Quick Verdict
The Nikon Coolpix B600 offers a 60x optical zoom lens in a relatively compact camera body, with easy to use controls, and good handling, but with just a 3inch screen on the back, and no electronic viewfinder, or tilting screen, it doesn't offer the same level of features as the competition. This coupled with a fairly high price make it difficult to recommend. If the price were to drop then it could be worth looking at, as colour reproduction is good.
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The Nikon Coolpix B600 is a new entry-level ultra zoom camera from Nikon, with a 60x optical zoom lens, a 16mp CMOS sensor, FullHD video recording, and built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. It's available for around £320.
Nikon Coolpix B600 Features
The Nikon Coolpix B600 updates the Coolpix B500, adding a 60x optical zoom lens, rather than a 40x optical zoom lens. The lens is equivalent to 24 to 1440mm (in 35mm equivalent terms), with an f/3.3 to f/6.5 aperture. The lens will let you focus down to 1cm in macro mode. You can use the top zoom control, and there's also a side zoom control, on the left side of the lens barrel.
One step forward, two steps back
However, the tilting screen has gone, battery life is much lower, as the camera uses a lithium-ion battery, instead of the AA batteries used in the B500.
The camera is designed to be easy to use, and has a number of modes available on the top mode dial including: Auto, Creative Mode, Scene, Scene Auto Selector, Smart Portrait, Movie, and a number of the scene modes can be directly selected on the mode dial, these include: Night shot, Night Portrait, Backlighting, and Sport.
In the Auto mode you get some control over ISO and white balance settings, but there are no manual controls over aperture or shutter speeds. The creative mode produces a number of automatically edited photos. If you want to choose the effects, you can edit your photos in playback, where there are effects including miniature, and toy camera. The backlighting mode has an option to shoot HDR images, where a number of shots are combined in to one.
Wi-Fi and low-power Bluetooth are built-in making it easy to transfer images to your smartphone (or tablet) using Nikon's Snapbridge app.
The camera records FullHD video, with stereo sound, and up to 30/25p. You can use the optical zoom while recording.
Key Features
- 16mp 1/2.3inch CMOS sensor
- 60x optical zoom lens, 24-1440mm equivalent (in 35mm terms)
- Vibration Reduction (Optical Image Stabilisation)
- 3inch screen, 921k dots
- FullHD video recording, with stereo sound
- Pop-up flash
- 7fps continuous shooting
- Wi-Fi and Bluetooth built-in
- ISO125 to ISO1600/3200/6400
- 1cm macro focus
- 280 shot battery life
- Available from Amazon UK (Check price)
Nikon Coolpix B600 Handling
Handling - The Nikon Coolpix B600 is relatively compact, with a thin body, and a large comfortable handgrip, with lots of rubber grip to hold on to. There's a rubber area on the back for you thumb, and the button layout means you can reach everything with your right hand. There's also a textured grip around the bottom of the lens barrel, to help when you're holding the camera with two hands. We'd recommend this, particularly when using a lot of optical zoom.
With a plastic body, you might expect the camera to feel flimsy, but instead the camera feels very well put together, with a sturdy feeling. The speckled effect on the plastic helps give the impression of a more premium model.
The top of the camera features the mode dial, on/off button, shutter releaser button, with zoom rocker around this. On top, behind the pop-up flash, are stereo microphones, and the pop-up flash is opened manually, and closed in the same way.
The buttons on the back give you quick access to flash, self-timer, exposure compensation, and macro focus. To change other settings you need to go in to the menus, and these are neatly laid out. There aren't too many options, and there is built-in help to explain each setting, making it easier to use. The video record button is guarded to avoid you accidentally pressing it. There's no quick access to other settings, unfortunately.
The screen is clear and gives a good view of the scene, although unfortunately the screen doesn't tilt, which means viewing the screen in bright sunlight can be difficult at times, and a tilting screen would definitely help with more creative angles.
Wi-Fi / Bluetooth Features - The Nikon “SnapBridge” app (available for Android and iOS) will let you transfer images over Bluetooth, as either 2mp images, or full-size images. If you transfer full-size images then this is noticeably slower than transferring 2mp images.
Battery life - Battery life is rated at 280 shots according to Nikon / CIPA test results, which is slightly below average for this class of camera. We'd recommend a spare battery if you plan on shooting more. Charging is via the MicroUSB connection, meaning you should be able to easily charge the camera when out and about.
Speed - Focus speeds were reasonable in good light, although slower in lower light. The camera is reasonable in how quickly it responds once you've taken a photo, it's not lightning fast, but it's also not frustratingly slow, so should be okay for most things. It's not really fast enough to rapidly respond to things happening quickly, so if you spot something, you might miss the shot, as you wait for the camera to switch on and focus on a subject.
Nikon Coolpix B600 Performance
The performance section is where we look at the image quality performance of the camera. Additional sample photos and product shots are available in the Equipment Database, where you can add your own review, photos and product ratings.
Nikon COOLPIX B600 Sample Photos
Sample Photos - Colour reproduction is pleasing, with nicely saturated colours both outdoors and indoors, and exposure is generally reliable. Dynamic range colour be better, and struggled at times to give an images without over-exposed highlights, when there was a wide dynamic range needed. Using the backlighting or HDR option helped here. The camera doesn't offer raw shooting, so you will need to get it right in camera, and using the D-lighting option can help. The camera struggled in low-light conditions, and our night shot was particularly disappointing.
