Within the nice battle of the manufacturers, it virtually all the time comes all the way down to Autel and DJI when evaluating the very best drones. It may’t be helped!
DJI continues to guide the drone {industry}, with the Mini 3 Professional as considered one of its most interesting improvements so far. It’s been considered one of my favorites since its launch, and regardless that the Mini 4 Professional has come out since, there are nonetheless many days the place I’d fairly fly my Mini 3.
However oh, the Autel EVO Lite and its four-axis gimbal. That’s a factor of magnificence, proper there.
So, which is best? It’s time to determine.
This evaluation will examine and distinction the Autel EVO Lite and DJI Mini 3 Professional, analyzing their variations in areas like efficiency, digicam and video high quality, transmission distance, security options, battery life, and good options. As you learn, you could understand why the Mini 3 Professional – my private choose – is a tricky one to beat.
I’ve loved utilizing each these drones completely, and I’m glad to share my flight experiences with you to information your choice so that you don’t waste a cent of your hard-earned moolah.
Transient overview
Autel EVO Lite
The Autel EVO Lite has among the absolute best options yow will discover in a shopper drone, particularly for beneath $1,000.
Granted, the EVO Lite simply squeaks by for that worth if you choose the Premium Bundle, but it surely’s decrease price if you are going to buy the usual version.
This drone got here out in January 2022, which already seems like a coon’s age within the drone world, because it was effectively over a 12 months in the past. I stored ready, considering some product from DJI would have a four-axis gimbal apart from the Ronin 4D, but it surely hasn’t.
That makes the EVO Lite the king of its fortress. So, what sorts of options does this drone have? Let’s have a look.
- An industry-leading four-axis gimbal. Autel calls it the “first on the earth,” however what’s clear is that you just actually can’t discover this in any DJI shopper drone. The gimbal goes the additional mile for the drone’s stability, making certain your photographs and movies are laser-sharp and lightning-focused.
- A world-class 1/1.28-inch CMOS sensor that shoots in 4K HDR and 50 MP picture decision with RYYB coloration filtering. The share of sunshine absorption that occurs with this mild array is bigger than most, resulting in crystal-clear pictures and excessive ranges of element for constructing a powerful portfolio.
- Glorious impediment avoidance cameras that may see as much as 150 levels in entrance of the drone, bettering your security whether or not you’re a newbie or a seasoned vet.
- A battery lifetime of 40 minutes, a regular for Autel that is still spectacular, nonetheless. Working extra effectively is simpler with Autel.
- Configurable choices, like a regular or upgraded bundle, and two colours, together with my private favourite – orange. It’s an important selection for higher visibility!
» MORE: Autel vs. DJI – Which Drones Are Higher?
DJI Mini 3 Professional
The Mini 3 Professional got here out later than the EVO Lite, in Might versus January 2022. It’s an upgraded model of the unique Mini 3 and was later adopted up by the Mini 4 Professional.
So, positive, the Mini 3 Professional isn’t the innovative anymore, however this drone nonetheless has a lot to like.
There’s a cause I and plenty of different drone pilots can’t cease speaking about it a 12 months and a half after its preliminary launch.
Really, there are numerous causes, they usually embrace the next.
- An ultra-lightweight profile of beneath 250 grams, making the Mini 3 Professional mild sufficient that you just don’t must register it when flying as a hobbyist. It’s additionally transportable, foldable, and able to go on each journey in your bucket record, as you possibly can all the time discover house for it in your carry-on or checked baggage.
- A 1/1.3-inch CMOS sensor that shoots pictures in 48 MP RAW and 4K HDR. The RAW recordsdata are filled with wealthy, unique element, simply as you captured them.
- Prime Clever Flight Modes, together with slow-mo video, True Vertical Capturing, Hyperlapses, MasterShots, Digital Zoom, FocusTrack, and Panorama. These modes automate drone flight for cinematic masterpieces you possibly can ship on the go utilizing QuickTransfer.
