I've shot a lot of pictures and videos since I bought my Nikon COOLPIX P1000 in 2019. I could spend all day every day zooming in on stuff. I suppose that makes me a super fan of this super zoom camera. And that's probably an understatement! So I was ridiculously excited when I heard about the new Nikon COOLPIX P1100. Here's my experience buying the P1100 and some of my first ever pictures. I'll detail the differences between the P1000 and the P1100 in my next article.

THE WAITING IS THE HARDEST PART

Back in April 2024, I and a lot other super zoom camera enthusiasts started to notice that it was getting really hard to find a Nikon COOLPIX P1000 that was in stock and available for purchase. The rumor on the internet at the time was that Nikon was no longer manufacturing the P1000.

The Nikon COOLPIX P1000 super zoom camera.

Wait, what? No more 24 - 3000mm super zoom camera? What if my P1000 broke and I couldn't replace it? I'd have to carry around a backpack full of lenses to fill the focal length range of the P1000 and I'd have to sell my house to afford a lens that could reach an optical focal length of 3000mm! Trembling with fear, I searched for many weeks to find a spare Nikon COOLPIX P1000 camera.

By July 2024, the online rumors evolved into the idea that Nikon was planning to release a new version of the COOLPIX P1000. So, I started searching the interwebs every morning for information about the new camera. As I waited to learn the fate of the king of super zoom cameras, I wondered what Nikon would call the new P1000. Perhaps P1000B? P1000 II? P1000 Mark II? The P1001? How about the Q1000? And of course, the P1100.

Over the next six months, I settled into a morning routine. Step #1 - wake up. Step #2 - check my list of websites for information about the new P1000. The websites I checked each morning included Nikon, B&H Photo, Adorama, BestBuy, Walmart and Amazon. Then I meandered around the forums at Digital Photography Review (dpreview). And finally, I did some general searching on one of the major internet search engines to check the rest of the internet, which often included information from the Nikon rumors website.

During those six months of searching, I never saw anything from Nikon about why the P1000 was out of stock for so long or what was happening with their popular super zoom camera. I understand why Nikon wouldn't be particularly chatty about a new or updated product, but I thought they might have posted something - even a tease - to let us superfans know that everything was going to be OK :)

By the way, did I mention that I searched for information about the new P1100 every single morning for six months?

THE P1100 IS ANNOUNCED

It seemed like a normal Tuesday night on February 4^th 2025. Bundled up in a few layers of clothing, I was outside taking super zoom pictures and video of the first quarter Moon. I hate cold temperatures, but I was out there because cold air cuts down on the thermal heat waves in the atmosphere which helps to get sharper images at high telephoto focal lengths. And I love sharp photographs of things that are really far away!

Click to see a full-size picture

Out in my cold, dark backyard, I watched mountain ranges and craters, some formed billions of years ago, float across my external monitor as the Moon orbited the Earth. Despite how cold it was, it was an awesome way to spend a Tuesday night. This is just one of the many reasons why I shoot with the Nikon P1000.

Click to see a full-size picture

BTW, you can reach the equivalent of a 6000mm focal length by zooming in to the P1000's maximum optical focal length of 3000mm and then applying an in-camera digital magnification of 2Xs. Up to 2Xs magnification is what Nikon calls "Dynamic Fine Zoom.

Just after 10:00 PM, I walked into my house and reconnected to civilization by checking my email. A quick scan of senders highlighted an email from Adorama. I'm on the Adorama's mailing list for their product announcements. Without looking at the subject, I opened the email and literally stopped in my tracks when I saw that it was an announcement that Nikon had released the new COOLPIX P1100!

Curiously, Nikon announced the new P1100 and the new NIKKOR Z 35MM F/1.2 S prime lens at the same time. Is it just me or was announcing a super zoom camera and a prime lens an odd thing to do? You can read Nikon's announcement of the P1100 here.

PANIC BUYING

Given the popularity of the P1000 with the point-and-shoot super zoom crowd, I figured that a lot of people might order the new version of the camera as soon as it became available. And if there were a lot of orders, then the people who ordered first would probably get their cameras long before the people who waited too long as it would take the Nikon manufacturing plant some time to catch-up with the orders.

A side view of the Nikon COOLPIX P1100.

It's actually kind of funny to look back on that Tuesday night, February 4^th 2025. At 10:30 PM on a weeknight, I was on my laptop quickly checking websites to see which stores had the P1100 for sale. It was like that episode of The Big Bang Theory when Sheldon, Leonard, Howard and Rajesh are all on their laptops desperately trying to buy tickets for San Diego Comicon when they first go on sale and before they are sold out :)   I remember typing and clicking really fast as I went from website to website trying to learn a little about the camera but not spending too much time because what if the stores would only take a limited number of pre-orders? Kind of irrational, but I couldn't take that risk!

