Electronics Hub has done a deep dive into the most liked photographs on Flickr, providing data on the most loved cameras, with some surprising results!
For those unaware, Flickr is a photo-sharing website that predates Instagram and is still very active in the photography community. On the site, much like most photo-sharing sites, people can view and like/love or in this case – favorite your images.
As Flickr is centered around photography, Exif Data is shown alongside photos showing the settings used to capture each image. This is not only a very cool educational feature for photographers but has been painstakingly studied by Electronics Hub to provide insights into the equipment used to take the Flickr community's best-loved images.
The data makes for very interesting reading, and proves that it's not just the latest and greatest equipment that can produce great images!
Topping the list of camera models is the Canon EOS M6 II with an average of 138.9 favorites, a portable yet powerful mirrorless camera with 32.5mp and 14fps continuous shooting. This is an interesting stat as the M6 II was recently discontinued - perhaps too soon?
The Fujifilm X-H1 and the Sony A7R II are in second and third place, although by quite some way, with 99.7 and 69.2 favorites respectively.
The list of top camera brands was equally eye-opening with the top place going to Olympus, with an average of 26.6 favorites per image shot with Olympus cameras.
The Olympus OM-D E-M5 III came fifth on the top model list, so is the main contributor to Olympus' success here. It is a small MFT mirrorless camera with excellent image stabilization and was given top marks when we reviewed it back in 2021. Leica comes in second with Fujifilm, Nikon, and Sony following closely behind. Interestingly Canon drops to seventh place for overall camera brand.
The study goes into a lot more detail, breaking down the top 10 cameras that provided the most favorited images by genre. The winners of the genre categories are as follows:
Landscape: Sony a6300
Wildlife: Olympus E-M10 II
Architecture: Fujifilm X30
Food: Nikon D500
Fashion: Fujifilm GFX 100S
Portrait: Nikon Z7 II
Camera Phone: Apple iPhone 13 Pro
While the cameras that have taken top spots have produced the most favorited images on Flickr, this does not mean that the cameras themselves are technically better, they have just produced well-liked images in the right hands.
In fact it is great to see that many of the cameras are entry-level and older models. The data is proof that the best camera is the one that you have on you!
See our guides for more helpful information on the best beginner camera or the best camera phone.