- Three-direction dual-vision impediment sensing and APAS 4.0 for impediment avoidance, a characteristic the Mini collection has not all the time had. This makes the Mini 3 Professional one of many most secure within the collection to fly.
- Help for daytime and nighttime flights (in case you’re legally allowed to) so you possibly can proceed having fun with the enjoyable along with your Mini 3 even after darkish.
» MORE: Tips on how to Join DJI Mini 3 / Mini 3 Professional to Wi-Fi (Step-by-Step Information)
Fast verdict
Listed below are two drones that got here out inside the final 12 months and – much more pertinently – inside six months of each other. But they’re so distinctive in lots of ways in which selecting the very best one was tough.
I’ve loved flying the EVO Lite and Mini 3 Professional, and whereas they shine in varied areas, you’re not right here since you wish to purchase each. You solely need one.
Right here at Droneblog, we’re dedicated to recommending solely essentially the most wonderful drones to you for leisure {and professional} use. These strategies come after a whole lot of hours of flight testing.
We’ve concluded that the DJI Mini 3 Professional is superior to the Autel EVO Lite, though granted, it isn’t by a lot. The Mini 3 Professional has equal video high quality and comparable picture high quality, whereas its security options are in the identical league as Autel. Nevertheless, its Clever Flight Modes can’t be beat.
The EVO Lite will all the time stay considered one of my favorites.
It has a lot the Mini 3 Professional doesn’t, resembling an extended battery and a greater gimbal. It’s a superb selection in so many respects and a drone I’m personally fairly obsessive about.
It’s an important drone for a lot of pilots, however I believe the Mini 3 Professional continues to be higher.
» MORE: Autel Evo Lite+ Evaluate
What are the primary variations?
Now that you just’ve seen my suggestion for the very best drone of the 2, let’s take a deep dive into how they’re totally different.
There are sufficient options between these two drones that it doesn’t matter what you like, you may get what you’re searching for.
- Gimbal: The Mini 3 Professional has a three-axis gimbal, the usual for DJI drones. Oppositely, it’s a four-axis gimbal for the EVO Lite, a distinction price noting. The extra axis provides a pan mechanic, giving the EVO Lite’s digicam a better diploma of management and precision throughout operation, however a three-axis gimbal is simply effective for many pilots.
- Picture high quality: Right here is one other class the place the EVO Lite excels. It shoots in 50 MP picture high quality, whereas it’s solely 48 MP for the Mini 3 Professional. Nevertheless, the DJI drone additionally takes RAW footage, so I might argue the standard and element are comparable.
- Weight: Right here’s an space the place the distinction between these two drones is extra obvious. The EVO Lite weighs a reasonable 835 grams, but it surely looks like a heavyweight in comparison with the Mini 3 Professional. You’ll recall that it solely weighs 249 grams, so the Autel drone is about 4 occasions heavier.
- Shade choices: The EVO Lite is accessible in vibrant orange for nice visibility or grey for an understated type. You possibly can’t select the colour of the Mini 3 Professional, or any DJI drone, for that matter.
» MORE: DJI Mini 3 Professional – Tips on how to Manufacturing unit Reset (Step-by-Step Information)
Autel EVO Lite
Autel proved that it’s keen to push the envelope and innovate simply as a lot, if no more so, than DJI when it launched the EVO Lite, a starring version in its EVO Lite Collection.
Let’s get proper to it and focus on the gimbal as a result of it’s one of the vital distinct options of the EVO Lite.
It’s a four-axis gimbal able to panning, yawing, pitching, and rolling with extra precision and accuracy than three-axis gimbals.
The EVO Lite can shoot vertically, a characteristic DJI has already supplied in a number of of its drones, so that is Autel’s reply to that.
Talking of taking pictures, you’ll end up getting carried away with this drone’s video and photograph capabilities, as they’re unbelievable. Its tiny 1/1.28-inch CMOS sensor has a 50 MP picture decision and 4K HDR video decision.
