DJI Mavic 4 Pro review: A new standard for consumer drones

DJI’s much-awaited Mavic 4 Pro drone has launched, but there’s atrocious news. Due to Trump’s tariffs and different marketplace uncertainties (like a potential DJI ban), it’s not yet connected merchantability successful America and there’s nary connection connected erstwhile it volition be, oregon for what price. That volition disappoint US buyers, due to the fact that the Mavic 4 Pro is the astir technologically precocious user drone ever.

With a triple-camera strategy housed successful a wild-looking circular gimbal, it tin sprout up to 6K astatine 60 fps with 16 stops of dynamic range, beating immoderate drone and adjacent astir cameras. DJI besides boosted apical speed, artillery beingness and range, portion improving obstacle avoidance successful debased airy via a caller LiDAR system. Plus, the institution introduced an all-new RC Pro 2 controller with a utile caller foldable design.

I’ve had the Mavic 4 Pro for a mates of weeks present and it performs adjacent amended than the specs would suggest. Though a spot expensive, this drone is truthful polished and susceptible that thing other remotely compares to it.

Design

The trademark feature, arsenic we’ve seen from leaks and a teaser past week, is the large circular triple-camera “Infinity Gimbal” module astatine the front. The thought is to let the gimbal to rotate freely for improved stabilization and absorbing camera angles. It boosts the tilt-up space from 60 to 70 degrees and lets the gimbal rotate astatine immoderate angle, allowing off-kilter “Dutch” camera angles for much absorbing shots. And of course, it tin rotate 90 degrees to present full-resolution vertical video for societal media.

With that caller lodging and somewhat larger batteries, the 2.3 lb Mavic 4 Pro is 0.2 pounds heavier than the Mavic 3 Pro. The propeller arms person been updated truthful they tin beryllium folded and unfolded successful immoderate order, dissimilar the erstwhile model. The assemblage is besides much aerodynamic to boost ratio and speed.

Tucked successful the near propeller limb is simply a forward-facing LiDAR sensor that greatly immunodeficiency nighttime obstacle detection. The drone besides has six omnidirectional fisheye sensors that enactment successful arsenic small arsenic 0.1 lux, which is equivalent to a nighttime entity lit by a afloat moon.

Where the Mavic 3 Pro had conscionable 8GB of interior memory, the modular Mavic 4 Pro is equipped with 64GB of retention (42GB usable), and the Creator Combo mentation comes with a generous 512GB of high-speed retention (460GB usable). Both models person a microSD paper slot arsenic well.

The Mavic 4 Pro ships with the RC2 surface controller archetypal seen with the Air 3 successful the basal and Fly More kits. However, DJI besides introduced the RC2 Pro, a controller dissimilar immoderate I’ve seen before. The agleam 7-inch HDR show folds up to supply a multi-angle presumption and the joysticks present illness into the body. It has a afloat complement of controls for flying and camera operations, including a fastener that flips the camera 90 degrees. The RC2 Pro besides has an HDMI and a USB-C port, on with Wi-Fi 6 enactment for high-speed information transfers.

The caller 95Wh batteries are rated to connection up to 51 minutes of formation time, oregon astir 40-45 minutes successful emblematic use. That’s a important boost from the 30-35 infinitesimal real-world artillery beingness connected the Mavic 3 Pro. Better still, they complaint faster than ever astatine 51 minutes for 1 artillery (via USB-C) oregon 90 minutes for 3 with the Fly More kit charger.

Performance and features

The Mavic 4 Pro tin present deed 56 mph (90 km/h) successful athletics mode without obstacle detection, up from 47 mph before, which volition beryllium a large assistance for filming centrifugal vehicles. Top velocity successful mean mode with tracking and obstacle detection is besides faster astatine 40 mph. It’s inactive a large SUV of a drone, though, truthful it lacks the agility of DJI’s Mini 4 Pro. And with nary prop guards, it’s not advisable to maneuver astir radical oregon successful choky spaces similar the Avata 2.

Noise from the Mavic 4 Pro is unchanged from the Mavic 3 Pro astatine 83 dB. However, the frequence is little and little bothersome, particularly erstwhile it’s flying adjacent to radical — so, er, props to DJI for that improvement.

With the caller O4+ transmission system, the Mavic 4 Pro present offers up to 18.6 miles (30 km) of video transmission range, treble that of the Mavic 3 Pro. Though astir pilots won’t task that acold away, I recovered the Mavic 4 Pro little susceptible to interference and dropouts than before. It besides supports agleam 10-bit HDR 1080p unrecorded video transmission for a higher-quality backup seizure and amended visibility successful sunlight.

Subject tracking is disposable via the ActiveTrack 360 relation (first seen connected the Mini 4 Pro), which allows you to manually power the camera presumption portion keeping your taxable successful frame. It’s besides designed to support subjects successful absorption adjacent if they’re partially obscured.

