26-12-2015, last revision 2-7-2018

Test period: starting 11-11-2015
Serial Nr: 1634973
Origin of sample: Leica Germany demo pool

2-7-2018: I own a sample since spring. Second look.

The Leica Ultravid 8x32 HD Plus (announced on 17-8-2015) is the latest version of the Ultravid 8x32 from 2003. It is the smallest and lightest of the premium 8x32s, and as such a very interesting binocular. Surely it is small enough to be a constant companion, but is it really big enough to offer an uncompromised performance? What are the trade offs involved in the 8x32 Ultravid design compared with the much bigger Ultravid 8x42 HD Plus?

What´s in the box?

The Ultravid comes with a neoprene strap, rubber ocular and objective covers and a Cordura bag (which strangely does not have a strap of its own, just the same as in the 8x42). The European guarantee is 5 years including material and labour, and another five years material only. The box is typical Leica seduction, they have the best corporate identity and art direction of all binocular manufacturers. It gets even better once you touch and see the real thing - this 8x32 is a very beautiful binocular. And the first look through it is definitely an experience. Could this even be sharper than the Ultravid 8x42...?

Mechanical quality

Body
An incredibly small pair of binoculars, just weighing 535g. Friction of the bridge is a bit too stiff for my taste, otherwise mechanical quality seems excellent.

Diopter adjustment
is possible for more than +/-4 diopters and works by pulling out the wheel. This is one of the very rare cases when I adjusted diopter once and only once without ever thinking about it again.

Focusing
in this sample is perfect, with even friction. The Nikon EDG 8x42 is the only roof prism binocular I have used with a smoother focusing. 1.1 revolutions focus from infinity to a close 2.2 meters. I never had any doubts about focus, so synchronicity of the barrels is really perfect (see "diopter adjustment" also...). This is a central quality of a great binocular.

The faint light areas around the pupil are the reflections of clouds on the oculars. These barrels are extremely well baffled and blackened.

Internal blackening and baffling
look perfect and help to produce outstanding contrast.

Eyecups
have two click stops and zero but can be used inbetween click stops as the friction is high. I used the Leica eye relief data for both the Ultravid 8x42 and 8x32 and measured the distance from ocular lens to eyecup edge. The 8x32 has an almost 1mm shorter eyecups in comparison to the 8x42. The thin, soft rubber coat on the hard plastic cup has excellent vibration dampening qualities, helping to hold the glass more steadily.


Ergonomy
The Ultravid is so compact that at the beginning I had some trouble of holding it without vignetting the left barrel with my hand. After I solved this I quickly became excited about the excellent steadiness of the image, I do feel I can extract a bit more details from the view than with any other handheld not image stabilized binocular. When walking, the Ultravid stays flat on my chest, it seems to disappear when not in use.

Accessories
The wide neoprene strap feels very comfortable, and the ocular cover can be pushed on the glass easily and then stays where it is. I did never use the lens covers.

Tripod adapter
The very bulky Ultravid tripod adapter just fits with this binocular, but I would much prefer to have a thread in the hinge axis for a more elegant and practical adapter solution.


Industrial design and finish
Hands down the Ultravids have the most beautiful, modern, grown up, tasteful and functional industrial design of all roof binoculars I have seen. Achim Heine was responsible for it.The rubber coating has a nice velvety texture, it attracts fine dust, but can be cleaned easily with a wet cloth.

Optical quality

Contrast
Macrocontrast (contrast ratio) is superb, often similar to the phenomenal Nikon EDG 8x42. Sharpness and microcontrast are simply perfect. This is one of the sharpest binoculars I ever used, one of the very few roofs that could dare to challenge my Swaroski Habicht 8x30, or the Zeiss Victory HT 8x42, in sharpness and contrast. The Ultravids images remind me very much of the Nikon EDG 8x42, but have a bit more sparkle in daylight, although they are not brighter really.

Daylight, low light and night use
The Ultravid 8x32 is wonderful on a sunny day, bright scenes look superb. In low light sharpness remains exquisite, quite a remarkable performance. Stars look good across about half of the field.

Flare suppression
A really outstanding performance, and even more so considering the small size of this glass. There can be some veiling glare viewing towards a high sun, but generally the image is very clean. It is fascinating to watch in difficult situations, for example towards a low sun, and still have the highest contrast with very black shadows. I could scan very bright backlit water without glare in the view. There were some shocking moments of disbelief and I started to wish my zoom lenses could offer this kind of flare suppression. For me this is the key to understanding the merits of the Ultravid 8x32, as there is no really great optics without efficient control. There is a price to pay for that though - see "ease of view".