That’s not the best video res in an Autel drone, however it’s among the many greatest picture high quality yow will discover in its drones.
Autel calls the digicam “supersensitive,” and I might agree with that sentiment, in the easiest way.
The RYYB coloration filter array has extra mild than common and a brighter palette of coloration.
Your sunrises can be vibrant pink and orange, your daytime pictures an ideal blue, and your night time images of a glimmering cityscape a rainbow of city chaos.
Activate HDR mode, and the EVO Lite will cobble collectively the last word shot based mostly on the very best dynamic vary, distinction, and publicity settings.
It is a characteristic Autel has replicated throughout a few of its drones, and I’m so glad to seek out it within the EVO Lite. It’s considered one of my favorites for saving time in put up.
Ship the EVO Lite into the sky and watch it do its factor utilizing cinematic modes like Orbit, Rocket, Flick, and Fade Away.
» MORE: Are Autel Drones Any Good? (You May Be Stunned)
The automated path the drone takes is nice for social media experts desirous to appear like drone professionals when missing expertise.
That’s not the one automated mode, by the best way. The EVO Lite consists of Dynamic Monitor 2.1 for extra precision monitoring of something that strikes, together with animals and autos.
SkyPortrait is your greatest buddy in case you stay for selfies, as it’ll take them for you, together with all your mates within the shot.
Then there’s this drone’s impediment avoidance. Autel has confirmed repeatedly that it excels in impediment avoidance in ways in which generally DJI doesn’t, at the least not constantly.
The EVO Lite has an ultra-wide impediment avoidance digicam, an innovation Autel created across the time of this drone’s launch. The sensors constructed into the mannequin present a frontal view that’s 150 expansive levels.
This characteristic will make you’re feeling safer when flying, particularly in case you’re nonetheless studying.
If you happen to’re a extra skilled pilot, you’ll recognize how one can focus extra on the EVO Lite’s dazzling cinematics and let it care for the remaining.
DJI Mini 3 Professional
The Mini 3 Professional has the very best traits of the Mini line so far, and that’s saying one thing, contemplating how critically acclaimed these DJI drones have been.
Dwelling as much as its title, it weighs beneath 249 grams, so it’s about the identical weight as your smartphone. You received’t thoughts carrying this drone in your pocket or in your again for hours, even days, resembling when backpacking.
DJI sharpened up the design in comparison with different Mini drones, growing the size of the props so the Mini 3 Professional is extra beginner-friendly.
In contrast to the Mini 3, the Professional has a greater gimbal, facilitating True Vertical Capturing. It won’t be a four-axis gimbal, however I believe it’s wonderful.
Now, what about its digicam? The Mini 3 Professional encompasses a 1/1.3-inch CMOS sensor with an f/1.7 aperture.
You possibly can’t alter it, however the price of sunshine is designed to brighten low-light videography and images, explaining why the Mini 3 Professional is appropriate for nighttime pictures.
You possibly can depend on its aperture in all kinds of situations, broadening your drone flight horizons and your portfolio in sort.
The 48 MP picture high quality is a few of DJI’s greatest, and the identical goes for its 4K HDR video, which is similar to what the EVO Lite affords.
Bear in mind, the photographs are all in RAW format, which suggests extra knowledge and element are retained in each shot.
You possibly can edit out what you don’t need in put up, which received’t be a lot, contemplating this drone has D-Cinelike Shade in its movies and pictures for a brighter, richer world your shoppers will marvel over.
» MORE: DJI Mini 3 Professional: One-12 months Evaluate (Video)
The Mini line has not all the time had impediment avoidance, however the Mini 3 Professional does.
Its tri-directional impediment sensing system may solely gauge downward, backward, and frontal threats with a dual-vision sensor system, however the Superior Pilot Help System or APAS 4.0 is for impediment avoidance.
