DJI’s New Foldable Mavic Pro Drone Will Soon Land at Apple Stores

The foldable Mavic Pro, Najberg opined, has a less intimidating form factor than the fixed-arm Phantom, and because it can be flown quickly and easily, he said it may one day become a standard tool for journalists. Karma was meant to be more compact and portable than DJI’s drones, but the DJI Mavic Pro is much, much smaller and lighter. That’s $US50 ($65) less than the larger, camera-less Karma. It’s called the Mavic, and you’re probably going to really, really want one.

Beyond these neat commands, you can also orchestrate the drone’s flight with your hands. In fact, it could be one of DJI Phantom 4’s issues that GoPro was able to fix with the Karma.

While the Mavic Pro has clear similarities to GoPro’s affordable option, this isn’t the first time the two companies have flown into each other’s territory. The Mavic Pro is available for preorder today, and will be available mid-October starting at $749.

It claims a flying time of 27 minutes and weighs 743g.

For hands-free control of the Mavic Pro, users can switch it into Gesture Mode where the FlightAutonomy system will take ove.

But perhaps the standout feature of the new Mavic Pro is its gesture control.

Get ready for the battle of the smaller, higher quality consumer drones. The pricing is very competitive with the Karma.

DJI has priced the Mavic Pro at $999 with the remote controller and $749 without it. DJI is also offering additional batteries for $89 and a bundle with a Mavic Pro, two extra batteries, additional propellers, a charging hub, an adapter, a auto charger, and a bag for $1,299. Eventually, though, the company decided it wanted control of the whole platform and began selling its hugely popular Phantom drones with built-in cameras.

DJI’s camera also looks to be suitably well-specified. It’s equipped with a 12-megapixel camera with 3-axis stabilization that can shoot 4K video at 30 frames per second. Plus, using OcuSync, a transmission system, fliers can stream 1080p video on Facebook Live, Periscope, and YouTube using the DJI Go app.

The Mavic Pro can race up to 22 miles per hour against wind.

The device boasts numerous same features Karma does, including a compact, foldable frame, image-stabilizing hardware, and accessibility features like self-landing.

There are also a collection of new intelligent Trace flight modes including Profile, which makes the drone fly along side of you while filming you. Karma also has that nifty stabilizer and grip handle, allowing it to be used handheld with compatible GoPro cameras, so GoPro devotées will definitely get some added value for their money. GoPro also plans to sell a discounted bundle with the Hero 5 Session for $1,000 next spring.

We recently accompanied DJI’s director of education Romeo Druscher for a test flight here on this classic California seaside bluff. Based on a dramatic turnaround in search volume trends driven by GoPro’s marketing blitz last week, we believe job #1 has been wildly successful so far. DJI says it also updated its tracking tech, so the drone can better detect certain things you might want to automatically keep in the shot including subjects like people, bikes, cars, boats and animals. It also sports two Global Positioning System units and sonar sensors, making it possible for the Mavic Pro to automatically follow you while filming. But you’ll literally need to bring along no more than just the drone, battery and your smartphone, rather than the backpack of gear GoPro would force you to carry. In addition to the joysticks, there are several buttons on the front of the controller that let you start and stop recordings, as well as adjust the camera angle. It does not include a camera. When it returns to land, the Mavic Pro will use the video and the satellite information to return within an inch of its launch location. But whether a drone this powerful and expensive will truly expand the audience for DJI’s products seems like the more important question. The Mavic can fly longer and faster than the Karma.

Furthermore, the GoPro Karma could be more versatile.

DJI unveiled its first DJI Googles Tuesday to pair with its Mavic Pro.

With the product now hitting the markets, more details now available.