Sofirn IF23

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Sofirn IF23 specs

Brand & Model	Sofirn IF23
Flashlight category	Camping, general use
LED	XHP50B 6000-6500k + flood LEDs
Max. output	4000 lumens (spot) / 500 lumens (flood)
Max. beam distance	247 meters
Max. beam intensity	15275 cd
Battery config.	1 x 21700
Onboard charging	Yes
Main modes	Many
Blinkies	Yes
Waterproof	IP68
Review publication date	June 2023

Sofirn has become quite a force in the flashlight community over the past few years. This new offering is the IF23 which combines multiple LEDs to offer spot and flood beam profiles using the ever popular 21700 battery format.

Package quality.

The IF23 comes in a pretty retail style packaging with a plastic insert to hold the items. Sofirn include a number of items with the light:

• Sofirn 21700 5000Mah battery
• USB-C cable
• Pocket clip
• Lanyard
• Spare O-ring

The IF23 is compact, but heavy. It is small enough to EDC and the pocket clip lends itself to this kind of use. Although the side button protrudes quite a lot. The flood light part of the light screams camping at me. Although having the magnet in the tailcap could prove useful under a car bonnet or somewhere metal that you could stick the light.

Overall it has a fairly broad general use kind of feel to the light.

The build quality seems pretty good. The anodising is smooth as are the threads. It is a heavy old lump in your pocket though. I’d guess not one for the modders either, but it seems to be well screwed together with no sharp edges anywhere.

The IF23 has a recessed silver bezel/retaining ring on the front. I would assume this is stainless steel. There is a mild orange peel (MOP) reflector and a class lens covering the large, but very cool white XHP50B LED. This is the “spot” end of the IF23. The beam profile is quite nice, with a smooth beam and more flood than you’d normally associate with a “spot” beam. Mean distance is moderate to short.

Along the side of the IF23 below the switch is a panel housing 20 small CSP1313 LEDs for the flood light feature. And nestled between these 20 LEDs is another 10 colour JF-387F-Y LEDs for the colour feature. The panel and switch are contained in a silver anodised surround.

All of this feels solid and well put together, although somewhat angular and chunky in the hand.

The flood beam is smooth with variable output, although no Kelvin rating is given, it is similar to the spot light by eye.

The colour lights can ramp across a range of colours from purple to yellow. Although I am rather baffled at what you’d use the colour lights for apart from a novelty feature. In which case I’d prefer them to not be there at all. While you can change the colour I have not seen or found a way to vary their output. Making them completely redundant for any kind of real world use.

Dimensions: 

Sofirn IF23	Millimeters	Inches
Length	120.5mm	4.75 in
Head diameter	30 mm	1.2 in
Body diameter	27.5mm	1.1 in

Dimensions are rounded to the nearest millimeter, and to the nearest tenth of an Inch.

Weight: 

Sofirn IF23	Weight in grams	Weight in oz
Without battery:	125g	4.4 oz

Weight is rounded to the nearest gram, and to the nearest tenth of an Oz.

Flashlight size comparison with its competition:

Group 1: Sofirn IF23, Maglite XL200

Group 2: Sofirn IF23, ZebraLight SC600w IV Plus, Nitecore LA30

The user interface is certainly the area I have most complaints with on the IF23. For me, a staple of a good UI is one you can figure out and use without the need for instructions. In the case of the IF23, even having the instructions in front of you, it is still a real chore to try and fathom.

I think its main issue is, it is trying to do way too many things from a single switch. Plus it does some things automatically in the background. I have been unable to completely understand all of the actions the light does. I have certainly used it in a way that isn’t covered in the instructions. But I do not know how I managed this. It also seems to do things that seem contrary to the instructions. Much of this is around the auto lockout feature. But you can certainly get yourself in a total pickle after only a few clicks. To the point you even end up unscrewing the tailcap to try and reset it.

Available modes: 

• Too many :–)

Available blinky modes:

• Yes

From OFF:

• Press and hold: Moonlight
• Single click: On, but it might flash at you or something do something else
• Double click:  Turbo
• 3 fast clicks: Switch to Flood or Colour mode
• 4 fast clicks: Lock

From ON:

• Press and hold: Scroll outputs
• 1 click:  Off unless in Turbo
• Double click: Switch to Flood or Colour mode
• 3 fast clicks: Switch to Flood or Colour mode
• 4 fast clicks: Lock

Mode memory:

• I think so, although it is unclear how it is set and when it is activated

Shortcuts:

• To Low: Sometimes
• To Turbo: Usually but not always
• To Strobe: No

Low voltage warning:

• Yes, the switch has another coloured LED to show battery state

Strobe/blinkies

• Multiple modes

Lock-out mode: 

• Yes, it is automatic after 3 mins or you can manually lock it. I have not found a way to disable the auto locking feature sadly.

