End of an Era: 1DX Mark III Discontinued

[Richard-CN]

First of all, I’m a little surprised by this. Canon’s 1-series cameras usually had a reasonably long lifespan, and the 1DX Mark III was announced via development announcement on October 24, 2019, and officially announced on January 6th, 2020, so it’s not even that old of a camera. Especially by professional standards. TOKYO, October 24, […]

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[David - Sydney]

The 1DXiii isn't listed in the Canon Japan list of discontinued bodies. The 5Div is also not listed there.
https://personal.canon.jp/product/camera/eos/old-products
Was there an announcement?

 

[SnowMiku]

The 1DXiii isn't listed in the Canon Japan list of discontinued bodies. The 5Div is also not listed there.
https://personal.canon.jp/product/camera/eos/old-products
Was there an announcement?

Interestingly I found that the 90D is now discontinued from that link, maybe they will add the 1DX iii soon?

 

[Richard-CN]

The 1DXiii isn't listed in the Canon Japan list of discontinued bodies. The 5Div is also not listed there.
https://personal.canon.jp/product/camera/eos/old-products
Was there an announcement?

It's labelled discontinued on Canon Japan's actual store, and is unable to purchase / reserve / etc.

I suspect it's a stealth addition that will go into other pages soon.

 

[PinholeR5]

It's labelled discontinued on Canon Japan's actual store, and is unable to purchase / reserve / etc.

I suspect it's a stealth addition that will go into other pages soon.

Interesting if the 1DXIII gets discontinued and the 5DiV doesn't. If anything, I would have expected the 1DXIII to last much longer than the 5DIV in production. AND the 5DIV was released in 2016!

 

[John Wilde]

It's labelled discontinued on Canon Japan's actual store, and is unable to purchase / reserve / etc.

I suspect it's a stealth addition that will go into other pages soon.

I suspect that Canon doesn't officially announce a camera as discontinued until inventory at their retailers is extremely low. I forget what the time lag was with M.

 

[David - Sydney]

It's labelled discontinued on Canon Japan's actual store, and is unable to purchase / reserve / etc.

I suspect it's a stealth addition that will go into other pages soon.

1DXiii isn't available on Canon Australia either. 5Div/90D/1500D/3000D remain for DLSR

Canon USA only has 5Div and T7 (and kits). What is very strange is that they still have the 5Div with canon log as a separate option and at USD500 price premium! To be fair it looks like the log version is not currently available yet I thought that soon after the log feature was a payable/return to shop upgrade, that Canon made it standard for all new purchases with a USD100 price increase.

I also am surprised that the 1DXiii is gone but 5Div hasn't even though the R5 was released is >5 years ago vs the R1.
The serviceable life for a 1D is definitely more than ~5.5 years...
Maybe
- The sales of R1 is so overwhelming that everyone has replaced their 1DX
- Canon is forcing 1DX owners to upgrade when/if their 1DX breaks down which also doesn't sound Canon-ish
- Some components are now impossible to get at a reasonable cost so Canon has made it discontinued across some (all) Canon regions

The latter makes more sense than the situation for 5Div.

 

[Maximilian]

The 1DX Mark III is still listed in some German stores on stock or short delivery times.

Some other stores don't even list it any more, like ac-foto.de or fotokoch.de.

 

[Sporgon]

The 1DXiii is an expensive, die hard professional camera. Those guys will be moving to, or wanting to move to the R1. The 5Div on the other hand is a cheaper, more general purpose camera that I can see still appealing to those of us that like the SLR concept, so I can understand the 5Div kicking about new much longer than the 1DXiii

 

[MythPlayer]

Interestingly I found that the 90D is now discontinued from that link, maybe they will add the 1DX iii soon?

Is list in discontiuned product right now

 

[David - Sydney]

Is list in discontiuned product right now

Canon are definitely reading Canon Rumors to have picked this up and corrected it so quickly!

 

[snapshot]

it must be the case that everybody using 1 series is happy with R1, and i wonder if R6 used up the stock of sensors.

 

[Michael Clark]

Interesting if the 1DXIII gets discontinued and the 5DiV doesn't. If anything, I would have expected the 1DXIII to last much longer than the 5DIV in production. AND the 5DIV was released in 2016!

