The Mini 3 Pro significantly outperforms its bigger sibling, costing almost as much as the larger Mavic Air 2 once a remote control is added (not included on the base model), but it also wins our new Editors’ Choice award for enthusiast camera drones. also you can check our article on DJI Mini 3 Pro review. The Mini 3 Pro, DJI’s newest and lightest Pro drone, is a replacement for earlier Mini drones that the company offered. One of DJI’s smallest form factors now boasts a top-notch camera, a tri-directional object avoidance technology, and an extensive feature set thanks to the Mini 3 Pro. DJI seems to cram more functions into ever-smaller drones with each new iteration. A relatively small drone with a mirrorless camera sensor, professional video quality, and more, the Mavic 3 was introduced last year. Now, it has transferred much of that technology to the Mini 3 Pro, an even smaller drone. On paper, it is more capable than the Mavic Air 2, a drone that is more than twice as big.
Design
The folding structure of Dji never ceases to surprise. Four hinges allow two rotor arms to fold inward towards the main body while the other two rotate into a position that is comparable. The design is straightforward but flawlessly implemented. The mini 3 Pro truly lives up to its name when it is folded up. On a budget airline flight with only under-seat luggage, we were able to fit the drone and its controller into a rucksack along with four days’ worth of clothing. The drone could even fit into a coat pocket if we were wearing one with room to spare. The delicate motorized gimbal that supports the 4K camera fights against gravity to keep it level at all times. The gimbal adjusts so swiftly that even when the drone is pitching sharply forward or backward, the camera remains pointed precisely where you want it to. There is only one battery pack, and it fits into the back of the body. Additionally, a USB-C port for charging and a microSD card slot are located here. This drone is free from almost all recreational flying regulations because it weighs less than 250g. In other words, if the motors fail, it is believed that quadcopters of such minimal weight can be flown over humans without raising any safety concerns. The Dji mini 3 pro can therefore be flown almost anywhere, and it only needs a few seconds to unfold, turn on, connect to the controller, and take off.
DJI Mini 3 Pro review: Features
Obstacle avoidance was absent from earlier Mavic Mini models, so the addition of this practical feature, made possible by a tri-directional obstacle sensing system with front, rear, and downward-facing wide-angle sensors, is very much appreciated. Along with Advanced Pilot Assistance Systems 4.0 (APAS 4.0), this gives you the option of setting collision avoidance to either fly around obstacles or to brake when one is detected. Additionally, this adds features like Quickshots and subject tracking/Follow Me that were previously missing from Mavic Mini drones. You can shoot cinematic video footage with the help of Quickshots, a collection of automatic flight patterns. While the FocusTrack Suite offers three options for manual flight while the camera tracks a predefined subject, two for tracking moving and static subjects autonomously. The Mini 3 Pro is now a highly capable device overall thanks to these added capabilities and camera enhancements. The Mini 3 Pro may be used in a variety of settings because to its versatility and low weight despite its small size and low wind resistance of just under 24mph. Additionally, there are the common Cine, Normal, and Sport modes, each of which offers a range of functionality and flight speeds, with Sport offering the fastest top speed of up to 35.7 mph.
DJI Mini 3 Pro review: Image quality
When it comes to a drone’s camera, image quality is quite important. It is amazing what DJI has accomplished with such little cameras. The drone cameras Osmo Pocket, Osmo Action, and their pedigree, which dates back to the Phantom series, all build upon one another to continuously enhance the camera’s quality. DJI keeps coming up with new ideas and demonstrates a preference for producing high-quality cameras with a compact design. The Mini 3 Pro’s camera produces incredibly sharp and clear video. In fact, it sometimes borders on being too sharp for our tastes. It has a respectable dynamic range, accurate color reproduction, and can deliver a great image right out of the camera with little effort. You can get more out of this capable small camera if you record video using D-Cinelike. For those interested in drone photography, it also captures stunning 48 MP stills in RAW. Filming in D-Cinelike at 4K 48p and above with an ISO of 1,600 or below produces the best-looking footage. Considering the price of this camera, the footage is pretty useable and considerably less murky than that of its predecessors. Higher ISO settings result in excessive built-in noise reduction processing, so we advise sticking with the previously suggested settings.