Colour reproduction
has less yellow but a tad more red than in the 8x42 Ultravid. These are beautiful, rich, vibrant and extremely saturated colours with deep blacks. It´s a slightly different, even crisper look than in the much brighter Ultravid 8x42.

Brightness
The 8x32 Ultravid at daylight used with closed pupil is visibly darker than the 8x42 Ultravid. This is puzzling and disappointing, because the 8x42 HD Plus shows what prisms made from HT glass can do. The aggressive baffling with a truncated exit pupil and a slightly more skewed transmission curve with a hint of red in the 8x32 will make the view darker, too. In lowlight things get worse, of course. Is there really HT glass in the 8x32 at all? I do miss the lovely high transmission sparkle of the Ultravid 8x42.


Distortion
is a classic strong pincushion, so panning and tilting are without rolling ball issues.


Field of view
is a good 135m.

Threedimensionality
is as with most roof prism binoculars not a strong point. The Ultravid has zero difference in the spacing of the objectives compared to the oculars.

Close focus
is 2.2 meters at 0 diopters, and the view remains comfortable at close focus, so the Ultravid is a superb binocular for the observation of small things. Addendum 2-7-2018: I would like to emphasize again: An excellent butterfly glass. One of the most comfortable close up performances ever, giving testimony to Leica quality norms. Because I suspect that less than ideally collimated bins become even more difficult to use in close up.

Chromatic aberrations
are very well controlled and hardly noticeable, I would dare to say they are on a slightly lower level than in the Ultravid 8x42.

Eye relief
is 13.3mm according to Leica ( I measured at least 15mm in my own sample, see below), definitely on the short side. Of course it helps keeping the design compact. I guess this could be a difficult glass for spectacle wearers, see also "ease of view".

Exit pupils
were visibly truncated. It´s easiest to see from the objective side - there is a segment of the image circle missing towards the lower outer part of the barrel - check the right lower part of this image of the right barrel. This is probably caused by Leica´s approach to minimize size while keeping macrocontrast as high as possible by aggressive baffling. Addendum 2-7-2018: I see less truncation in the second sample. Maybe there is some tolerance in the baffles.

Ease of view
Hyper sharpness and extreme contrast yield awesome images. But ease of view is not as good as I expected, being used to 8x42s. With its very tightly baffling the exit pupils get easily truncated when tilting the glass and the 8x32 Ultravid needs to be adjusted with care both with regards to interpupillary distance (IPD) and eye relief. The latter is made even more difficult by slightly too short eyecups with only two click stops. As I do a lot of close up viewing followed by observations at infinity, I constantly optimize IPD to account for parallaxe. To me, the beautiful images are well worth the effort. A Swarovision 8x32 is much easier in that respect, but simply flares horribly. In bright light ease of view is best in the Ultravid, but it deteriorates in low light, and at open pupil I feel it is becoming a somewhat uncomfortable glass, although sharpness in the center remains perfect. Even with closed pupil there is some nervousness in the image when panning which seems to be caused by a tendency for black outs. Closing one eye and panning, I sometimes had peripheral blackouts which get somewhat smeared when using both eyes, as they do not occur symmetrically in both barrels at the same time. Kimmo Absetz writes in his comparison of the Ultravid 8x32 with the Zeiss Victory FL 8x32: "...when panning their image is less coherent than in the Zeiss. Black shadows also appeared on the edges of the field if I pressed the eyecups firmly against my face. Eyecups that twist out further would certainly have helped."

Comparing to the Ultravid 8x42 HD Plus

The Ultravid 8x42 is much brighter and has a much better ease of view in all light levels than the 8x32, but the 8x32 looks contrastier and sharper than the 8x42, which might primarily be a perception caused by its darker image with more crushed shadows, although this might also suggest that 32mm objectives are so much easier to design than 42mm ones. Anyway, the 8x32 can really be a great everyday companion, whereas the 8x42 is the better choice when brightness and ease of view are paramount during long observation periods.

Conclusion

Pros:

1. Optical performance - except from ease of view and brightness - is really amazing: Sharpness, colour, contrast, flare suppression...

