Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Parrot Anafi vs DJI Mavic Air – What’s the Best Compact Drone?”.
What’S up folks how’s it going, this watch hope you guys are all doing well and today we’re going to be taking a look at the parrot anify. Now this is one of the few drones that’s going to give dji a run for its money, uh for real we’re going to be comparing it directly against the mavic air, which is super popular super compact and probably one of my favorite drones of all time. Both of these actually share a lot of common features that we’ll talk about, but there’s some specific advantage that each of them present and we want to ultimately find out which one reigns supreme. All things considered. So, if you’re interested in seeing which one comes out on top, let’s get right into this comparison now, first, let’s talk about the design and overall form factor of both flying camera platforms. Now for parent, the anife is the first fold out drone design that they’ve came out with, and obviously it’s designed to compete with, the mavic air and the mavic pro series of drones. And even though the air, both in terms of drone and controller combination, has a smaller overall footprint, there are some interesting design attributes that the anifee has to offer. Firstly, thanks to its lightweight carbon frame construction, it’s about 100 grams lighter than the air which, in combination of the slightly larger battery results in a slightly longer flight time, and thanks to the retractable arm design for the propellers, you can actually deploy the drone about half The time it takes to deploy the mavic air since the fold-out design is a little bit more involved on the air compared to the more simple retractable design we found on the anti-feed now, in terms of the controller itself, i certainly think that dji has the better Controller in terms of overall form factor and design, certainly more compact solution, but the new sky controller 3 from parrot is a huge improvement from the giant monstrosity they used to get with the bebop and bebop 2 drones and from a functionality. Standpoint.
Both are extremely similar in terms of controller dynamics. The amount of controller options you have both transmitters have the same maximum distance of about four kilometers in terms of communication, and you get an hd uh 30fps feed directly into your smartphones on both platforms as well. Now, before we get into the actual camera differences, let’s talk about the gimbal itself, because there’s some interesting things about the nfv. Firstly, it’s using a two axis mechanical stabilization, gimbal for tilt and roll, but the yaw axis is actually being digitally stabilized and it looks just as good as the fully mechanical three axis stabilization system we have on the air.
What’S really interesting is that the parrot can shoot actually about 180 degrees on its tilt access. So if you want to shoot the sky or something above the drone, you have that capability and, like every other drone out there, the air is limited to about 170 degrees. On its tilt axis, which is fine for most people, i think now, let’s talk about the cameras themselves in terms of sensor technology, we’re using a half point. Four inch cmos sony chip on the parrot versus you’re. Looking about a half point, three inch cmos chip, which i believe is also supplied by sony, but there’s a difference in terms of resolution on the cmos chips you’re. Looking about 12 megapixel sensor on the mavic versus about a 21 megapixel sensor on the anapha.
Now, one of the major benefits of the higher resolution is the fact that you have a lossless digital zoom capability on the parrot, giving you an effective, a focal range of 23 millimeters by 69 millimeters in photo mode and 26 millimeters to 78 millimeters in video mode. So it gives you a little bit more versatility in terms of what you can do with your shots on the fly. A similar feature that we found on the mavic 2 zoom, but instead of zooming in optically, it’s using a digital base system, which is definitely not going to give you the same level of quality, but definitely from a utilitarian standpoint and from a feature.
Standpoint is pretty neat nonetheless, now in terms of the video capabilities. Both can shoot a 4k at 30 fps and uh. The mavic air has 120 frames per second at full 1080p, whereas you’re looking at only 60 frames per second on the parrot.
So definitely in terms of slow motion, capabilities and high speed frame rates, the mavic air has the parrot beat on that front, but in terms of overall video quality, both have hdr capabilities, both shoot around 100 megabits per second in terms of video bitrate. But we’re going to roll some side by side footage, and you be the judge to what looks better to your eyes now in terms of flight dynamics of the mavic air is certainly more advanced in terms of its aerial capabilities. It has forward backwards and downwards facing obstacle avoidance system. It has a faster top speed about 42 miles per hour versus you’re, looking at 33 miles per hour in its sport mode for the anapha, but surprisingly, in terms of hover stability and overall ease of use. Both are actually pretty much on par with each other. The anti-fee is extremely stable up in the air, even with a high wind, velocities uh going right up against it, and i would definitely put it on par with what dji has to offer, which is definitely pretty high.
