Has the Canon 600EX II been discontinued ?

B&H shows it as discontinued. Perhaps Canon considers it to have been replaced by the (much more expensive) EL-1.

There is a rumor of a new speedlite:

Canon Speedlite EL-5 $399

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So they discontinue the only flashes that work with my brand new R5 and will now ONLY sell flashes that don't work with anything but a handful of brand new cameras... How ridiculous. The EL-1 is a moronic unit. $1500 for a flash. Why??? The EL-5 looks interesting, but what the heck are they thinking??? They've given up completely on the dSLR market?

dennirussel said:

So they discontinue the only flashes that work with my brand new R5 and will now ONLY sell flashes that don't work with anything but a handful of brand new cameras... How ridiculous. The EL-1 is a moronic unit. $1500 for a flash. Why??? The EL-5 looks interesting, but what the heck are they thinking??? They've given up completely on the dSLR market?

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The vast majority of DSLRs being sold now entry-level models. The EL-100 works with those (not that many such buyers will get a speedlite, since their camera already has a flash).

I suspect they’re thinking they launched a new hotshoe and no fully compatible flash, so one was needed. I have four 600EX-RTs, but I preordered an EL-5.

dennirussel said:

The EL-1 is a moronic unit. $1500 for a flash.

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Well, it's actually $900, and seems to be holding at that price for a while now. It works with your R5.
Not sure why you say it's moronic, it's actually quite a nice flash.

danfaz said:

Well, it's actually $900, and seems to be holding at that price for a while now.

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Perhaps consider that both Canada and Australia use dollars ($), with current values different than the US$.

In this case:

danfaz said:

Well, it's actually $900, and seems to be holding at that price for a while now. It works with your R5.
Not sure why you say it's moronic, it's actually quite a nice flash.

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Actually, it's $1500 in Canada. Which lead to the whole moronic statement...

neuroanatomist said:

The vast majority of DSLRs being sold now entry-level models. The EL-100 works with those (not that many such buyers will get a speedlite, since their camera already has a flash).

I suspect they’re thinking they launched a new hotshoe and no fully compatible flash, so one was needed. I have four 600EX-RTs, but I preordered an EL-5.

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True re the dSLR sales, but still... They should release an adapter, as with the EF-R. You've got the R3, so you're ok, but a whole heck of a lot of us have picked up an R5 in the not too distant past. Right now, anyone without a flash is officially out of luck! No flashes available besides the used market (or left over stock). Lol - Why in the world would they discontinue the 600 if there wasn't a replacement for one of their top cameras? And the camera most likely to be used by event shooters? That means they're ceding that entire segment to the off brands.

dennirussel said:

Actually, it's $1500 in Canada. Which lead to the whole moronic statement...

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Understood, my mistake.

dennirussel said:

True re the dSLR sales, but still... They should release an adapter, as with the EF-R. You've got the R3, so you're ok, but a whole heck of a lot of us have picked up an R5 in the not too distant past. Right now, anyone without a flash is officially out of luck! No flashes available besides the used market (or left over stock).

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Sorry, I really don’t understand your point. The EL-1 is available. The EL-100 is available. Both mount ‘natively’ on the R5, R6, etc. The 430EX III-RT appears to be still available, as well. Not to mention several 3rd party flashes, including some good brands like Profoto and Godox that mount on-camera.

There are no currently available Canon flashes, or 3rd party flashes AFAIK, that don’t mount natively on the R5 or any camera with the old-style hotshoe. Of course, those flashes also mount directly and function normally (as far as electronics go) on the R3 / R6II / R7 / R10 with the new multifunction shoe.

The only available native flash-like product for the new multifunction shoe is the ST-E10 master (and the ST-E3-RT it replaces appears to still be available). The recently-announced EL-5 is the first flash that requires the multifunction shoe, i.e., is not compatible with the cameras having the old-style hotshoe, and that flash won’t even ship until the end of March 2023.

Until then, if I want a weather-sealed connection between my R3 and a sealed flash like the EL-1 or one of my 600EX’s, I must use the AD-E1 adapter.

If you want a new 600-EX II-RT and only a new 600-EX II-RT then yes, you’re officially out of luck. But to claim there are ‘no flashes available’ for a camera like the R5 is simply false.