DJI Mavic Pro preview: Insanely powerful, portable drone

DJI recently launched its latest drone, and what is easily the most impressive step towards making these high-tech hobby gadgets accessible to the average consumer.

It features many of the same specs and technological advances of the Phantom series drones, but packs them all in to a much smaller, foldable drone capable of fitting in anyone’s backpack or purse. 

DJI Mavic Pro: Design

Perhaps the most impressive feature of the Mavic Pro is its size. We’ve seen a lot of the technology before, on drones like the Phantom 4, but we’ve never seen it packed in to such a compact and portable product.

It’s also a much meaner-looking product, with more of the contours and angular sharp edges of a stealth bomber, than the bulbous, round finish of the Phantom.

Also, unlike the Phantom series, the Mavic Pro doesn’t rest on a built-in set of helicopter-like stands. It almost lies flat on its belly, resting on the short legs which protrude downwards from the quadcopter arms.

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These arms themselves are completely redesigned too, in the fact that they can be easily folded in to the body. The front arms fold inward towards the top of the chassis, while the rear arms pivot downwards to tuck in to the underside, leaving you with a product which easily fits in your hand and can be thrown in to a backpack.

To make it so compact, the designers also had to recreate the camera and three axis gimbal system which holds it in place, and offers smooth stabilisation. It’s not only much smaller than the Phantom’s, it sits on the front of the drone, rather than dangling from underneath.

As for the quadcopter blades, they’ve been designed in a manner which means you don’t have to set them up in the right position before taking flight. Just starting up the motors is enough to force them in to their correct orientation, optimised for flight.

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DJI Mavic Pro: Features

As feature lists go there aren’t many that match the plethora of useful and market-leading technological capabilities of the Mavic, at least not at this price point or in a device this small.

First up, the 2970mAh battery – despite being compact – has been designed to handle between 21 and 27 minutes of flight time, depending on what kind of flying you’re doing, in what conditions and how fast. That’s a maximum distance of eight miles, providing there’s no wind. Obviously the battery is a little less long-lasting if the drone is being forced to contend with a stiff breeze.

Then there’s the proprietary OcuSync transmission built in to the new controller, which has a range up to 4.3 miles (7km). In other words, if you fly it as far away as you can before losing signal, it would more than likely run out of battery before making its way back to you. This same transmission technology is used in the new Goggles VR-type headset for first-person-view through the drone’s camera.

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As with the Phantom, there are a number of important sensors and processors built in to the Mavic, which make it both incredibly easy to use and very high-end.

Starting with the basics, there’s GPS and GLONASS to keep it connected to over 20 positioning satellites to ensure it knows where it is all the time. Then, on the underside, there are sensors to detect how far away from the ground it is as well as cameras to recognise specific parts of the ground.

These cameras are vital for its insane landing accuracy. We witnessed the Mavic Pro landing precisely (within a cm or two) where it took off from using its homing feature.

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To do that, it records some video as it’s taking off, you go fly the drone, and hit the return home button icon on the smartphone screen. It uses GPS/GLONASS to return to the location, then records some more video with the bottom-firing cameras, overlays it on to the video captured at take-off, then matches them up so that it lands in exactly the same place it started from.

DJI claims it can land within an inch of its starting position, and our time with the Mavic so far hasn’t done anything to make us question those claims. It’s really impressive.

Lastly on the sensor side, there are the obstacle avoidance sensors on the front. The drone will automatically detect when something’s coming up ahead, and can see objects up to 15 metres ahead. It’s worth noting, these only work when flying forwards.

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DJI Mavic Pro: Controlling and flight modes

If you’re a first-time drone flyer, there’s no better drone to start with than the Mavic. It’s almost too easy to control.

The aforementioned control pad has two joysticks, these control your height, the direction the drone faces and make it move in any way you see fit. There are also two scroll-wheels on the back, one of which adjusts the angle of the camera gimbal, and the other is programmable.

It’s compact and easy to hold, and can be used on its own, or in conjunction with your smartphone. The smartphone – in essence – becomes a monitor to view the live camera feed at up to 1080p resolution, but also has its own onscreen buttons for landing, returning home and looking at information like drone battery life, signal strength and such.

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Once the drone is in the air, you can signal it with a handful of preset gestures. First wave to get its attention, then tell it to take a selfie, or to track you as you move around. You can even tell it to circle around you at a set height.

Once new flight mode is terrain mode, which uses the sensors on the bottom to ensure it never gets too close to the ground as you walk up a hill, regardless of how high or steep the ground gets.

Of course, for the racers, there’s Sport Mode that gets the drone up to 40mph, which – incidentally – turns off the obstacle avoidance system. On the opposite end of the spectrum is tripod mode which slows things right down, and boosts the sensitivity of the controller to get nice, smooth and slow movements. Perfect for cinematic film-making.

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DJI Mavic Pro: Camera

DJI’s new, smaller camera is capable of shooting video up to 4K resolution at 30 frames per second. Still images are just under 13-megapixels, but more importantly, the stabilisation of the three-axis gimbal ensures everything is smooth and sharp. It’s also controllable, so you can tell it which way to point.

Unlike the Phantom’s, and traditional action cameras, the camera lens isn’t crazy wide. At a little under 79-degrees view, you still get a relatively wide shot, but without so much distortion to blurring towards the edges.

First Impressions

Our first impressions of the drone have been very positive overall. It’s great to see something so small, and so feature rich, hit the market for under £1000. Sure, it would be great if the drone had obstacle avoidance sensors that work at the back, or around the sides, but as it stands, it seems the Mavic Pro is the most exciting drone on the market right now, at least for the average consumer. 

You can find all of our other drone coverage in our dedicated hub.