Praise both have awesome. General safety features like find. My drone and return to home function as you would expect, with a modern, uh aerial camera platform.
Now one of the most impressive things about the anifee was the fact that it was almost 10 decibels quieter than the mavic air. The mavic air is extremely loud and, generally speaking, when you’re flying a drone, you want to attract as less attention as possible, and that is definitely a big positive thing for the attitude. Just take a look at this side by side noise level comparison now in terms of some of the intelligent flight modes. Uh both have a lot of share common features. They both can do smart dronies hyperlapse. They can do orbit uh digital, dolly shots, cable, cams. All that kind of fun stuff that you expect in terms of live.
Subject tracking. I think the active tracking system on the air is a little bit more advanced and a little bit more reliable. And, unfortunately, you do have to purchase the active tracking capabilities on the anifee, which is about uh in-app purchase about 99 cents, which isn’t a huge deal. But kind of does suck since dji does include for free and i think they have more reliable system, but it’s certainly usable on the parrot side.
We do have a 32 megapixel spherical panel capabilities on uh, the air as well as the hand gesture capabilities. So you can control and actively track the drone by just using some simple hand, gesture or something that the parrot anify does not have. At this point, and really the only thing you can do is launch a drone out of your hand, you’re pretty much tied to the controller for the most part. Unless it’s using a follow me protocol or something like that, so generally speaking uh, the dji is definitely the more advanced uh drone in terms of intelligent flight capabilities, as you would expect now.
Let’S talk about overall flight times and battery performance in terms of battery capacity itself, we have a 2700 milliamp hour battery on the any fee versus looking at 23 75 milliamp hour battery on the air dji claims about 21 minutes versus parrot claims about 25 minutes based On the dozen flights that i’ve experienced with the anifee and about uh 25 flights, i’ve experienced with the air i range anywhere between 12 minutes to 16 minutes on the air versus about 15 to 20 minutes on the anife. So i definitely in terms of longer flight times the anaphy has the air beat now to sum up everything we’ve talked about thus far. Let’S talk about the individual advantage that each of the drones present, let’s start with the parrot anify. Firstly, it has that digital losses, zoom capabilities, it has a greater range of a degree of tilt up to 180 degrees.
It has the longer flight times, plus it’s much quieter in terms of noise levels and, lastly, uh. The price point is a lot more aggressive right now. You can get it on amazon for under 550 dollars and i’m guessing it’s going to go down even more as we go throughout 2019, so compared to the 7.99 or sometimes dji has sales for around uh 6.99 and even refurbished models can go for around 639. It’S still not going to compete with what you could typically find a parrot and a fee for so definitely a huge advantage there in terms of value now, in terms of the air itself, we, i definitely have to say it has a smaller footprint, both in terms Of the drone and controller combination, it has a slow motion capabilities at 1080p at 120 frames per second versus the best thing you can do as 1080p at 60 on the parrot, as well as a full gesture and hand control mode.
And lastly, it has a multi-directional obstacle avoidance system, which adds a level of assurance and technology that is definitely not present on the parrot side, but uh really other than that guys. Uh, honestly, this is the first comparison in a very, very long time where dji has actually been challenged. I know they kind of own the skies and own the industry in terms of compact form-factor drones, but now you actually have a awesome, viable option. That is not only great in terms of its aerial photography capabilities, but presents some unique advantages that even uh the air doesn’t end.
Before this thing really came out, i i would actually uh keep uh this drone. I know we we review a lot of drones and this channel, but uh, usually the one that i keep most often is the more compact ones and the air was my favorite uh for a very very long time, but this is actually a lot more affordable. It’S more compact, it’s easier to deploy and it has all those unique advantages. I would honestly consider this over the air based on my experience thus far now we’ll uh definitely keep you guys posted in terms of any issues that we encounter later on. I’Ve had this for the last four weeks, thus far, no real issues or in terms of reliability, concerns or anything like that, and hopefully the software will get more advanced and better as we go through. Our 2019.
definitely love to hear your thoughts. If you have any specific questions, uh love to hear all those things in the comment section down below give us a thumbs up. If you like this video and also make sure you have notifications turned on so that way, when we upload a video, you can actually watch it. Thanks again for your support and we’ll see, you later take care.
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