2. Perfect, absolutely reliable focus mechanism.

3. Extremely compact with great ergonomy.

4. Exceptional close up performance, great for butterfly watching.

5. Premium build quality, industrial design and finish.

Cons:

1. Ease of view is good but not great in bright light, and decreases considerably in low light. This glass needs some routine to be perfectly adjusted to one´s eyes but never achieves the Ultravid 8x42s great viewing comfort.

2. Slightly truncated exit pupil.

3. Brightness is lower than expected.

4. Hinge is too stiff.

How does the Ultravid compare to the other premium 8x32s? The 8x32 Swarovision is not for me due to strong flaring. I am curious to use the Nikon EDG 8x32 and the Zeiss Victory FL 8x32, they might offer better ease of view and at least the same brightness - but can they really get close enough to the great qualities of the Leica to be better choices?

Wishlist to Leica

The main quarrel I have with this glass is less than ideal ease of view. This is due to the extremely compact design which is the essence of the 8x32 Ultravid, so I don´t really expect changes here. But I definitely would like to see a brighter image in the footsteps of the 8x42.

Opinion

The Ultravid 8x32 HD Plus occupies a special, but interesting niche - extremely small with best image quality possible for that size if your emphasis is more on high contrast than on viewing comfort - and is probably quite successful in doing so. On one hand I miss the brightness and ease of view of the 8x42 Ultravid, especially if not observing in bright daylight, on the other hand the 8x42 always feels like a brick around the neck whereas the 8x32 magically disappears while not in use. Despite its flaws the tiny Ultravid embodies what a really great binocular should be - a door to a new world and a joy for everyday.

Addendum - Second look at the Ultravid 8x32 HD Plus - 2-7-2018

Fell in love with this tiny but gorgeous glass when reviewing it in 2015. I finally gave up resisting and bought my own one this spring. As obviously the best bin is the one you have with you, the little Leica is easily the best of the whole lot of bins in my cupboard. It not only fits in any pocket, but also nicely in my middle sized hands. And all at 535 grams.

I found few differences in the two samples, my sample seemed to have less truncation of the exit pupils. But hinge friction is also a bit too much. Otherwise, two great samples, which gives me some confidence in Leica quality control, but also in a well proven, evolved to maturity design with no major problems remaining.

It is a somewhat difficult glass though. Not for the lazy or faint hearted. Those should get a Swarovision instead (but then not complain about a distinct TWOdimensionality of the imagery). With the Leica, you really have to get your ocular cup length right to perfectly bring the binocular´s exit pupil into your pupil. "Eye relief" (ER) that is. And Leica screwed that up mechanically. Because the ocular cups are simply way to short. That is because their diameter is on the small side, so they rest deeper in the average eye socket than wider ocular cups, say from a 42mm glass. I had to partly unscrew the cups to get them about 1.5 millimeters longer, fix them with gaffer tape, and suddenly: a great view. Of course not Ultravid 7x42 great. But definitely something to enjoy everyday. 

So get your ER distance right with this glass or you will be embarressed fiddling around with it forever. My method for finding optimal eye relief distance/ocular cup length is to move the glass towards the eyes until the view is unvignetted and then to wobble the glass a bit to the left and right. There should be no black patches (black outs) appearing, otherwise you are still a bit to close to the ocular. Even if like me you are not suceptible to black outs, the view will be somehow inconsistent and nervous, especially when panning - if you are too close. It really is a matter of a millimeter, probably less, and not helped by the coarse steps in ocular cup adjustment. Also you will constantly need to adjust interpupillary distance according to focusing distance - which is the case with most bins and especially the well baffled ones with small exit pupils. A Swarovision will be much more tolerant in those two aspects, which IMO is at the heart of Swarovski´s success more than flat fields. 

The Leica is extremely sharp, contrasty, and with the most lovely, saturated colours over the whole spectrum - also the deep blues of shadows which I miss in some other glasses. Build quality and industrial design are top notch. Leica beauty. It also compared favourably to the Nikon 8x42 EDG, with a quite similar image. Build quality and industrial design are top notch. Although this is not a flat field glass, the edge performance is very good. And due to good aberration control you can fully use the enhanced depth of field due to field curvature.

Leica claims an eye relief of 13.3mm, but I measured a solid 15mm. It is probably not the best glass for spectacle wearers, nor for people with big hands. If Leica designed an 8x32 Noctivid with longer eye relief, it would surely be a considerably bigger glass, probably similar in size to a Nikon EDG 8x32 (650g)...