Should You Buy This Camera
Sony Alpha 99

Photo: 運転太郎, CC BY 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons

Sony Alpha 99

DSLT · Sony A · released 2012-09-12
Lowest now
$598
Steep discount -79% vs MSRP
See prices at 1 source (jumps down this page)
MSRP at launch
$2,799
Sep 2012
Inventory
2
across 1 source

Prices are rising

How we compute this

Used prices have been rising recently. Prices are up 20.7% over the last 30 days. The 90-day low was $359, $239 below today. Currently 21% of the $2,799 MSRP.

Lowest now
$598
MSRP
$2,799
vs MSRP
-79%
90-day low
$359
All-time low
$264 (Jun 15, 2026)
30-day trend
+20.7%
Observed across 1 source · 66 days of history in last 90 · Methodology

Latest pricing by source

Each row is a direct observation from the seller. eBay links are affiliate links. How this works.
Source Condition Price Listings Observed Link
ebay
used
→ good
$598
ships free
2 Observed yesterday view listing

Price history

One point per day per (source, grade) pair, connected with lines. Hue marks the source; lightness within a hue marks the condition (darker = better grade). The dashed line is launch MSRP.

See Methods notes #1.1, #1.2, #1.3, #1.4.

Loading price history

Specs

Brand
Sony
Family
Sony Alpha (A-mount)
Category
body
Body type
DSLT
Mount
Sony A
Sensor
Full Frame
Megapixels
24.3 MP
Lens type
—
Sensor family
Sony FF 24MP CMOS (A99)
Autofocus
Phase Detection
AF system
Sony phase-detect (A-mount)
IBIS
—
Weather sealed
—
Max video
—
Max native ISO
—
Weight
—
Dimensions
—
Body material
—
Released
2012-09-12
Status
discontinued

Autofocus & action

AF system
Phase detect
Focus points
19 dedicated + 102 on-sensor phase-detect
Subject detection
Human face
Burst (mechanical)
6 fps
Pre-burst capture
No
Card slots
2 (Dual SD (one slot also accepts Memory Stick Duo))
Sensor readout
Standard CMOS

Full-frame SLT with translucent mirror; dual AF system combines 19-point optical PDAF with 102-point on-sensor PDAF; face detection only, no Eye AF.

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Appears in

Curated lists where this camera currently qualifies. Each list ranks members by deal score.

Similar cameras

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Compare with another model

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Family
Model

Measured dynamic range

Bill Claff's lab measurements of how much shadow-to-highlight range this sensor holds, plotted across the full ISO range. Higher is more latitude to recover a dark frame.

See the curve on Photons to Photos

Measurements by William J. Claff. We link rather than reprint them.

Sample photos

Real-world photos taken with this camera, grouped by EXIF data on Flickr.

Browse shots on Flickr
Methods

How we compute each section

References on each chart link down here. More notes will land as new sections grow.

1. Price history

#1.1 · Grade buckets
Each seller publishes their own raw condition labels (e.g. "Excellent+", "Like new minus", "Bargain"). Those are normalized to a small bucket set: mint, excellent, good, fair, poor, and unknown. The "Latest pricing by source" table above shows both the raw label and the normalized bucket so you can audit any individual mapping.
#1.2 · Missing days
A point is only drawn on a day when a snapshot existed for that (source, grade) pair. Lines connect across gaps so a series with sparse sampling still reads as a single trend, but absence of a point does not mean a stockout: it means we didn't see a listing at that grade that day.
#1.3 · Color encoding
Hue carries the source: terracotta = mpb, sage = keh, cobalt = B&H, honey = ebay. Lightness within a hue carries the condition: darker means a better grade (mint and excellent are darkest; poor is lightest). The dashed ink line is launch MSRP, included as a reference even though it isn't a price observation.
#1.4 · Shipping
Every price on this page is the item price, the number the seller puts on the listing. Where a seller quotes shipping we show it underneath as a separate line and add it up for you, because on used marketplaces it is not small: a lens listed at $189 can carry $74 of shipping, which is 39% on top. Dealers (mpb, keh, B&H) ship domestically free or flat and we do not ask them for a figure. Where eBay quotes nothing the row says so, because some listings calculate shipping from your address and we cannot know it; on the 2026-08-23 crawl that was about a third of eBay listings, and most of them were US sellers rather than overseas ones. Price history charts the item price throughout, so a series stays comparable to its own past.
#1.5 · Lenses sold in several mounts
A third-party lens like the Sigma 35mm f/1.4 Art is one optic in a dozen mounts, and the mounts don't sell for the same money, so each one gets its own page here. Listings are less tidy: plenty of them read "Sigma 35mm f/1.4 DG HSM Art Lens" and never say which mount that is. We reject a listing whose title names a different mount, but a title that names none can't be contradicted, and we keep it rather than leave the page blank. That is a deliberate trade of precision for coverage, and it only applies to lenses carrying the note above the price table. If the exact mount matters to you, open the listing.