How valuable is an extra year of warranty on lenses?

I guess another way of asking is how reliable generally are camera lenses, and if they do fail, are they likely to do within the first 2 years of ownership, or rather after like 5-6 years?

I ask because Amex extends the manufacturer warranty by 1 year. So if I buy a lens with AMEX, for Canon I'd get 2 years instead of 1.

The drawback is my Amex card doesn't give me as good cash back as some of my other cards, so say on a $500 dollar lens, using an Amex may cost me $25. Seems fairly cheap for an extended warranty, but then again maybe I'm "paying" for something I don't really need?

I've never had a lens break and i buy all refurbish and used lenses.

I would venture that bodies will die a lot faster than lenses, even those with IS. As long as you don't drop the lens or throw sand all over it, it should last a very long time.

I buy every lens used; heavily used. And I use them hard; in rain, snow, sand, grit, dust, grease, etc. Never has a Canon lens failed me. Can't see much value in a warranty at all.

The only lens 'failures' I have ever seen are
1) user caused--letting camera swing into a stone wall, striking zoom lens and jamming zoom
2) 50 year old lens in need of cleaning oil on aperture blades, which causes aperture to actuate slowly

Does your card just extend the warranty or does it add insurance for loss and damage ?

Agree, lenses generally only break due to abuse or accident, which wouldn't be covered by most warranty anyway.

Aftermarket warranty is generally never worth it. Otherwise, why would the company offer it?

saintz wrote in post #15069356
Agree, lenses generally only break due to abuse or accident,....

There are plenty of thread here at POTN of lenses having broken. 100-400 tension locks that no longer lock, IS failures, lenses that no longer zoom the whole range. However, if you look at those and the number of lenses out there the chance of yours breaking is very small. It can happen but odds are that it wont.

My personal experiences with the 15 or so lenses I have or have had is that I've had issues right out of the box, several front/back focus issues and one lens with a sticky aperture, but all those were fixed within the first few weeks of owning the lens and no failures since.

Don't you have to send the lens in and then get reimbursed by Amex?

You have to weight it against simply sending the lens in to fix.

The only lens that has failed me, so far is my Sigma. Only recently and I've had it for 6 years. Can't say the same about a Canon Speedlite.

Have bought many used lenses, their reliability has remained the same throughout the time i've had them.

You could buy an extra 6 year warranty for a new Canon lens (less than 1000$ value) from Mack for 20$.
That means in general the rate of manufacturing defect is very low.