Canon PowerShot A4000 IS review

Videos are recorded at 720p with stereo sound. Image and sound quality were both excellent and clips ran for up to 30 minutes. However, zoom and focus were locked for the duration of clips, except for a digital zoom function that made a mess of image quality.

The A4000 promises a lot for such a low-cost camera, but it’s slow, its controls are fiddly, its video mode lacks important features and image quality doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. That’s a sizeable list of flaws, but we’re hesitant to write this camera off entirely. Few cameras at this price excel for image quality, and none can match both the A4000’s slim proportions and its generous zoom range.

Details are clean and sharp at the centre of frames in brightly lit conditions – click to enlarge

If you can rustle up £200, the Canon Ixus 230 HS is a much better implementation of the same idea. If that’s beyond your budget, we’d recommend the more moderately specified Canon Ixus 115 HS, which is currently end-of-line but still widely available for around £100 (it’s just a coincidence that these are all Canon cameras). However, if a big zoom is essential and the budget is tight, the A4000 is a solid option.