A Review of the Godox V1 Flash

Godox is well known for producing affordable, high quality lights that a lot of photographers are quite fond of. The Godox V1 is their entry into the round head speedlight market, and it has captured the attention of a lot of photographers, particularly in the face of the much more expensive Profoto A1. Is it the right speedlight for you? This great review will answer that question.

Coming to you from Wes Perry, this excellent video review takes a look at the Godox V1 round head flash. Many photographers were intrigued by this when it first came out, particularly since it came out at a price about a quarter that of the premium Profoto A1. For the many photographers who are invested in Godox's monolights, it's also the logical addition for more portability and for events work. Along with the round head design, the V1 features a rotation range of 330 degrees, tilt range of -7 to 120 degrees, a magnetic modifier mount, 76 Ws of output, a removable battery that offers up to 480 full-power flashes, and a recycle time of 1.5 seconds. It also features High Speed Sync and a built-in wireless receiver, along with an LED modeling lamp and AF assist lamp, making it quite the enticing option. Check out the video above for Perry's full thoughts. 

Alex Cooke's picture

Alex Cooke is a Cleveland-based portrait, events, and landscape photographer. He holds an M.S. in Applied Mathematics and a doctorate in Music Composition. He is also an avid equestrian.

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14 Comments

I bought a Baofeng scanner. The documentation about scanning channels said "can scan 3 channels/sec. Not the fastest but will work".

I’ve burnt out 6 YN560iv’s, so I gave up on those and switched to Nissin. Then I didn’t much care for those and switched to Godox. Pretty happy there (for now).

I kind of liked the review, but then I found that Wes only reviews Sony and Godox. Something very obvious tells me he hasn't even touched a Profoto A1 and base his review strictly on the price (and no I don't own any Profoto). It's like thanks but no, thanks. I think I'll skip his clips for now on.

I only review things I’m actively using, and have used many times and in many circumstances. I have no interest in opening the box and firing it at the wall a few times and calling that a review. And as a working photographer, I don’t have time to switch ecosystems for a review. So I just do what I have on hand.
If you want a review of the Profoto, there are many other places on YouTube to find such a thing.
But just out of interest, did I not say enough nice things about the Profoto, or too many nice things? 🤔

If only all that sarcasm could remove the fact that you are the one who introduced Profoto to your own Godox vs Godox commercial! I don't want to take more of your working photographer time so goodbye and have a great babablabla.

William Hicks, instead lurking with negative votes in the background, you should really get involved here if you have any problem with my replies. I don't bite. But know that last year I was about to buy 2 Godox 400. They seemed good for some precarious situations in some environment I shoot in at time. The only thing that stopped me is the fact that they don't have hyper sync. Beside, it's becoming very clear with each new model that Godox is modeling it's line of product after Profoto. It's fine, but shaming continually Profoto on forums with the exclusive intention of shaming their pricing when Godox only copy them all the way is clearly not something I would find pride in.

Thanks for the review Wes, I will stay with my 860II and the TT685. Cheers.

Of all the gear I own, my most reviled and detested piece of gear is my Nikon SB700 flash. Thanks for the link. The Godox line of speed lights is worth a closer look.

Yeah, at $300 and $500 USD...I will take the Godox A1 for $70. And it works with Android. I wonder if anyone will call the C1 a Swedish clone :-)

The one thing I was disappointed with V1 is the focus assisted beam which has not been updated/redesigned. The red assisted beam pattern is not wide/bright enough and not centered and only covering top middle part of focus area. So it makes harder and longer to get focus in low light event shoot situations. It is same as TT685 and TT860... was really tempted to get it, but will have to stick with tt685 or canon I own already...

Hi, need some help. In the TT600 series, I could trigger via a Godox remote as well as having the optical trigger on. After I bought the V1, I am not able to find the function to have both to work at the same time.

not sure what I'm doing wrong, but i have a v1-s and the assist beam from the flash doesn't work on either my a7iii or a7r3.

have camera set to AF-S and single shot mode and nothing works.

any ideas? the flash is really terrible in low light conditions especially if using it for something as a nightlife photographer.

with no assist beam, this thing is basically useless.

Sony doesn’t activate the AF assist pin on the hotshot during AF-C, so you’re pretty much out of luck there regardless. Additionally, infrared assist beams can’t be seen by most mirrorless sensors anyway.