so i finally feel like i have enough flight time to give a real opinion on this thing instead of just regurgitating the specs. bought it back in the spring mostly because i wanted obstacle avoidance and my old Mini 2 had none and i nearly lost it in some trees twice.

the good stuff first ? image quality is genuinely really nice, the 4K footage i get in normal lighting conditions is honestly better than i expected for the price range. and the obstacle avoidance actually works, like it has saved me at least 3 times already which is wild compared to what i was used to.

the annoying stuff though ? battery life isnt as good as advertised in real world conditions, especially if its even slightly windy. and the RC2 controller they push you towards is fine but the screen washes out in direct sunlight more than i expected. also had one weird moment where it just hovered and wouldnt respond for like 4 seconds which scared the hell out of me, never figured out why that happened.

overall id say yes its worth it if youre coming from something older and you fly in areas with any kind of obstacles. if youre already on a Mini 3 Pro honestly probably not worth the upgrade cost for most people. anyway curious if anyone else has had the same freezing issue or if mine is just weird

the 4 second freeze thing happened to me once too, i think it was a signal interference issue near some power lines but i cant be 100% sure. never happened again after that so i kind of just moved on. the battery thing is real though ? i get maybe 28-30 minutes in calm conditions if im lucky, the 34 minutes they claim is definitely not real world numbers.

i came from a Mavic Air 2 and for me the upgrade made sense but yeah if someone already has a Mini 3 Pro id tell them to save their money unless they really need the omnidirectional avoidance. the sideways sensing on the 3 Pro is more limited and that matters more than people realize when youre flying through anything with any complexity to it.

this is really helpful actually, im trying to decide between this and the Air 3 right now and ive been going back and forth for weeks. my main thing is i mostly shoot hiking stuff so portability matters but i also want it to look good. does the mini 4 pro hold up okay in moderate wind? thats kind of my worry with the smaller drones