Tools

Serial number calculator

You have a camera or lens in hand and a serial number. This turns it into a production year — as a range where the scheme only narrows to a span, and with the source it came from so you can check it.

A serial outside every known block returns “cannot date”, never a guessed year.

Maker

Date code

Canon stamped a date code on the rear plate of the lens — not the serial number. A letter then 3–4 digits (V1015) up to 1986; two letters then digits (UR0902) after. It gives the year and the month.

Which lens? (recommended)

Canon reused the same year letters every 26 years — A means 1960, 1986 and 2012. Telling us the lens lets us rule the wrong ones out from its production dates. Without it, an ambiguous letter gets no answer rather than a guessed one.