The Yuneec Mantis Q is a compact, folding drone at a equally compact $499 worth. It makes a variety of guarantees, together with 4K video seize and best-in-class battery life, however it would not ship. The 4K footage is shaky and, frankly, unusable, and the precise battery life, whereas good, is not what Yuneec claims. If you need an reasonably priced drone that is small and shoots in 4K, spend just a bit bit extra on the Parrot Anafi, or stretch your funds and choose up the DJI Mavic Air—each are enormously higher than the Mantis.
Very Small and Light
The Mantis Q is among the smaller folding drones in the marketplace. It measures 2.3 by 3.8 by 6.6 inches (HWD) when folded for storage, and a pair of.3 by 7.4 by 9.8 inches with arms open and able to fly. It would not add a ton of weight to your bag, tipping the scales at a couple of pound. It’s heavy sufficient to require FAA registration, even for noncommercial use.
The digital camera is mounted within the nostril, however it would not profit from a three-axis gimbal for stabilization, as most different drones that price this a lot do. It’s mounted on a tilt mechanism, so it may be pointed ahead, straight down, or anyplace in between. But the Mantis Q depends on digital instruments for stabilization, and as I am going to speak about in a bit, that is not a superb factor.
A devoted distant management is included, a function Yuneec skipped with its first effort at making a tiny drone, the Breeze. You do have the choice of flying the Mantis with a smartphone app alone, however I do not suggest it. On-screen flight controls aren’t almost as nice to make use of when put next with the devoted, analog flight sticks you get with the distant.
Instead you are higher off downloading the Yuneec Pilot app, free for Android and iOS, and attaching your telephone to the distant. It has a clip to safe your telephone—it is simply barely sufficiently big to deal with an iPhone 8 Plus—however it does place your telephone at a moderately steep angle that makes holding the distant at an angle the place you’ll be able to see the telephone’s display screen a barely uncomfortable proposition. The ergonomics right here aren’t as nicely thought out as we might like.
In addition to the sticks, which management flight, the distant has a devoted Return-to-Home button and a swap to enabled the high-speed Sport mode on its facade. At the highest there are twin management wheels—one to set digital camera tilt, the opposite brighten or darken video or photographs, together with Record and Photo buttons. There’s a USB-A port to attach your telephone and a USB-C port to cost the distant.
GPS stabilization and positioning is included. The Mantis is ready to talk with the satellites orbiting the planet with the intention to acquire its precise location. This permits it to hover in place when flying open air, and routinely return to its takeoff place. Indoor flight is feasible too, because of sensors that acknowledge patterns on the bottom under the drone.
The Mantis would not have any type of impediment avoidance or detection system. The onus to keep away from flying the drone right into a tree is totally on you. It’s not a shocking omission at this worth level—to get a small drone with 4K assist and impediment detection, you may must spend round $800 on the DJI Mavic Air. If you are pleased with 1080p, the DJI Spark is an efficient low-cost possibility with higher stabilization and impediment detection, however its battery is paltry.
In commonplace mode, which we used for all of our take a look at video footage, the Mantis chugs alongside at a high velocity of 13.4mph—just a bit slower than the Mavic Air (17.9mph). Like the Mavic, the Mantis has a Sport mode that ups the highest velocity to round 44mph, though I would not suggest utilizing it for video, because the digital stabilization system struggles sufficient at slower speeds as it’s.
In addition to guide flight, the Mantis has another management choices. It helps Journey, which flies upward and returns for a enjoyable reveal shot, and Point of Interest, which orbits a topic. There are additionally voice controls, captured utilizing your telephone’s microphone. You can say, “Take a selfie,” or, “Record a video,” and the drone will reply simply as for those who had been urgent a button on the distant.
The Mantis would not have any type of inner reminiscence, a function we have began to see in additional drones. Instead it makes use of microSD for storage. A 16GB card, which is included, holds about 40 minutes of 4K video or round 105 minutes of 1080p footage.