Nikon COOLPIX B600 Lens test images
Lens Performance - The lens is soft toward the edges at wide-angle. Images are also softer when using the full optical zoom. Results in-between are a little better. Levels of detail are average, with images looking a little soft or "mushy" at times.
The lens is quite resistant to flare, and we struggled to spot any signs of vignetting. There is fairly well controlled purple fringing, although some is visible when there are high levels of contrast in an image, and there's also some signs of chromatic aberration. Distortion is well controlled, with the camera automatically correcting for any barrel or pincushion distortion in-camera.
Overall, the lens gives fairly reasonable performance under good lighting. Macro performance is impressive, with the camera letting you focus on objects just 1cm away from the lens. Focus was also good, with a high success rate.
Nikon COOLPIX B600 ISO test images
ISO Noise Performance - Noise is lowest at ISO125, and results are good, with good colour reproduction. As the ISO speed increases, so does noise, however results at good at ISO200. At ISO400 results are still good, although fine detail does drop off. At ISO800 noise increases again and fine detail is lost further. At ISO1600 noise becomes quite strong and this setting is likely to be the highest ISO speed you'll want to use. ISO3200 and above is available, although results aren't great, with ISO6400 showing the most noise, and a drop in colour saturation.
Nikon COOLPIX B600 White-balance test images
White Balance Performance - Auto White Balance (AWB) performs well under tungsten lighting, with a neutral image produced. If you'd like a warmer result, you can use the tungsten preset. AWB performs well under mixed lighting, and under fluorescent lighting. The fluorescent preset gives a magenta colour cast.
Nikon COOLPIX B600 Digital filters
Digital Filters - The creative effects mode takes a number of photos, one is left unedited, and four are produced with an effect applied to them. You can apply additional effects in playback.
Panoramic | 1/250 sec | f/3.5 | 5.0 mm | ISO 140
The camera has an automatic panoramic mode, where you simply pan the camera from one side to the other. The stitching is good, but the image resolution is low, with a 4800x920 pixel image. Dynamic range has struggled.
Video - The B600 records FullHD video at 30/25fps, and you can use the optical zoom while recording. Audio is recorded using the stereo microphones on top of the camera. The built-in vibration reduction (optical image stabilisation) helps keep video stable, and the camera was able to focus quickly even when using the full optical zoom of the lens.
Value For Money
The Nikon Coolpix B600 is available for around £320, which makes it seem a little expensive compared to the competition. There are a number of alternatives available, starting with the cheapest:
Nikon Coolpix B500, 16mp, 40x optical zoom lens, FullHD video, £209
Panasonic Lumix FZ82, 18mp, 60x optical zoom lens, 4K video, EVF, £275
Panasonic Lumix FZ330, 12mp, 24x optical zoom lens, 4K video, EVF, £350-399 (if available)
Nikon Coolpix B700, 20mp, 60x optical zoom lens, 4K video, EVF, £359 (if available)
Canon Powershot SX70 HS, 20mp sensor, 65x optical zoom lens, 4K video, EVF, £452
Nikon Coolpix P900, 16mp, 83x optical zoom lens, FullHD video, EVF, £469
Have a look at more ultra-zoom / bridge cameras in our Top 13 Best Ultra Zoom Cameras, or if you're looking for something smaller have a look at the Top 12 Best Pocket / Travel Zoom Cameras. You'll also need to buy a memory card and a case or bag to keep your camera safe and protected - have a look at our complete guide to camera bags.
Nikon Coolpix B600 Verdict
The Nikon Coolpix B600 offers good looking photos, and focus is reliable, with good results whether using the wide-angle end of the lens, or the telephoto end, or anywhere in between, particularly in good light. However, the majority of the competition offers more features, at a similar or lower price, including an EVF, or 4K video, or a tilting or vari-angle touch-screen, manual controls, a flash hot-shoe, raw shooting, better battery life (the list goes on). Unfortunately for the Nikon Coolpix B600, it's offering features of a budget ultra-zoom camera, but without the budget price of a budget ultra-zoom camera. If you want the cheapest ultra-zoom available, and aren't too fussed about more advanced features, buy the B500, while it's still available.
The compact camera market has seen massive decline in recent years, and the only areas that remain steady ultra-zoom bridge cameras, waterproof cameras, travel zooms, and serious compacts. However, unless the camera offers something new, improved, or better than the previous model, then why would people be interested in it? Cameras also need to compete with smartphones, with the majority now offering 4K video recording, and the lack of 4K video on the B600 is very apparent, considering almost all of the competition offer it. Another area where the B600 falls down is in the lack of an electronic viewfinder, all of the competition offer this, and instead you have a fixed 3inch screen, which will seem tiny if you've ever used a smartphone. Why haven't camera screens increased in size in the same way as smartphones?
If you want an ultra-zoom bridge camera, then the B600 is competent, but doesn't offer anywhere near as many features as other cameras. Perhaps if the price drops over time, then it could be a good option, but at it's current price of around £320, it just doesn't offer enough to justify the price.
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