topic EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out in Speedlite Flashes

EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

brianbhood — Thu, 19 Sep 2024 15:44:04 GMT

I have an EL-10 that I use as a sender unit on top of my R6II to connect to two EL-5 Speedlites off camera. The link to the EL-5 keeps dropping out. It is random. It might a a few seconds, it might be 10 minutes. It might be EL-5#1 or EL-5#2. To re-establish the link, I have to power down and power back up. This does not work during a client shoot.

I have tried using an EL-5 as the sender with an EL-5 as receiver and the EL-10 as receiver. The EL-5 still drops link and the EL-10 has not been noticed to drop link. Canon has recommended I send them in for warranty service. Before I go to the trouble, I am wondering if anyone else has had this same problem and, if so, did you get it fixed short of repairs? It seems to me that it is a system issue since I have it with two EL-5 units. If it was only one unit, it might be a defective unit, but not likely two.

I am a bit concerned as I read this being prevalent with other flashes like the 600EX-RT and no solution has been shared publicly.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

John_Q — Tue, 24 Sep 2024 22:27:13 GMT

Hello brianbhood,

I would recommend going into the Custom Functions menu on the EL-5 flashes and disabling all Auto power off options to see if this helps. C.Fn-10 is the auto power off timer for when this unit is used as a receiver. I would still disable C.Fn-01 as well as this auto power off option kicks in after only 90 seconds.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

brianbhood — Tue, 24 Sep 2024 22:33:38 GMT

Thanks. I checked all the settings before posting but that doesn't work. I scanned for the best channel. That doesn't work. Over the past few days I ran 27 tests and the system stayed linked for the full hour only three times. That's an 89% failure rate. The link dropped as early as one minute through about 10 minutes. No rationale on why or what causes it. I plan to send them in to Canon for repairs. I am guessing they will tell me it works fine in their shop but that doesn't matter. I need it to work find in my studio at home. It's an average home, by the way. Nothing special electronically, simple Wi-Fi, Bluetooth devices, etc. Common stuff. The system needs to work anywhere and everywhere regardless of electronic devices around.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

brianbhood — Tue, 10 Dec 2024 18:58:20 GMT

Update: These EL-5 flashes are garbage. $10K to migrate over from Nikon only to find the the final step, the flashes do not work. I have been back and forth with Canon for over two months. Canon claims that since the link drop does not happen in their lab, my problem is not valid. I need the flashes to work in my home studio, their lab is irrelevant. Once sent back to me, they predictably failed, so I contacted Canon who finally admitted that there were others reporting the same problem. I do not know if that is true or they were blowing sunshine up my skirt. I suspect the latter since there has been no movement toward a solution. Canon told me they referred my problem to Canon Japan for a possible firmware update. That was mid October. Several lost photo shoots later, and still no answer on the horizon, I escalated this to a supervisor. She did not know anything about a firmware fix, but she offered to send me two new EL-5 flashes and let me keep the two non-performing ones that I have. I fully expect the new ones to fail as well since I seriously doubt two EL-5 flashes were coincidently defective at the same time. Meanwhile, I understand the the EL-1 and EL-5 is being recalled in Japan. The point here is that my studio is in my home, and average ranch style home. We have Wi-Fi and a handful of Bluetooth devices, nothing special. These flashes need to work EVERYWHERE, not just Canon's controlled lab and certainly in an average home with little radio interference. Stay tuned.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

JohnnyF-CT — Wed, 01 Jan 2025 17:24:23 GMT

Hi all.

New to Canon equipment. I have an EOS R8 with various lenses. Recently purchased a Speedlite EL-5 and a ST-E10 transmitter and I'm the victim of the infamous Wireless signal drop issue.

Going to return the ST-E10. Can't return the EL-5.

In reading various posts, seems the GODOX transmitter and receiver scenario will suit my needs. Folks have mentioned the combination of the GODOX transmitter X-Pro II C and GODOX X1RC receiver seems to work well.

Does anyone have experience with the newer GODOX X3 trigger? It's a newer version of the X-Pro II C and wondering if anyone has experience with it working on the R8 or Canon Multifunction hotshoe?

Thanks in advance

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

brianbhood — Wed, 01 Jan 2025 22:29:10 GMT

I highly encourage you to report your EL-5 problems to Canon. My EL-10 has never failed but all of my EL-5's fail in some way. They work fine at my office, mother in law's house, and outside my neighborhood, but not in my house. There must be some interference but Canon needs to figure out how to run these units in a typical home. Supposedly they are working on it, but nothing so far in three months. They send me two new EL-5's recently and both of those failed so I have a total of four EL-5's that all fail.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

JohnnyF-CT — Wed, 01 Jan 2025 23:01:45 GMT

Will do. Tried to find a way to report the issue on canon.com but haven't figured out yet how to do that outside the community

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

brianbhood — Wed, 01 Jan 2025 23:19:42 GMT

Call Dale at Canon USA (877.277.8122) or (vacpsservice@cusa.canon.com). Tell him Brian referred you :). Seriously, if you reference this forum and the problems I have been having he should know about it. We have spoken a lot during this issue. Thanks for helping out by reporting it.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