APAS 4.0 won’t be the most recent version (that’s APAS 5.0, as of this writing), but it surely greater than suffices, particularly if the choice isn’t any impediment avoidance in any respect.
Apart from True Vertical Capturing, the Mini 3 Professional is able to so many Clever Flight Modes.
You possibly can scale back velocity and take slow-mo movies, a great characteristic for cinematics, or velocity up every little thing round you with a dramatic Hyperlapse.
Digital Zoom facilitates safer taking pictures situations of wildlife and harmful nature, as you may get in on the motion with out being in the midst of it.
» MORE: DJI Mini 3 / Mini 3 Professional – Tips on how to Stay Stream on YouTube (Video)
FocusTrack is like Autel’s Dynamic Monitor, permitting for topic monitoring, whereas MasterShots makes use of automated flight modes to seize reliably superior movies.
These options are the type that make me maintain coming again to DJI.
This suite of enjoyable, good modes has one thing for each kind of pilot, from industrial consultants trying to make their jobs simpler to influencers looking forward to distinctive footage to get these likes and clicks.
DJI Mini 3 Professional (DJI RC)
Light-weight and Foldable Digicam Drone
- 4K/60fps Video
- 48MP Photograph
- 34-min Flight Time
- Tri-Directional Impediment Sensing, Built-in RC and display
We earn a fee in case you make a purchase order, at no further price to you.
11/30/2023 07:42 pm GMT
Head-to-head comparability
Digicam system
Winner: Autel EVO Lite
Congratulations go to the EVO Lite for its four-axis gimbal.
Do I personally suppose a four-axis gimbal is a gamechanger?
No. It’s undoubtedly cool, don’t get me flawed, however I can go from flying a four-axis gimbal drone just like the EVO Lite and again to a three-axis gimbal drone just like the Mini 3 Professional and never really feel like I’m lacking out on too terribly a lot.
DJI’s gimbals provide a excessive diploma of flexibility and adjustability regardless of having three axes as an alternative of 4.
Nevertheless, a four-axis gimbal is technically higher, so the EVO Lite wins this class.
There are extra causes to reward it, after all. It has distinctive picture high quality, top-notch video high quality, a twin CDAF and PDAF autofocus system, a 0.8-inch CMOS sensor, and an RYYB coloration filter array.
They’re altogether some sterling options.
That’s to not say the Mini 3 Professional is a slouch. It has a surprising coloration show similar to the RYYB coloration filter array within the type of its D-Cinelike Shade.
Its 48 MP picture high quality in RAW recordsdata preserves all of the element you may need, whether or not you’re having enjoyable taking pictures lovely cliffsides or on the job photographing a property on the market.
Its 4K HDR at 60 frames per second offers you a similar stage of video element as seen within the EVO Lite. I want the Mini 3 Professional’s video, because it feels extra high-fidelity to me.
After all, in case you’re working at 120 fps, the video high quality drops to 1080p, which isn’t so nice.
» MORE: Digicam Know-how in Drones (Defined)
Efficiency
Winner: DJI Mini 3 Professional
The light-weight, agile flyer DJI designed within the Mini 3 Professional is so enjoyable to choose up and fly. It’s extra aerodynamic than ever, and it’s beginner-friendly but by no means boring for intermediates and consultants.
As a pro-level drone, it has the digicam capabilities and Clever Flight Modes to accompany you on the job, augmenting your initiatives.
These automated modes take the Mini 3 Professional additional, whether or not it’s twisting and looping by the air on an automatic route or taking pictures slow-mo movies or hyperlapse photographs.
The flexibility is nothing in need of wonderful, which I’ve come to anticipate from DJI.
And positive, perhaps this drone doesn’t have Superior RTH or Waypoints, but it surely’s a Mini drone. It’s uncomplicated but reliable and has simply the correct Clever Flight Modes.
