okay so this has been driving me crazy for about two weeks now. I switched to manual mode for the first time a few months ago and after a bunch of practice I'm reasonably comfortable with it, not doing anything crazy just some long flowing passes in a big field. But every once in a while, maybe once or twice per flight, the drone just like dips suddenly for half a second before recovering. It's not a crash, it corrects itself but it's enough to ruin a shot and honestly kind of freaks me out because I don't know what's causing it.

It happened on two different sets of batteries so I don't think its that. Props are fine, checked them. I did update firmware recently actually, maybe around the time it started? Not sure if that's connected. Signal looks fine in the goggles when it happens. Anyone had anything like this or have a clue where to start

Could be a few things but the firmware timing is suspicious if thats when it started. Worth checking if there's a thread on the DJI forum about that specific version, sometimes a bad update sneaks through and causes weird flight behavior before they patch it. I'd also look at your throttle stick calibration, I had a similar dipping issue once and it turned out my stick wasnt centering quite right which in manual mode matters a lot more than in normal or sport.

had something similar after a firmware update last year, rolled back and the problem went away. DJI's manual mode implementation is good but it can be sensitive to any kind of controller input weirdness. Also ? and maybe this is obvious ? are you flying anywhere with potential GPS interference or near power lines? In manual mode the drone isn't doing any position hold so outside interference can have more visible effects on flight behavior than youd notice in normal mode where the system is actively compensating