Recently, here at the Phoblographer, we’ve been working on investigating more of what’s going on with the Sony a7V. We published our review with updates and even updated all our Viltrox lens reviews. Reviews Editor Alberto Lima did the initial review, and then I did the updates. The standard here at the Phoblographer is that we try to get multiple testers from our team to have hands-on time with each product because we then find new things each time. But something really shocked me enough to have to update our Tamron 35-150mm lens review.
You can read the full review at this link. But if you’re curious about just the updated text, then please see below.
Focusing Update February 2026
Of all the brands that I thought wouldn’t be affected by the Sony a7v’s autofocusing problems, I believed that it would be Tamron. Tamron, after all, is partially owned by Sony and even is licensed to make lenses for the mount. That means that their products automatically receive support — even if new firmware updates come in every now and again.
I purchased the Tamron 35-150mm f2-2.8 a long time ago and it is, by far, my favorite lens for the Sony camera system. Using it makes the whole process of shooting with Sony cameras a lot more enjoyable for me. But when the a7V came in from Lensrentals, I was pretty shocked to find that when switching between Zeiss, Sony, Tamron, and Viltrox lenses that even the Tamron 35-150mm lens had issues.
Let me describe these issues:
- Autofocus would sometimes be erratic or inaccurate
- It wouldn’t be able to achieve autofocus at times.
- Scene detection even had some inaccuracies with eye detection. It seemed almost like Fujifilm’s eyelash AF issue.
Because of this, I recommend the Tamron 35-150mm f2-2.8 with a lot of other cameras. But with the Sony a7V, I truly think that there is a problem of some sort that goes beyond even using the Chinese lenses.
Years ago, brands would blame the fact that the third-party manufacturer has to work on these issues. And many times, Tamron has offered firmware updates to their lenses that offer fixes and even boosts. But this is nuts. Does this mean that Tamron will have to issue a firmware update to get their lenses to work better with the Sony a7v?
Sony recommends this camera for enthusiasts. And the Tamron 35-150mm f2-2.8 is very obviously a lens designed for professionals. In fact, it’s pretty much one of the most innovative lenses on the market still to this day. I don’t recommend this lens for the camera though. Stick it on the Sony a1 II or the a9 III instead.