The Yashica Crew is a cheap, tiny compact “inspired by friend groups”

Unlike the undeniably retro Y16 the company announced last month, the Crew features a more classic compact form factor, looking much like many of the other cameras being sold under the Yashica brand name. However, while cameras like the City 100 feature a fully articulating screen, the Crew features a 3.0″ LCD (in a slightly unusual 16:9 aspect ratio) that flips up, making it ever so slightly quicker to grab a selfie of you and your friends.

That’s the idea, anyways. In practice, that may be a bit of a struggle, thanks to the camera’s retracting lens, which the company boasts features a “6x optical zoom.” According to the images on the company’s website, it has a focal range of 4.3-24.8mm, which works out to around 32-183mm equiv., given the camera’s sensor. While 32mm equiv. is still relatively wide, you may struggle to capture more than a person or two at that setting with sensible framing unless you have particularly long arms.

That sensor seems to be the one found in many of Yashica’s other cameras: a 13MP model in the minuscule Type 1/3.06 (16.45mm²) format. For reference, that’s almost three times smaller than the Type 1/1.56 (48mm²) that the iPhone 17 uses for its main camera, and is still substantially smaller than what you’d find in the 2000’s-era compacts it’s aping. That, combined with the lens’ very slow apertures (F3.1-6.4, or F22.8-47.2 equiv.) mean the camera will struggle in all but the best light, though it does have a flash to help out a bit; it’s unclear whether it’s a xenon tube or an LED.

Some people may be able to overlook that because they’re going for a lo-fi aesthetic, or because this camera takes its compact moniker seriously. Yashica says it’s 26mm (1″) thick when powered off, and weighs just 126g (4.4oz), which means it may genuinely fit in a relatively small purse or bag, or even a pants pocket.

It can shoot 2.7K (2688×1512, a bit higher-res than FullHD) video at up to 60p, and can even upscale that to 4K, though we wouldn’t expect stellar results. Likewise, it has the option of producing up to 36MP images though, again, the sensor is only 13MP.

The Crew has a removable battery and USB-C charging. The company says it’s designed to be an “approachable introduction to photography for the next generation of image-makers” that offers “more creative flexibility than a smartphone while maintaining point-and shoot simplicity.”

While I’m not entirely sure the inclusion of seven color filters delivers on the promise of creative flexibility – the camera doesn’t seem to offer much manual control – it definitely delivers on the approachability. It costs just $168, or 1,320 Hong Kong dollars for a standalone model, though you can pay $10 more to get a version with a 32GB microSD card. It will be available in black or silver, starting later this month, around October 26.

Like many other compacts on the market, the Crew is being sold under a brand name that people may remember (or be familiar with from shopping for vintage cameras), but it’s not really the same company anymore. The Crew and Yashica’s other cameras are branded and distributed by the Hong Kong-based 100 Enterprises, though it’s not entirely clear who actually produces them.