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How To Find The Shutter Count On Canon EOS 6D
💡 Here’s a quick summary of the post:
The shutter count of your Canon 6D shows how much it has been used.
Based on actual real life user data, the average shutter life on a 6D where the shutter has died is 115,231.
On Windows you can find the shutter count for the Canon 6D using:
So you’ve got yourself a 10+ year old Canon EOS 6D.
Whether you’re buying it second hand or selling it, you gotta know how to check the shutter count on Canon 6D
It’s the camera equivalent of mileage on a car.
Table of Contents
Instructions To Find The Shutter Count On 6D
Official Canon Method
Sending your Canon 6D to a Canon Service Center for a service and asking them to also provide you with the shutter count is the only official way to do this.
For some reason, Canon doesn’t want to make it easy for us to check our own cameras shutter counts.
Most people (including me) end up using third-party software that you can download on Windows or Mac.
Find Your 6D Shutter Count On Windows
Here’s how to find your shutter count on your Canon 6D:
Install software that can check the shutter count on your 6D.
Connect your Canon 6D to your Windows device
The software will then tell you what your shutter count is
Here are the apps you can use for Windows to check the shutter count on your Canon 6D:
Ok so the name is kinda bad because this tool isn’t free.
Freeshuttercount only provides a shutter count for free if the shutter count is under 1000, and lets be honest if you’re looking at a Canon 6D there’s almost zero chance that the shutter count is under 1000.
To see what the shutter count is for a camera with over 1000 actuations you’re gonna have to pay $7 (price at the time of writing this Mary 2023).
Check 6D Shutter Count On Mac
To find your shutter count on Mac you’ll need to:
Install software that can check the shutter count
Connect your Canon 6D to your Mac device
The software will then tell you what your shutter count is
For Mac users the most popular apps that work are the following two and neither of them are free but they are fairly inexpensive:
This tool is $7.99 for the standard version and $14.99 for the pro version(you don’t really need the pro version).
If you run into any issues when using the ShutterCount app then their FAQ page is useful for troubleshooting.
What Is The Shutter Count On A Canon 6D?
The shutter count (also known as shutter actuations) is basically a way to measure how much a DSLR like the Canon 6D has been used.
Only cameras that use mechanical shutters have a shutter count. So other cameras like the G7X Mark III don’t actually have a shutter count.
Of course, the Canon 6D does have a mechanical shutter as does every DSLR, so it does have a shutter count.
Basically, every time you take a picture the shutter count goes up and each cycle of the shutter going up and down is called a shutter actuation.
Over time shutter actuations eventually leads to wear and tear of the shutter until one day it goes kaput and dies.
Luckily you can check the shutter count and life expectancy on your 6D.
How Long Does The Canon 6D Shutter Last?
Based on real-life user data the shutter count rating for the Canon EOS 6D is about 115,000 shutter actuations.
Keep in mind that this is just a guideline.
Some people might only get 70,000 actuations out of the 6D while other people have reported getting upwards of 200,000.
You can actually see the average actual usage that people get from their 6D on this site created by Oleg Kikin. Below is a screenshot from the site.
Canon EOS 6D shutter count data – screenshot from Olegkikin.com
At the time of writing, the database has data from thousands of Canon 6D cameras.
It shows:
The average shutter actuations on a 6D where the shutter is still alive is 120,796.
The average shutter actuations on a 6D where the shutter has died is 115,231.
There are some people that still have a 6D with a shutter that is alive after a shutter count of over 500,000!
There’s a decent amount of people with a shutter count over 150,000
For about 10% of people, the shutter dies before reaching 50,000 on the Canon EOS 6D
The thing with shutter count is that the shutter can fail at 20,000 or 200,000 but you just never know.
The main rule of thumb is that the lower the better because it shows that the camera hasn’t been used as much.
What’s A Good Shutter Count On The Canon 6D?
So based on actual data, the average shutter count lifespan on the 6D is about 115,000 so anything more than this is technically beyond the minimum that you could expect to get out of the camera.
Remember that the average shutter actuations on a 6D where the shutter has died is 115,231 so you don’t really want to be too close to this number.
But then again, if you get a really good deal it might be worth a shot.
If you’re looking for a secondhand Canon 6D, the lower the shutter count the better.
For example, a shutter count of 50,000 still has a decent amount of life left on it.
To put this into perspective it would take you…
100 shutter actuations every day for 500 days to reach 50,000 shutter actuations.
So it would take you another 500 days of 100 shutter actuations everyday to even get to 100,000
Apart from the shutter count look for other signs of wear and tear on a secondhand camera.
If the camera you’re looking at has lots of scratches, bumps or dents then the owner probably hasn’t taken as much care of their camera.
Even with a low shutter count this camera is more likely to have issues because it’s probably been knocked around a lot more.
Also, have a look at the lenses the previous owner has, as this can show signs of how well the user takes care of their equipment.
Conclusion
So now you should know the average shutter life expectancy and how to check the shutter count on any Canon EOS 6D.
