DJI Mavic Air 2 Drone Comparison

Its official. DJI have announced the follow up drone to the widely successful Mavic Air, the Mavic Air 2. With its portability, good picture and video quality and decent flight time, the Mavic Air was a hit with travelers looking to enhance their travel photography. However, how does the Mavic Air 2 stack up against the Mavic Air, Mavic Mini and Mavic 2 Pro? In this article, we will compare the Mavic Air 2 with DJI’s other drones.

Whats new about the Mavic Air 2?

The key new features of the Mavic Air 2 are:

• ½-inch camera senor,
• 48 megapixel photos,
• 4k/60 frames per second video,
• Enhanced HDR,
• 34 minute max flight time,
• OcuSync 2.0 with 10km range at 1080p/30 frames per second, and
• Enhanced obstacle avoidance.

All these features are outlined in DJI’s promo video below:

Being relatively light weight, at 570g, the Mavic Air 2 is looking to help you enhance your portability. Pulling in some of the features from the original Mavic Air and the Mavic 2 series, the Mavic Air 2 looks to be a great multipurpose drone, especially for beginners or those not looking to splash out on a Mavic 2. The table below looks at the Mavic Air 2, Mavic Mini, Mavic Air and Mavic 2 Pro and compares the drones specs.

Which DJI Drone Is Best?

	Mavic Air 2	Mavic Air	Mavic Mini	Mavic 2 Pro
Dimensions (mm)	180×97×84 – Folded 183×253×77 – Unfolded	168×83×49 – Folded 168×184×64 – Unfolded	140×82×57 – Folded 245×290×55 – Unfolded (with propellers)	214×91×84 – Folded 322×242×84 – Unfolded
Takeoff weight (grams)	570	430	249	907
Max speed (kps)	68.4	68.4	46.8	72
Max flight time (no wind)	34 minutes	21 minutes	30 minutes	31 minutes
Operating temperature range (C)	-10 to 40	0 – 40	0 – 40	-10 to 40
Flight range (km)	18.5	16	10	18
Internal storage (gb)	8	8	0	8
Sensor	1/2” CMOS	1/2.3” CMOS	1/2.3” CMOS	1″ CMOS
ISO range	100 -6400 (video) & 100-6400 (manual at 12mp photo) & 100-3200 (manual at 48mp photo)	100 – 6400 (video) & 100 – 3200 (manual photo)	100 – 3200 (video) & 100 – 3200 (manual photo)	100 – 6400 (video) & 100 – 12800 (manual photo)
MAX resolution	4K 3840 × 2160	4K 3840 × 2160	2.7K 2720 x 1530	4k 3840 x 2160
Bitrate (mbps)	120	100	40	100
Aperture	f/2.8	f/2.8	f/2.8	f/2.8–f/11
Optical zoom	No	No	No	No

Drone comparison analysis

The Mavic Air 2 not only replaces the Mavic Air effectively in all categories but can also complete with the Mavic 2 series for most hobbyists.

With one of the best flight times for a drone it’s size, 18.5km flight range, a more than respectable sensor size and megapixel count, the Mavic Air 2 could easily be the go to drone to new entrants to aerial photography as well as those who were waiting to upgrade.

Whilst it may lack the optical zoom that the Mavic 2 Zoom has (and thus no dolly zoom QuickShot), it’s larger sensor (relative to that of the Zoom) may make Mavic 2 Zoom owners a bit green with envy.

Mavic Air 2 QuickShots

The Mavic Air 2 offers the following QuickShots:

• Dronie,
• Circle
• Helix,
• Rocket,
• Boomerang, and
• Asteroid.

The video below gives an example of each QuickShot:

Other new features

SmartPhoto

The Mavic Air 2 features a new intelligent photography system called Smartphoto. SmartPhoto is a combination of HDR, HyperLight, and scene recognition to optimize your drone photographs.

Hyperlight improves photos taken with low or bad lighting. It does this by combining and a series of images and reducing the noise in them.

HDR optimize the dynamic range of your image.

Scene recognition recognizes the situation or subject of the photo, ie, forests, desert, ocean, beaches, sunsets, etc and optimizes the image based on an algorithm.

Using a mix of the above, SmartPhoto seems to make it easier than ever to take excellent looking photos. If you need any extra help, there is Lightroom and a host of other post production apps you can use.

Cinema quality video

The Air 2 helps gives drone videographers cinema quality video recording. By including ActiveTrack 3.0, SpotLight 2.0, POI 3.0 and 8k hyperlapse systems it allows you to enhance the video you record.

ActiveTrack 3.0 allows you to track a target whilst avoiding obstacles.

SpotLight 2.0 allows you to easily keep your subject in the center of your shot.

POI 3.0 allows you to create automated flight paths or select a fixed point that the drone will fly around.

Do you love day to night hyperlapse shots? With 4 options to pick from, the 8k hyperlapse function allows you to create these and more.

How does it compare to the Autel Evo 2?

With DJI getting some stiff competition from other technology providers, it is worth looking at how the Mavic Air 2 compares to other drones, such as the Autel Evo 2.

The table below compares the 2 drones side by side;

	Mavic Air 2	Autel Evo 2
Takeoff weight (grams)	570	1127
Max speed (kps)	68.4	38
Max flight time (no wind)	34	40
Operating temperature range (C)	-10 to 40	-10 to 40
Flight range (km)	18.5	9
Internal storage (gb)	8	8
Sensor	1/2” CMOS	1/2″ CMOS
ISO range	100 -6400 (video) & 100-6400 (manual at 12mp photo) & 100-3200 (manual at 48mp photo)	100 – 3200
MAX resolution	4K 3840 × 2160	8000 x 6000
Bitrate (mbps)	120	120
Optical zoom	No	No

Mavic Air 2 packages and accessories

Like most of their drones, DJI offers the Air 2 as a standalone drone as well as with the Fly More Combo.

A nice inclusion with the Fly More Combo is the addition of ND Filters.

Those of you who are not sure what an ND filter is… in photography and optics, a neutral-density filter (ND filter) is a filter that reduces or modifies the intensity of all wavelengths, or colours of light equally but does not cause any changes in hue of colour rendition.

In essence, an ND filer acts like a sunglasses lens for your camera. Why would you want to do this?

If you block some of the light coming into the lens, you will have the expose the camera for longer, ie, open the shutter for a longer period of time to allow the correct amount of light to enter.

This is a bit different as previous Fly More Combos have not included them.

What comes in the box?

When you buy your new Air 2, you will get the following:

• DJI Mavic Air 2 drone
• Remote controller
• 1 Intelligent flight battery
• 3 pairs of low-noise propellers
• RC cable (USB-C connector)
• RC cable (Lightning connector)
• RC cable (standard micro-USB connector)
• 1 pair of control sticks
• A gimbal protector
• Battery charger
• User manual
• AC power cable
• 1 USB 3.0 Type-C
• Battery charging hub (Fly More Combo only)
• Battery to power bank adaptor (Fly More Combo only)
• Shoulder bag (Fly More Combo only)
• ND filters set (ND16/64/256) (Fly More Combo only)

We want your views!

Let us know what you think of the Mavic Air 2 in the comment box below.

Will you be getting one?

Would you consider upgrading to one? If so, let us know what you have any why you are switching.

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