Quality

To compare the noise levels between the Sony A7 III and the Sony A7r III, I photographed the following scene at every sensitivity in JPEG and RAW; both cameras were fitted with the same lens at the same focal length and aperture value. I processed each RAW file using Adobe Camera RAW with sharpening settings of 50 / 0.5 / 36 / 10 and with all noise reduction disabled. The combination of relatively high sharpening with zero noise reduction reveals when noise begins to creep-in and how much real data you have to work with. The complete scene is below, with the red rectangle representing the area cropped for presentation at 100% in the following table.

Sony A7 III vs Sony A7r III noise
(crops from RAW files with 50 / 0.5 / 36 / 10 sharpening and NR disabled)

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 50 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 100 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 200 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 400 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 800 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 1600 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 3200 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 6400 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 12800 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 25600 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 51200 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 102400 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III at 204800 ISO. 100% crop from RAW file.

Sony A7 III vs Sony A7r III (with Pixel Shift Multi Shooting)

In my next quality test I wanted to compare the A7 III against the A7r III when the latter was using its Pixel Shift Multi Shooting mode. The setup was the same as above. First I’ll show the earlier result at 100 ISO from the single frames, followed by a second comparison where the A7r III result has been switched for the Pixel Shift version. As before these are 100% crops.

Above: Sony A7 III (left) and Sony A7r III (right) at 100 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Above: Sony A7 III single frame (left) and Sony A7r III with Pixel Shift (right) at 100 ISO. 100% crops from RAW files.

Sony A7 III JPEG noise

For reference, here’s an additional test with the A7 III, illustrating noise levels on out-of-camera JPEGs.

Sony A7 III noise (out of camera JPEG crops, presented at 100%)

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 50 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 100 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 200 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 400 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 800 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 1600 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 3200 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 6400 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 12800 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 25600 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 51200 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 102400 ISO

Above: Sony A7 III noise. 100% crop from OOC JPEG at 204800 ISO