Kodak Mini Shot 2 Retro review

1. Verdict: the cheapest sensible way to make physical photos

Kodak Mini Shot 2 Retro

Half the running cost of instax, a screen so no frame is wasted, and a print that comes out dry and laminated.

Buy it for

Anyone who wants physical photographs regularly rather than occasionally, and anyone buying for someone who would be upset by an 85-cent mistake.

Skip it if

A buyer who wants real instant film and the develop-in-your-hand ritual. This is a digital camera with a printer attached — there is no chemistry, no shaking, no surprise.

• •**About 42 cents a print**, from a **$24.99 Kodak 4PASS cartridge that makes 60** — half of instax mini.
• •**A 1.7 inch LCD** on the back, so you look at the photograph before you spend media on it.
• •**4PASS dye sublimation with a laminate pass** at 291 x 300 dpi: the print leaves dry, sealed and water resistant.
• •**It also prints from a phone** over Bluetooth or USB-C, with a Lightning adapter in the box, on iOS and Android.
• •**255 g and 132.4 x 78.2 x 25.8 mm** — it goes in a coat pocket, which no 4 x 6 printer does.

Running cost: Kodak 4PASS 2.1 x 3.4 works out at $0.42 a shot, so a hundred photographs in the first year puts the real total at about $179.97 including the camera. See every format’s cost.

How it scores8.2/10 overall

• Running cost9
• Not wasting media10
• Print durability8
• Print size5
• Instant-film feel2

Our editorial scoring, built from published specifications and reviews by outlets that test hardware — see how we pick. We have not handled these products, so these are not test results.

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Read the full review

What it is

The Mini Shot 2 Retro does three jobs in one body. It is a 13-megapixel digital camera. It is a Bluetooth printer for photographs already on your phone. And it has a small screen in between, which is the part that changes how it feels to use.

That screen is the whole argument. On a film camera like the instax mini 12 every press of the shutter costs about 85 cents whether the photograph works or not — a blink, a thumb over the lens, a badly judged flash, all of it paid for. Here you take the shot, look at it, and decide. A frame you do not like costs nothing.

Kodak builds it on the same chassis as its printer-only Kodak Mini 2 Retro: identical 132.4 x 78.2 x 25.8 mm dimensions, identical 255 g weight, identical media. The Mini Shot is the version with a lens and a screen added, and it costs more for that reason.

Specifications

What it costs to own

A Kodak 4PASS cartridge for this print size was $24.99 for 60 prints when we checked — about 42 cents a photograph, and that single figure is most of the reason to buy this camera. It is less than half of instax mini film and about a fifth of a full-size Polaroid.

The gap compounds. At 120 photographs a year the media costs about $50 against about $102 of instax mini film, and the screen means more of those 120 are photographs somebody wanted. Over two or three years the running-cost saving is larger than the camera.

One caveat on the bundle. The hardware is normally sold with media included — 38 sheets in the current bundle — which makes the on-shelf price look higher than a bare camera and makes it a complete gift rather than one that needs a second purchase. Work out the per-print cost on the refill cartridge, not the bundle, when you are comparing.

What it is good at

• •The running cost. About 42 cents a print is the cheapest physical photograph on this site outside the desktop 4 x 6 printers, and those do not fit in a pocket.
• •Not wasting media. A screen before the print is the single most practical feature in this whole category, and most instant cameras do not have one.
• •The print survives things. 4PASS lays color down in passes and finishes with a laminate, so the photo is dry on exit and shrugs off fingerprints, water and a wallet. Instant film does none of that.
• •It is two devices. The same body prints the photographs already on a phone, which is where almost everybody's photographs actually live.
• •It is genuinely pocketable at 255 g, and the media is a single all-in-one cartridge rather than separate ink and paper.
• •Autofocus from 30 cm to infinity, where a simple instax is fixed focus with a close-up mode you have to remember to engage.

Where it falls short

• •It is not instant film, and that matters to people. There is no chemistry, nothing develops in your hand, and the photograph is a print of a digital file. If the recipient wants the Polaroid ritual, this is the wrong gift however good the numbers are.
• •The print is small. 2.1 x 3.4 inches is credit-card size. It is slightly larger than an instax mini print and much smaller than a 4 x 6 photograph.
• •13 megapixels through a small lens is not a modern phone camera. The photographs are fine at print size and would not survive being blown up.
• •Proprietary media. The cartridge fits Kodak's 2.1 x 3.4 inch system and nothing else, so you are tied to one manufacturer's supply — unlike ZINK paper, which is interchangeable across brands.
• •No published battery life. An odd omission on a device you take to events, especially when Kodak publishes the figure for its own printer.
• •A screen is not a viewfinder. A 1.7 inch LCD in bright sunlight is hard to see, which is a general limitation of small-screen cameras rather than a Kodak flaw.

Alternatives

• •Kodak Mini Shot 3 Retro — the same idea with a 3 x 3 inch square print, also about 42 cents a print. Buy it if the square frame is what you want; the print is noticeably bigger for the same running cost.
• •[instax mini Evo](/instant-cameras/instax-mini-evo-review) — the same screen-before-you-print idea on real instax film, with far more creative control and a much better-made body. It costs about 85 cents a shot rather than 42.
• •[Kodak Mini 2 Retro](/photo-printers/kodak-mini-2-retro-review) — the same body and the same media without the camera. Cheaper, and the right buy if the photographs are already on a phone.
• •[instax mini 12](/instant-cameras/instax-mini-12-review) — cheaper to buy, twice as expensive to run, and real instant film. The honest trade is set out in Kodak Mini Shot vs instax.
• •If you want the biggest, cheapest print instead, the answer is a desktop unit — see the best 4 x 6 photo printers, where prints land at about 39 cents but nothing fits in a pocket.

Who should buy it

Buy the Mini Shot 2 Retro for someone who will actually make photographs rather than make a few and stop. The 42-cent print and the screen together remove the two things that cause an instant camera to end up in a drawer: the running cost and the frustration of paying for bad frames. For a family, a teenager, a journal-keeper or a classroom, it is the most sensible device in this category.

Do not buy it for someone who asked for a Polaroid or an instax by name. They want instant film, and they will be able to tell within a second that this is not it. For that buyer the honest recommendation is a film camera and the higher running cost that comes with it — are instant cameras worth it is the page that argues both sides, and the best instant cameras has the picks.