Canon R5 II - What Improvements Could We See Over The R5? (2024)

In today’s world, waiting four years for a new camera model to be released almost seems like an eternity. Given how many brands are adopting what seems and feels like a two-year refresh cycle, Canon has still so far held back from updating its solid R5 model. Launched in June 2020, the R5 received a full five stars and our Editor’s Choice Award in our review. It wasn’t the most popular model on launch, though, with many users berating that it was overheating on occasion. New reports suggest that Canon may be working to counter such headaches in the Mark II version of this camera. Should this be true, it speaks volumes about the notion that they are catering to photography and videography professionals first and content creators next. And that’s a relief on many counts.

What to Know About The Canon R5 II

At this stage, there are no confirmed reports about the Canon R5 II. We’ve been seeing unconfirmed reports for nearly a year now, so we’re still unsure when Canon is expecting to launch this. They have been slow of late to bring out much-expected models, such as the Canon R1, which last month, they finally admitted is in development. But since it’s been 4 years since the R5 came out, there’s a decent chance the R5 II could see daylight sometime this year. CanonRumors says they’ve even seen real images of the prototype in the hands of a few people.

What Specs Could We See In The Canon R5 II

The R5 was supremely built. It aced our weather sealing tests and stood up to the heavy rains we tested it in. We’re pretty confident that the R5 II will probably improve upon everything we enjoyed in the R5. CanonRumors expects to see the below specs in the upcoming model:

• 45mp BSI Stacked CMOS sensor
• 3.2″ OLED articulating screen
• A newer version of the DIGIC X Image Processor
• No mechanical shutter
• 60fps stills frame rate
• New AI autofocus features. They even say it’ll have Eye control AF from the EOS R3
• 8K RAW
• 4K 120fps at least
• Extra vents to help with cooling

How Is Canon Planning To Deal With Overheating

Granted, the overheating on the Canon R5 was in very specific conditions. In our review we noted:

Some folks may complain about the overheating issues. This is because of the placement of the processor and the RAM next to each other. I experienced the camera being warm at 30 minutes after recording at 24p and 4K video. Then I recorded for around 15 more minutes after that until I just stopped the camera myself. For the life of me, I can’t understand why someone would record a take that long. Let alone, I don’t understand why you’d record a take at 60p for that long.

But fickle as users are these days, there was quite some hullabaloo about the heating all over the internet. This of course, hasn’t escaped the ears of the head honchos at Canon, who appear to be doing two things to alleviate future buyers’ concerns:

1. Two additional vents might be on the R5 II body to help with ventilation in scenarios where the camera might be heating up
2. A dedicated cooling grip that will bring down the temperature of the R5 II when in use. There aren’t any further details on whether the cooling will be done via fans or some other mechanism. Of course, this grip could support an additional battery for longer photography and videography, as well as dials and a shutter button in portrait mode.

Features That Might Make The Canon R5 II More Appealing

Here are some specifications that I feel would make the R5 II more appealing

1. Pixel Shift. I’d never really used this before I purchased the Nikon Zf some months ago. It’s a great way to at least quadruple the resolution of your image without resorting to software, using purely the camera’s capabilities.
2. Better designed back dial (we noted this was a weak point on the R5)
3. 8K video support (at 60 fps)
4. Improved rolling shutter effect in silent/electronic shutter mode
5. Better high ISO performance

On the whole, it looks to be a very exciting camera for fans of the original model, as well as those who’ve held off from buying the R5 in the hopes that the R5 II would have better specs and performance. There’s also the cost factor, which one can only speculate on at the moment; however, we can expect it to compete with cameras like the Nikon Z8 and Sony A7RV on this front. And since CanonRumors claims to have seen real-world images of it, we can assume that the release isn’t too far away in the future.

All images in this article, unless otherwise stated, are screenshots from CanonRumors