so ive been going back and forth on this for like three weeks now and i cant make up my mind. my budget is around $800-900 and both of these keep coming up every time i do research. i mostly want to shoot landscape stuff, some hiking trips, occasional family video. nothing crazy commercial or anything.

the mini 4 pro seems like the obvious choice because of the weight exemption in my country (UK) which would make life so much easier for where i want to fly. but then i look at the air 3's omnidirectional obstacle avoidance and the dual camera setup and i start second guessing myself. like is the extra hassle of the A2 CofC actually worth it for the image quality difference

has anyone actually used both and can give me a straight answer rather than just spec sheet comparisons? i feel like i've read every review online and they all just end up being wishy washy about it

had the mini 3 pro before and just upgraded to the air 3 a few months ago so maybe i can help a bit. honestly if you're in the UK and want to just grab it and go without thinking about where you can fly, the mini 4 pro makes a lot of sense. the A2 CofC isn't that hard to get but it does add friction, you know? especially if you just want to go hiking and pull out the drone without worrying.

that said the air 3's medium tele lens is genuinely useful for landscape stuff, more than i expected. compressing distance on mountains looks really nice. the omnidirectional sensing on the air 3 is also just... better. mini 4 pro has APAS but it still has blind spots on the sides which has got me nervous more than once flying in trees.

if i had to choose again from scratch for your use case i'd probably still take the air 3 but get the CofC sorted first. it's like a weekend of studying and an online test, not a big deal once you do it

im in a pretty similar boat actually, just pulled the trigger on the mini 4 pro last month. the weight thing was the dealbreaker for me tbh, i fly near some populated areas sometimes and just not having to stress about that was worth it. image quality is honestly stunning for what it is, i dont think i'd notice the difference in a real world landscape shot versus the air 3