The Canon EF 40mm f/2.8 STM lens as a great cheap lens for budding photographers. That’s because its pancake design makes it great for street photography because of its portability and lightness. Furthermore, it’s slightly larger focal length of 40 mm allows you to capture a wider scene if you have a full frame camera, while a cropped-sensor camera would give you a medium telephoto equivalent of 64 mm.
However, since this is no longer available new, you will have to settle for the Canon EF-S 24mm f/2.8 STM, which goes for $149 on Amazon. This lens is another pancake design, meaning its easy to carry around in the field. Furthermore, its wider focal length gives it an equivalent full frame focal length of 38.4 mm. While it’s not as wide as the 35mm lenses popularly used in street photography, it’s close enough to give you that feel in a cropped-sensor Canon camera.
Unfortunately, since it’s an EF-S lens, you cannot use it on full frame Canon cameras, as its deeper mount physically does not allow the lens to attach to the body. But if you have a newer mirrorless APS-C Canon camera, like the Canon EOS R7 and the Canon EOS R10, you can use this lens on those cameras with an EF-EOS R Mount Adapter.
