okay so this is probably the most common post on here but bear with me. my brother in law has a phantom 4 from years ago and letting me borrow it has completely hooked me, but that thing is huge and i dont want to haul it around. ive been looking at stuff in the like $300-600 range and the options are kind of all over the place.

dji mini 3 keeps coming up as the obvious beginner suggestion but then i see people saying the autel nano plus is worth a look, and then someone else said just save up for the mini 4 pro and dont bother with the cheaper stuff. i dont really know what i need yet since im still figuring out what kind of flying i even like. shot some footage of a hiking trip with my brothers drone and loved it, maybe some family stuff too

is there a reason not to just get the cheapest dji that isnt totally garbage and upgrade in a year once i know what i actually want? or does that end up costing more in the long run. genuinely not sure how to think about this

honestly your instinct about buying cheaper first isnt wrong. the mini 3 non-pro is a solid drone and if you crash it learning (and you will bump into something at some point, everyone does) it hurts less than binning a more expensive one. the footage is genuinely good for hiking and family stuff, you dont need the pro features yet. upgrade path exists when you know what gaps are actually bothering you vs what you just think you'll want

autel nano plus is fine but the ecosystem and support for dji is just so much more established, parts, tutorials, community, all of it. makes learning easier imo

i went through exactly this about 18 months ago and bought the mini 3 (not pro) and zero regrets. only thing i wish i'd known is get the fly more combo upfront, extra batteries make such a huge difference to how much you actually enjoy a session. nothing worse than 18 minutes of fly time and youre done. the drone itself is great and the footage surprised me honestly, looked way better than i expected for the price point. just go for it and stop overthinking, the research phase can go on forever if you let it