The EVO Lite has its personal good modes, however to not the identical diploma because the Mini 3 Professional.
Plus, I’ve all the time discovered that no different drone model fairly matches DJI when it comes to good options, though Autel is getting darn shut.
I recognize how the Mini 3 Professional has impediment avoidance.
It’s not DJI’s most refined system, however APAS 4.0 continues to be higher than nothing, and mixed with the obstacle-sensing system, you need to really feel safer within the skies than you maybe ever have when flying a Mini drone.
The EVO Lite has a unique kind of impediment avoidance than a few of its different drones, such because the EVO II Professional.
The Lite’s front-facing digicam sensors can detect obstacles in entrance of it.
It’s wonderful, and possibly somewhat higher than DJI’s impediment avoidance for the Mini drones, however the Mini 3 Professional wins this class as an entire.
» MORE: DJI Mini 3 vs. Mini 3 Professional (Which Drone Is Higher?)
Portability
Winner: DJI Mini 3 Professional
Right here’s one other class the place the Mini 3 Professional wins, and it wasn’t even tough to choose a winner right here.
The Mini 3 Professional, as you’ll recall, weighs 4 occasions lower than the EVO Lite.
You should have extra choices for packing it in baggage, resembling a checked bag or carry-on, or in a drone backpack in your on a regular basis adventures.
You possibly can convey the EVO Lite on simply as lots of these adventures; the bundle packs even embrace a tough carrying case.
The difficulty is, the EVO Lite is heavier, though at the least it’s foldable.
» MORE: Finest Newbie Drones Below $500
RC compatibility and flight vary
Winner: DJI Mini 3 Professional
The Autel Lite and Nano collection share a controller that’s appropriately named the EVO Nano & Lite Distant Controller. I prefer it as a result of it type of jogs my memory of an Xbox 360 controller however with much less bulk and extra ergonomics.
It’s a smooth black, with few buttons, transmission by the SkyApp, and a removable holster in your smartphone.
The Mini 3 Professional works with two DJI remotes, the DJI RC or the DJI RC-N1. The RC-N1 is suitable with the Mini 2, Air 2, Air 2S, and Mavic 3.
It has no display, just like the EVO Lite’s controller, however encompasses a boxier distant with a smartphone holster.
The RC-N1 is sufficient, but when doable, I like to recommend the DJI RC extra.
This newer, smarter, extra trendy controller with DJI O3+ video transmission energy has a display, an excellent display to spare your smartphone.
The EVO Lite has a 7.4-mile transmission vary, which is nothing to sneeze at. The Mini 3 Professional’s transmission vary is 7.45 miles, so it’s only a smidge over.
Battery life
Winner: Autel EVO Lite
The battle of battery life commences. It’s the EVO Lite right here, which guarantees 40 minutes of flight time based on Autel. In my expertise, it’s over 35 minutes however not fairly 40 minutes.
Each drone model overpromises on flight occasions, in order that didn’t shock me.
As for the Mini 3 Professional, it’s presupposed to fly for 34 minutes with the Clever Flight Battery. DJI calls that “prolonged.” I acquired round half-hour of flight time, simply over.
Extra flight time is all the time higher, and Autel is main the best way for a way lengthy a drone ought to be capable to fly. The Mini 3 Professional may afford to catch up.
» MORE: Drone Batteries (In-Depth Info)
Conclusion
It was a neck-and-neck race between the Autel EVO Lite and DJI Mini 3 Professional.
Finally, the Mini 3 Professional got here out on high for qualities like a light-weight, forward-thinking design, practical digicam system, higher impediment avoidance than Minis previous, and Clever Flight Modes, considered one of its strongest options.
The EVO Lite is likely one of the greatest Autel drones so far in a set of fashions that I discover it arduous to decide on between.
Nevertheless, it’s marketed as a lightweight drone and is something however. It additionally barely excels over DJI in areas like picture high quality and impediment avoidance.
