Panasonic Lumix DC-TZ300

The Lumix TZ300 marks the welcome return of Panasonic’s enormously popular travel zoom series of compacts, packing a long zoom range and large sensor into a pocket-sized body. It may inherit the same lens as the TZ200 before it, but the 15x range remains unmatched taking you from 24mm wide angle to a serious 360mm telephoto. This gives the camera comfortably longer reach than rivals with similar sensors, and the stabilisation is excellent, although as before the autofocus is better-suited to more leisurely subjects. But apart from employing a back-illuminated sensor and switching Micro USB for USB-C, there’s nothing new here over the earlier TZ200. I complained about the screen not tilting eight years ago, so it’s frustrating to find it still fixed in place today, but doubly-so now that Panasonic has unforgivably removed the electronic viewfinder. This is a major downgrade in my view, especially for framing and tracking a subject with a long lens, although I do understand many of the target audience may not have used it. But I am sure almost all the target audience would have appreciated a tilting screen, as it makes the TZ300 less than ideal for vlogging or selfies. If you desire a tilting screen and viewfinder, check Canon’s G5X II and Sony’s RX100 VII, but they’re pricier and hard to find new. Ultimately that’s the secret weapon of the TZ300: simple availability. By refreshing an older model, the TZ300 should at least be available to buy new if you want to, and it’s priced competitively for what it offers.