Video quality
The Mini 3 Pro takes fantastic video. Neutral density (ND) filters were not used when recording the videos for our tests because they weren’t accessible. As a result of the quick shutter speeds necessary to balance exposure against the quick f/1.7 fixed aperture, the 4K footage is a little choppy. However, when shooting video, the detail and sharpness are excellent throughout the frame, and using ND filters will result in fluid footage when shot at the right shutter speed for the frame rate of the video being captured. If you want to shoot video, you must purchase an ND filter set from DJI separately. Three different video resolutions can be recorded: 4K (up to 60p), 2.7K (up to 60p), and FHD (up to 120p). When recorded at 120 frames per second, the latter offers slow-motion video. The Mini 3 Pro is suitable for both amateur and professional video capture because it has a maximum video bitrate of 150Mbps and offers both Normal and D-Cinelike colour profiles. The ability to shoot D-Cinelike with 10-bit colour depth has been enabled by a firmware update. While this does not increase the drone’s dynamic range, it does give colour graders more freedom to edit scenes without problems like colour banding in the skies. A digital zoom option is also available, offering 2x zoom at 4K resolution, 3x zoom at 2.7K resolution, and 4x zoom at FHD resolution. Despite the quality loss, FHD ultimately produces the best results up to a 2x zoom, but this must be used with caution. also you will learn our article on DJI Mini 3 Pro review.
Flight performance
Compared to its predecessor, the Mini 3 Pro’s design is significantly more geared toward forward motion, but other than that, it flies similarly to any modern Mavic drone. There isn’t much to it because all of the drones in this family are quite simple and secure to fly. Like any drone, it will be pushed around by moderate to strong winds. However, the Mini 3 is a little more prone to strong gusts due to its lightweight body. Although the built-in gimbal can correct for any shake caused by the wind, a heavier drone might be preferable if you need it to hover still all the time. Imagine that after you’ve already taken off, the wind picks up. you can read our article on DJI Mini 3 Pro review. In that situation, the Mini 3 appears to be more able to fly into headwinds than the previous Mini models because to its revised body and stronger motors. More significant obstacle avoidance is something we felt the larger models lacked. The Mini 3 Pro contains sensors for the front, bottom, and back, though we weren’t totally satisfied with the rear sensor’s accuracy. These sensors have a respectably large field of view. Although most of them are disabled in intelligent flight modes, including lateral movement, there is still a sizable blind spot on the sides that won’t shield you.
DJI Mini 3 Pro review: Battery life
Every generation sees a slight increase in flight times, and the Mini 3 Pro continues this trend by flying for 34 minutes as opposed to the Mini 2’s 31 minutes. Three minutes longer may not seem like much, but when you account for takeoff, landing, and the time it takes to frame a shot, that extra 10% is actually closer to 15% or 20% longer. For those that require even more time, DJI also offers a “Flight Battery Plus” with a staggering 47-minute runtime. The combined weight of the battery and the regular model, however, exceeds the 250g limit that permitted the drone to operate without being registered. Using the Mini 3 Pro’s standard battery, we were able to fly the device for up to 27 minutes while recording 4K video before we had to bring it inside. It takes roughly an hour for the battery to fully recharge after that. At the time of the review, the ‘Plus’ battery wasn’t accessible for testing.
Price
Three different configurations of the Mavic Mini 3 Pro will be offered, as well as a Fly More Bundle that includes extra batteries and other practical extras. The price of the drone has drastically increased since the Mavic Mini 2, thus it isn’t as budget-friendly as its predecessor. The first choice is for consumers who already have a suitable controller to purchase the Mini 3 Pro without a controller for $669 / £639 instead. The second kit costs $759 / £709 and includes a DJI RC-N1 controller. The Mavic 3, Mavic Air 2S, Mavic Air 2, and Mavic Mini 2 all ship with the same controller. The third kit costs $909 (£859) and includes the new DJI RC Smart Controller.
Conclusion
The DJI Mini 3 Pro is a strong and powerful drone despite its small size. Our testing show that it is completely viable for solar surveying and that flying it is enjoyable. Two warnings apply to this drone: the first is that certain functionalities cannot be used simultaneously due to restrictions in the DJI Fly app. Second, due to its extremely small size, it is challenging to operate in even moderate gusts. Although you can work around these two problems, they do make solar surveying flights slightly more manual and require a more specialised pilot skill set. Nevertheless, they are not deal breakers.