PWM

• None that I could detect

Additional/summary info on the UI: 

• Probably one of the worst UI’s on the market

Sofirn does include a 5000mAh battery with the IF23 and as it has onboard charging you are ready to go without any other hardware. They even include a suitable length USB-C charging cable.

Charging is very easy, pop open the rubber cover of the USB-C port and plug it in. The light in the middle of the switch will be red for charging and green for fully charged. The switch light also works as a battery meter too which is handy.

The included battery does seem to hold the light back in terms of performance, I found significantly more output using a slightly better INR 21700 battery, but the included one will get the job done.

Lumen measurements

How Lumens are Measured: Understanding ANSI FL1 Standards How Lumens are Measured: Understanding ANSI FL1 Standards: The ANSI FL1 standards specify that output in lumens should be measured 30 seconds after turning on, as this is the standardized time for measuring brightness according to the industry standard. This is why we focus on this part in our measurements. The ANSI FL1 standards require an ambient temperature of 22 ± 3°C. We record the ambient the ambient temperature to identify potential reasons for any observed discrepancies.

Lumen measurements (for each mode)

** Sofirn 5000mAh 21700 battery

* Molicel INR 21700 battery

The IF23 seemed to perform significantly better using the Molicel battery rather than the supplied Sofirn branded one. 

Spot Mode:

Mode	Specs	turn on	30 sec	10 minutes
Moon	1	1*	1*	1
Low	100	110*	109*	–
Med	500	480*	477*	–
High	1500	1257* (1070**)	1228* (1051**)	635*
Turbo	4000	3251lm* (2831**)	2968 lm* (2644**)	525*

Flood Mode:

Mode	Specs	turn on	30 sec	10 minutes
Moon	1	6	6	6
Low	10	18	18	18
Med	50	135	134	–
High	150	368	358	119
Turbo	500	1116	1034	345

Battery Life: Runtime graphs

How Runtimes are Measured: Understanding ANSI FL1 Standards About ANSI FL1 runtime standards: The runtime is measured until the light drops to 10% of its initial output (30 seconds after turning on). This does not mean that the flashlight is not usable anymore. The last column shows how long the light actually works till it shuts off. If there is a + symbol, it means that the test was stopped at that particular point, but the light was actually still running. This happens on certain occasions, with certain drivers, firmware, or batteries.

Spot:

Mode	Specified runtime	Measured runtime ANSI	Time till shut off
Moon	27 days	?	?
Low	17h 36min	?	?
Med	4h	?	?
High	2h 30min	3h 21min	?
Turbo	2h	2h 42min	?

Sofirn does not display any claims for the floodlight runtimes in the instruction manual.

Flood:

Mode	Specified runtime	Measured runtime ANSI	Time till shut off
Moon	?	?	?
Low	?	?	?
Med	?	?	?
High	?	3h 30min	?
Turbo	?	3h 30min	?

Peak beam intensity and beam distance measurements

About Peak beam intensity: Understanding ANSI FL1 Standards About peak beam intensity The calculated value of distance in meters at which the flashlight produces a light intensity of 0.25 lux. (0.25 lux is about the brightness of a full moon shining on an object). This means that the intensity has decreased so much, it becomes difficult to see darker objects, or objects that don’t reflect light. The columns ‘Meters’ and ‘Yards’ use rounded numbers.

Spot:

Mode	Specs	Candela measured	Meters	Yards
Low	425 cd	554	47 m	51 yd
Medium	2092.5 cd	2134	92 m	101 yd
High	6375 cd	5136	143 m	156 yd
Turbo	15275 cd	9737 cd	197 m	215 yd

Flood:

Mode	Specs	Candela measured	Meters	Yards
High	115.5 cd	112	21 m	23 yd
Turbo	380 cd	234 cd	31 m	34 yd

Camera settings and distance: Canon EOS 200D – Canon 18-55mm EFS IS – 2”/F6.3/ISO 400/WB 5200k “Daylight”

15m

• Sofirn IF23
• JetBEAM RRT01 Raptor Nichia 219

100m distance:

Beamshots of the following flashlights compared:

• Sofirn IF23
• Astrolux EA01 SST-40
• 4Sevens Maelstrom MMU SST-90

Disclaimer: This flashlight was sent to me for review at no cost by Sofirn. I have not been paid to review, nor have I been holding back on problems or defects.