Nick55 — Mon, 06 Jan 2025 20:48:42 GMT

The issue of “ Link Drop” coined by yours truly, has been going on for years.
My 5 600 EX-RT paired with 2 ST-E3 RT on two 5D Mark III started exactly two years ago.
shipped four 600 and both Transmitters to Virginia. They did do a firm ware update on Transmitters as they now say Sender, not on 600 as they still have Master or Slave.
controlled lab and could not get to fail. Arrived at my home, opened all units and same results….. Link Drop.
back on the phone and still no results.
it’s their components for Radio that are failing and unwilling to verify and come up with solutions.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

brianbhood — Mon, 06 Jan 2025 20:59:00 GMT

Thanks for the info, Nick. I'm curious if you (or others) find it only happens in certain places. For example, this only happens to me in my home and my neighborhood. My flashes work just fine at my office, my mother in laws house, and outdoors (outside my neighborhood). However, they fail at my home and my neighbor's home and without consistency. I simply cannot figure out what might be causing it and the more tests I do with inconsistent results, the more it bugs me. Any thoughts?

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

JLCKJC — Sun, 12 Jan 2025 21:45:35 GMT

This is a known issue with the Canon flash wireless radio system (RT system). See the many posts in this forum and elsewhere about the wireless flash link dropping issue. It appears to affect all Canon wireless flashes and triggers that use the Canon RT wireless system from older, now retired units, to their most recently introduced flashes and triggers. They are not suitable for the wireless environments in which they would be commonly used. Canon has been slow to acknowledge this issue, and it is unknown whether they are working on a solution that would improve the wireless connectivity of the system.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

onlysublime — Thu, 30 Jan 2025 08:58:27 GMT

I solved my 600EX II-RT problems and posted a help thread. The bottom line is the sleep mode disables the connection and the only recovery is to power cycle all the devices (the flashes, the camera). So what I did on my EOS R5ii was to change the sleep mode from its default of 3 minutes to 30 minutes. As long as I do something within 30 minutes (which prevents it from sleeping), the connection is maintained.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

brianbhood — Thu, 30 Jan 2025 15:36:20 GMT

Thanks. Unfortunately, that does not solve the EL-5 and EL-1 issues as they are related to the RT system hardware. Canon is no help and does not seem to care about a solution. I wish it was as simple as a sleep mode setting.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

JLCKJC — Thu, 30 Jan 2025 18:00:25 GMT

Some users on this forum have already suggested this solution for the 600EX-II-RT dropped link issue. Unfortunately, for the vast majority of users, this does not work, Furthermore, many tests have shown that electromagnetic (radio) interference in the 2.4GHz band is the culprit. Even Canon suggest this as a cause but has yet to do anything about it. Long ago I turned off all the power saving functions in my camera equipment including in my Canon RT flash system. The problem persists. This is not a solution for the vast majority of users.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

brianbhood — Mon, 02 Feb 2026 19:20:35 GMT

UPDATE: The October firmware update to 1.20 seems to have corrected the link issues. At least at my house and studio, it has yet to fail. It took two years but at least they issued the firmware update.

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

JLCKJC — Mon, 02 Feb 2026 19:34:32 GMT

To what update are you referring? What units need to be updated?

Thanks!

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

JCFernPhoto — Sat, 21 Feb 2026 19:36:52 GMT

I would advise performing a firmware update on your Canon EL-5 to get it to Ver 1.2.0. This firmware update was released 10/14/2025

In my use case using multiple EL-5 units as remotes, with a firmware-updated EL-5 or firmware-updated ST-E10 as a controller, I am no longer plagued by the dreaded "link-drop"

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

JLCKJC — Wed, 25 Feb 2026 00:00:15 GMT

As far as I know this problem has not been resolved. You are experiencing the same issues reported by many Canon flash system users. The complaints have been largely ignored. The system is not robust enough to work reliably in today's crowded Wi-Fi/wireless environment. The EL-5 and EL-10 units use the same radio system the earlier 600EX-RTs used, so it suffers the same issues.

If you read through the reports in this forum, you will see that the problems you are seeing affect both old and new Canon flash units. You can send your units in to Canon service to see what they have to say, but I'll bet you dollars to donuts they will tell you there were no issues found.

Keep us posted on what you do.

Good luck!

Re: EL-5 Speedlite Link Drops Out

Curamantel — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 00:13:49 GMT

Hello, I use this setup - One Speedlite EL-1 on camera (R5 MarkII) and one EL-1 and one EL-5 off-camera. I group them together via wireless. They “link” up right away. I now have one sender and two receivers. Within a few seconds the “link” used to drop. I just upgraded to Firmware 1.1.0 on the EL-1’s and 1.2.0 on the EL-5’s and the connection has stabilized and hasn’t dropped since. I’ll keep this post updated as I continue to test.

I sent in a Canon support request and I got a response suggesting to use the “Scan” on the Sender and set the Channel to the strongest as shown on the resulting graphical analysis. I never got the graph to show on the EL-1. I think the channels get set automatically to the best available amongst all the flashes.