Review by Klaus Schroiff, published May 2013

Introduction

Honestly speaking, the previous Canon standard kit lenses had a rather cheap if not crappy build quality which clearly reflected the attempt to push the cost cuttings to the max. This new little fellow is still not carved from granite, of course, but things are somewhat better now. It's still an all-plastic shell but the inner lens tube doesn't wobble quite as much and it now features a non-rotating front element. Another improvement is a dedicated 'proper' focus ring. Your heart will still not jump for joy when using the zoom or focus rings but, to be fair, it is quite decent now really. The zoom characteristic remains similar to the older lenses so it has its shortest length around the 30mm setting and extends both towards 18mm as well as 55mm. Interestingly it has slightly bigger physical dimensions than its predecessors - which is surprising given the current trend towards downsizing everything.

Canon's new STM ("Stepping motor") is optimized for silent and smooth operations and as such it is also usable for movies. It's also pretty fast, too. The accuracy of the tested sample was good.
Typical for most Canon lenses, the EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 STM IS features a image stabilizer. Canon claims an efficiency of up to 4 f-stops. While this is a lab figure, the real life results come quite close. However, it is a good idea, where possible, to stay on the conservative side during shooting.