A view of the Nikon COOLPIX P1100 from the back.

The P1100 was available for pre-order on the Adorama and B&H websites, but it was not listed on the BestBuy website. Out of curiosity, I also checked Walmart.com, but there was no listing there either. But the P1100 was available for pre-order on Nikon's website. Back in July 2024, I had purchased an extra P1000 as a back-up from the Nikon website and had a good experience, so I grabbed my credit card and placed my pre-order of the COOLPIX P1100 on the Nikon website at 11:33 PM, a little more than an hour after seeing the announcement from Adorama.

The Nikon COOLPIX P1100 with the lens extended.

Yay! I secured my P1100! The price for the P1100 on the Nikon website was $1,099.95 USD with free shipping, which is what the P1000 was selling for. On the B&H and Adorama websites, the price of the P1100 is $1,096.95 with free shipping. So, rounding up to the nearest dollar, the price for the P1100 is $1100 :)

By the way, I'm glad that I placed my order quickly. Within days of the pre-order announcement, the Nikon P1100 was showing as a best seller at B&H Photo. And through early May 2025 as I write this article, the P1100 is still often listed as in back-order on all of the online stores that I've been keeping an eye on. It looks like the demand for the P1100 is higher than Nikon's production volume level.

MY P1100 ARRIVES

On March 3^rd - a month after I pre-ordered the P1100 - the UPS truck rolled up to my house and delivered my new P1100. The following items were in the box:

1. The COOLPIX P1100 camera
2. A camera neck strap (AN-DC3)
3. A 77mm snap-on lens cap (LC-77)
4. A rechargeable Li-ion battery (EN-EL20a)
5. A lens hood (HB-CP1)
6. A USB-C cable (UC-E24)
7. A printed user's manual (short version)
8. The warranty card (with the serial number printed on it)

What's in the box?

And here are some things that are not included when you buy a P1100:

• A battery charger (you can charge the battery in the camera)
• An AC adapter for the USB-C cable (the part that plugs into the electrical outlet)
• An SD memory card
• A camera case/bag

Do you already have a P1000? If so, then be sure to read my next article where I'll detail what makes the P1100 different from the P1000. Spoiler alert, other than the switch to a USB-C charging port... not much changed!  Because the cameras are so similar, you should be able to use most of your P1000 accessories with the P1100. For example, I share the following accessories between P1000 and my P1100: batteries, battery charger, ND filter, NC filter, ML-L7 remote control and my external monitor.

I posted a video on YouTube of me unboxing the P1100 which you can watch by clicking on the video below. The video starts with a timelapse of the unboxing and then I show my first few super zoom test video clips. You can click on the image below to watch the video.

Click to Watch the Video on YouTube

MY FIRST P1100 TEST ZOOMS

Here are some of my first ever super zoom tests with my new P1100!  These are all super zoom pictures. My YouTube video includes mostly video clip versions of my first super zooms. You can click on the pictures below to see a full-size version. All references to focal lengths are 35mm equivalents.

One of the new features of the P1100 is the ability to change the size of the auto-focus area on the viewfinder in bird mode. I love this new feature and used it to snap the following picture of what I think is a green Costa Humming Bird perched way up on the top of a tree. Costa Hummingbirds are about three and a half inches, or 89 mm, tall.

Click to see a full-size picture

Check out these two pictures of a municipal airport control tower at the opposite ends of the P1100's optical zoom range. The tower is a mile and a half, or 2.4 km, away.

Click to see a full-size picture

Click to see a full-size picture

You can find all kinds of tall towers around town. Have you ever wondered what's on top of those large antenna towers that reach way up into the sky? Here are a few towers at South Mountain Park in Phoenix, Arizona in the United States.

Click to see a full-size picture

The picture above was shot at the P1100's most wide-angle focal length of 24mm. For the picture below, I zoomed the P1100 in to its maximum optical focal length of 3000mm and then applied the P1100's in-camera digital magnification of 4Xs.

Click to see a full-size picture

That's clearly a digital magnification, but... that's amazing! I mean, you can see that the little clips that secure the top are in the locked position from way down here! I think this is a spectacular illustration of the P1100's total zoom range when you use the in-camera digital magnification.

Well, those are some of my first super zoom tests with the new Nikon COOLPIX P1100 super zoom camera! I hope you enjoyed seeing them. If you did them you might want to check out some of my other super zoom articles on this website. And there will be much more P1100 super zooming in the future, so be sure to stop back here in a little bit to see what other far away secrets we can uncover!