Yuneec guarantees as much as 33 minutes of flight time on a completely charged battery. I will not go so far as to say that is a lie, however it’s actually an exaggeration. The numbers producers present for drone battery life usually are examined through hovering—not precisely a real take a look at of real-world use. Our battery take a look at, which is averaged from a number of flights, is extra in tune with real-world use, and usually lags behind marketed life by a few minutes.
The Mantis Q lags behind by extra, netting a median most flight time of about 25 minutes—a full eight minutes behind what Yuneec guarantees. It’s consistent with what we see from the Parrot Anafi, and somewhat behind the 28 minutes we obtained with the DJI Mavic Air. Don’t get me incorrect—25 minutes remains to be a superb mark, I simply want Yuneec was a bit extra clear in its advertising.
While the distant costs through USB-C, the flight battery doesn’t. Yuneec features a devoted charger which is compact, by itself, however hampered by a big AC energy brick. It can cost three batteries at a time, though just one is included with the Mantis. Additional batteries are priced at a really affordable $60.
Shaky, Underwhelming Video
When you consider drone video, the very first thing that involves thoughts is probably going a sweeping, broad shot of a panorama—so clean and regular it is as if it was captured with assistance from magic. Those pictures aren’t made with alchemy or incantations—they’re the results of powered gimbals, which maintain the digital camera completely stage and regular, even when the plane isn’t.
The Mantis Q would not have a powered gimbal. It can document 4K footage with none type of stabilization, and it appears as shaky and horrible as you’d anticipate—check out the pattern clip above to see for your self. It’s not simply the shake—the lens exhibits some barrel distortion, very noticeable in case your horizon isn’t positioned close to the middle of the body top, and element from the small lens and sensor isn’t nice, regardless of a good 50Mbps recording charge.
Dropping the decision to 1080p positively provides some digital stabilization, however it’s not anyplace close to the extent you get with a gimbal, as you’ll be able to see within the video embedded above. The lowered decision would not do any favors, although—particulars are even much less pronounced than with the 4K video, and the video appears noisier, little question partly to a low 20Mbps bit charge. As with most drones, video is silent, so we added a music observe to our pattern clips.
Still photographs are captured at 12.9MP decision in your alternative of JPG or Raw DNG format. The picture high quality is simply okay, just like what you may get from an older smartphone. Photos present a superb quantity of noise and never a ton of element, even below shiny gentle. The sensor is a tiny one, a 1/3.06-inch design. To put it in perspective, that is about half the dimensions because the picture sensor utilized in most present flagship smartphones.
Despite the tiny imager, the Mantis Q’s lens would not even fully cowl its corners. Raw photographs do not have automated corrections in-built like JPGs do, and present a really heavy vignette on the corners of the body, in addition to some barrel distortion that is faraway from JPGs by the Mantis Q’s picture processing engine. Compare the out-of-camera JPG above with the processed Raw picture under—it is easy to identify the vignette and distortion.
Not Worth It
Yuneec has made an effort to compete with its principal drone rival, DJI, however the Mantis Q is an indication that its priorities are all incorrect. It does tackle our largest criticism with the DJI Spark, battery life. The Q will get you 25 minutes within the air on a cost, whereas the Spark solely manages about half that determine. But, regardless of providing 4K, the Mantis isn’t any match for the Spark relating to imaging and video high quality.
Despite being a fairly first rate plane in its personal proper—responsive, speedy if desired, and with robust battery life—the Mantis Q’s digital camera is simply poor. Instead of placing effort into gimmicky options like voice management, these assets ought to have been devoted into making a greater digital camera—maybe one with actual stabilization.
If you wish to purchase a small, 4K drone, the Mantis Q might bounce out at you due to its worth. Don’t be tempted, even when your bookkeeper is asking you to rein in your spending. The Parrot Anafi is a greater choose for funds customers—it is priced at $700, however usually sells for much less. We additionally just like the DJI Mavic Air, which is priced at $800, and is tremendously higher than the Mantis Q.