I tested it with a car, upland motorcycle and portion walking to spot however it worked astatine assorted speeds. The Mavic 4 Pro stayed locked connected a car driving astatine up to 30 mph with afloat obstacle avoidance. When filming the motorcycle rider, the Mavic 4 Pro chose absorbing and random routes astir trees that often yielded cinematic greatness. That behaviour besides caused a clang into a tiny histrion branch, but luckily, it caused nary disposable oregon functional damage. The drone besides worked good arsenic a vlogging tool, pursuing maine connected a preset ActiveTrack 360 path.

Later, I took the Mavic 4 Pro retired astatine nighttime to trial the LiDAR and low-light sensors, flying it up astir trees and adjacent to buildings. That would person been risky with past models, but it successfully detected and avoided each obstacles successful my testing. The low-light capableness volition besides assistance you bring the drone location safely astatine night, arsenic agelong arsenic you retrieve that the LiDAR lone works successful the guardant direction. Return-to-home present functions without GPS successful capable light, arsenic the Mavic 4 Pro tin memorize formation paths.

Video quality

With its caller camera system, the Mavic 4 Pro has the champion video prime I’ve seen connected immoderate user drone. The main Hasselblad-branded 28mm wide camera has a 100-megapixel , dual ISO 4/3 sensor that supports 6K 60 fps oregon 4K 120 fps seizure on with DJI’s nonrecreational D-Log and D-LogM modes to max retired dynamic range. It besides delivers up to 100MP photos. The Mavic 4 Pro is 1 of fewer drones with a adaptable aperture (f/2.0 to f/11) for amended extent of tract power and much usability successful sunlight.

The Infinity Gimbal besides houses a 70mm mean telephoto lens with a 1/1.3-inch sensor similar the 1 connected the Mini 4 Pro. Plus, there’s a longer 168mm camera with a 1/1.5-inch sensor that should beryllium perfect for things similar wildlife tracking. Both diagnostic an f/2.8 aperture, 4K 60p video and D-Log/D-LogM and HDR, on with subject-tracking AF and dual autochthonal ISO.

6K and 4K video prime connected the Hasselblad camera is incredibly crisp and color-accurate, portion providing bully dynamic range, peculiarly with entity and unreality details. Switching implicit to D-Log mode further boosts dynamic range, but makes colour correction a spot trickier. I liked utilizing D-LogM to get a bully equilibrium betwixt easiness of accommodation and dynamic range.

The basal Mavic 4 Pro captures H.265 video up to 180 Mbps, but the Creator Combo mentation — with its faster interior retention — besides supports 1,200 Mbps H.264 All-I for easier editing. However, DJI dropped the ProRes 4:2:2 HQ enactment that was disposable connected the Cine mentation of the Mavic 3 Pro.

Where the Mavic 4 Pro truly beats different drones is successful debased light, acknowledgment to the autochthonal dual ISO capability. When shooting a cityscape astatine dusk astatine ISO 6400 and up, atom was casual to tamp down with a spot of sound reduction. And if shooting astatine dawn oregon dusk, the D-Log mode provides capable dynamic scope to equilibrium airy entity and acheronian crushed areas.

Photo prime is besides outstanding successful the 100MP mode with truthful overmuch item that I could zoom successful and intelligibly spot tiny objects. For low-light shooting, though, it’s champion to instrumentality with 25MP to trim noise. DJI’s RAW DNG seizure makes it casual to fine-tune photos changeable successful contrasty lighting conditions.

The 70mm (3x) 1/1.3-inch telephoto camera is large for taking portraits oregon getting successful tighter erstwhile shooting landscapes. With enactment for 4K astatine up to 120 fps and D-Log oregon D-LogM, it tin easy beryllium mixed and matched with footage from the main camera, though item and low-light capableness isn’t arsenic good. The 168mm 1/1.5-inch camera produces mediocre video quality, but it’s large for capturing wildlife.

Wrap-up

The Mavic 4 Pro is simply a large illustration of however DJI stays acold up of rivals by consistently updating and perfecting its products. It’s an betterment implicit the Mavic 3 Pro successful astir each area, and arsenic mentioned, it doesn’t truly person immoderate contention successful the user space. The closest alternate successful terms and capableness is Autel’s Evo II Pro 6K, but that drone has a single-camera strategy with a smaller sensor, little endurance and shorter range.

The deficiency of US availability is simply a large contented that’s bound to origin a furor with drone enthusiasts successful the States. And there’s inactive a large hazard that income of DJI drones volition beryllium wholly banned successful America by the extremity of the year. The institution insists that its drones airs nary nationalist information hazard and says it welcomes immoderate scrutiny.

The Mavic 4 Pro is present connected merchantability successful astir regions but the United States starting astatine €2,099 oregon £1,879 (about $2,360) with the RC2 controller. You tin besides get it successful the Fly More kit with the RC2 controller, a bag, 3 batteries and a charger for £2,459 and €2,699 ($3,040). The Creator Combo, which includes everything successful the Fly More kit positive the RC2 Pro controller, 512GB of retention and All-I video capture, is €3,539 (£3,209) oregon astir $3,980. The RC2 Pro controller by itself is €999 and €879 (about $1,125).