit to your wallet can feel most acute as you’re starting to build a system from scratch, when a new entry-level camera costs you north of $500, and it may not even come with a lens. Buying used, however, can get you 90% of the quality and longevity of new gear at 60% of the price. That’s a deal that’s hard to turn down. Dismiss ..read more

If you’ve done even a little shopping for a mirrorless camera, a DSLR, or a high-end compact camera, you’ve probably come across terms such as “APS-C” and “full-frame.” Like many terms in the jargon-heavy photography hobby, their meanings may not be immediately clear. To put it as simply as possible, these terms refer to the physical size of the sensor inside the camera, which, thanks to the physical properties of light, determines a lot about a camera’s light-gathering, background-blur, and magnification capabilities. In addition to those differences, as sensor size increases, so too does th ..read more

After six years of reviewing a variety of Wyze security cameras at Wirecutter, we’ve made the decision to suspend our recommendation of them from all our guides. Dismiss ..read more

Flying drones is a visceral thrill: Zipping through a gap between buildings or swooping among trees along a coastline not only makes for great footage but turbocharges your heart rate, too. And thanks to more reliable GPS coverage, advancements in camera tech, and drone makers’ focus on anti-collision sensors and software, it’s easier than ever for amateurs to get this kind of adrenaline high. But with great thrills comes great responsibility. No matter your experience level, you need to take a few crucial steps before sending your camera into the sky. Dismiss ..read more