Rodenstock Photo Optics traces its origins to a mechanical workshop founded in 1877 by Josef Rodenstock and his brother Michael in Würzburg, Germany. The company relocated to Munich by 1884 and became an important manufacturer of both corrective lenses for glasses and camera lenses by the early 1900s. These two lines began to diverge in the 1960s as the center of photographic lens manufacturing shifted to Japan; the ophthalmic business continued as Rodenstock GmbH while the remaining camera lens business was repositioned to serve the large format and industrial precision optics markets, then spun off in 1996 as Rodenstock Präzisionsoptik. Since then, the precision optics brand has been acquired in succession by LINOS Photonics (Göttingen, 2000), Qioptiq Group (Luxembourg, 2006), and Excelitas Technologies (2013).
Photographic lenses produced by Rodenstock during and since the 20th century include the brands Ysarex, Heligon, Eurygon, Rotelar, Apo-Ronar, Rodagon, and Grandagon for many different lens mounts including M42, Deckel, and large format lens boards.