It's all about sales units. The 5-Series has always outsold the 1-Series by several orders of magnitude. If there are more authorized dealers around the world than the number of bodies a particular model sells in a year, it's not going to be maintained in the catalog. If a model is still selling enough units for each dealer to stock it, they'll keep it in the catalog.

In the "old days" when most 1-Series buyers were commercial organizations who issued camera gear to their staff photographers the 1-Series sold most of their units shortly after introduction. Those days are long gone, though, as the number of staff photographers in 2025 is miniscule compared to just 10-15 years ago. I imagine most well heeled enthusiasts, who are what drives the upper end of the market now, are much more into MILCs than DSLRs. The few news organizations left who still issue gear to their staff photographers started transitioning to MILCs a couple of years ago. At least that's when my friend who shoots for a Gannett owned newspaper and covers major sporting events in the surrounding region for Gannett transitioned from Canon DSLRs to Sony MILCs. It was around the same time the AP took Sony's offer of greatly discounted gear and ended their relationship with Canon.

 

[Michael Clark]

The serviceable life for a 1D is definitely more than ~5.5 years...
Maybe
- The sales of R1 is so overwhelming that everyone has replaced their 1DX
- Canon is forcing 1DX owners to upgrade when/if their 1DX breaks down which also doesn't sound Canon-ish
- Some components are now impossible to get at a reasonable cost so Canon has made it discontinued across some (all) Canon regions

The latter makes more sense than the situation for 5Div.

When Canon discontinues a model they continue supporting it for at least seven years. They hold enough repair parts in reserve that they estimate will last for at least seven years. Some of these come from unsold units returned by dealers when it has been discontinued.

The last time I remember a lens dropping from the repair support list sooner than seven years after it was discontinued was the EF 200mm f/1.8 L because they ran out of parts for it.

The EF 200mm f/1.8 L was introduced in 1988 and discontinued in 2004 or 2005 (Canon never makes an official announcement, they just quietly remove items from their catalog) without an immediate replacement. It was during the period when Canon was eliminating lenses which used lead in the manufacturing process. Only around 8,000 were ever produced. The last known date codes indicate the last production run was in 1998. Lens owners began reporting Canon returned their lenses needing AF motors replaced unrepaired as early as 2006, two years before the EF 200mm f/2 L IS was introduced. By 2007 it was removed from the CPS support list in the U.S.

Since it is a focus-by-wire lens, it can't even be manually focused without an AF motor. Third party repair businesses started reporting they could no longer order the AF motor from Canon shortly after the lens was removed from Canon's catalog.

The EF 200mm f/1.8 L used the same AF motor as the EF 1200mm f/5.6 L (1993-?: less than 100 ever made and more likely around 20 - only three have ever been offered on the used market), EF 300mm f/2.8 L (1987-1999), EF 400mm f/2.8 L (1991-1996), EF 500mm f/4.5 L (1992-1999), and EF 600mm f/4 L (1988-1999). Other than the special order 1200/5.6, which was offered through 2005, all of the other lenses which used the same USM part number for focus-by-wire were discontinued by 1999 and replaced by IS versions which were not focus-by-wire and used other part numbers for the USM. It's been theorized that Canon used up all their reserve of that AF motor on the lenses that were discontinued in the late 1990s.

 

[Michael Clark]

Introduced in early 2020 almost six years ago, the 1D X Mark III has been on the market for considerably longer than any other 1-Series digital camera in Canon's history. The closest runners up are the 1D X and the 1Ds Mark III, both of which were in the catalog for only four years and one quarter.

This shouldn't be that surprising. Historically each 1-Series camera has been discontinued shortly after its replacement was available. Since unifying the APS-H 1D Series and Full Frame 1Ds Series with the 1D X in 2012, the 1D Mark IV and 1Ds Mark III disappeared from the catalog a few short months later. The 1D X was gone shortly after the 1D X Mark II was introduced in 2016. The 1D X Mark II went away shortly after the 1D X mark III came along in 2020. With the R1 introduction in mid-2024, I'm surprised it has taken this long.

 

[David - Sydney]

Of course… the ‘discontinuation’ date is basically end of sale date (of new equipment from canon itself). Stock on retailers’ shelves will extend the consumer end of sale date.
End of support date is much longer especially for L lenses. 3rd parties are likely to repair lenses part their official end of support date for as long as there are spare available.