DJI Mavic Mini vs Yuneec Mantis Q Camera Drone Comparison

Spec Comparison of the DJI Mavic Mini and the Yuneec Mantis Q

Two sub $500 camera drones by DJI and Yuneec are compared side by side in this article.

The Yuneec is nearly 2 years old being released in mid 2018 and the DJI Mavic Mini was released over a year after in after in late 2019.

The surprising first difference is that the Yuneec has a diagonal distance of 193mm when folded up with its arms in.

The DJI Mavic Mini is renowned for it's small size and comes in at 213mm diagonally which is 20mm/2cm longer.

The Yuneec makes up for this elsewhere as it's dimensions overall are bigger, giving it a volume size of 935cm³ as it has a bigger height of 96mm.

The DJI Mavic Mini has a volume of 654cm³ which is miniscule when folded up, it definitely is pocketable.

The Mini weighs in at a tiny 249grams and the Yuneec is almost double that at 480grams in total weight, ready for take-off.

One huge difference is that of field of view, the Mini has a regular FOV of 83° and the Yuneec comes in at 117°. From the same spot the Yuneec would see a lot more of the area and land below it.

It also has one of the fastest top speeds of many aerial photography drones, at 72kmh, whilst the Mini is capable of 46kmh.

The ascent and descent speeds are identical at 4m/s acent and 3m/s descent speeds.

Yuneec has a tiny transmission distance of just 1km, which is a big let down, the Mini has 4km distance.

But the Yuneec can fly for longer, with a total flight time of 33 minutes, compared to 30 minutes for the Mini, which isn't anything bad either.

Photo and Camera Comparison of the DJI Mavic Mini and the Yuneec Mantis Q

They differ straight away in this department, both utilising different image sensor sizes.

The Mini uses a 1/2.3" image sensor and the Yuneec has a 1/3" image sensor which is slightly smaller at 6mm diagonally.

They both take 12MP photos but the Yuneec can take RAW photos and save in DNG format.

The Yuneec Mantis Q can also take 4K video and has more video resolution options, whilst both can do 2x slow mo videos at 1080p at 60fps.

Although the Yuneec is better on paper in the photo and video department, it is let down by its 2-axis gimbal which is what is used to stabilize the footage, it's just not as good as the 3-axis of the DJI Mavic Mini.

It uses electronic image stabilization to compensate for this but when YAWing you'll see issues, especially when moving fast.

This means you'll have to fly more carefully to get the cinematic footage you are after.

Summary

The Yuneec is just a fantastic drone, much better than the Mini in a lot of departments but let down by it's 2-axis gimbal.

If you want a known brand and the absolutely smallest camera drone without RAW photos of 4K video, the Mini winds this one.