Dji Osmo Nano Review: High-quality Video In A Truly Tiny Action Cam

DJI mightiness beryllium an innovative company, but it has been playing catch-up to rival Insta360 successful nan action cam world. A cleanable illustration of that is its latest product, nan Osmo Nano ($299). It follows a way Insta360 paved pinch its mini Go Ultra and Go 3S, which fto you abstracted nan cam from nan show to sprout pinch nan slightest weight possible. Like those, nan Nano’s mini camera tin beryllium detached from nan surface and easy worn to grounds activities ranging from utmost watersports to feline cam videos.

The Osmo Nano isn’t rather a copy-paste of its rival, though. Rather than inserting nan camera into nan flip up surface lodging for illustration nan Go Ultra, nan Nano’s surface magnetically clips to nan bottommost of nan camera truthful you tin constituent it guardant to seizure action aliases backward for vlogging. While it still lags down its rival successful immoderate areas, DJI’s Osmo Nano is simply a coagulated first effort astatine a mini-sized camera acknowledgment to its fantabulous video quality.

A mini size designed for regular activities

With its lightweight detachable camera that tin beryllium clipped to your caput aliases worn connected your assemblage for illustration a pendant, nan Nano tin beryllium utilized successful mundane activities for illustration hiking aliases swimming — pinch nan second imaginable acknowledgment to its 33 ft (10 meter) underwater rating. It’s besides mini capable to beryllium attached to kids and pets to create a ocular diary of their activities. At nan aforesaid time, erstwhile attached to nan Vision Dock that houses nan screen, nan Nano functions for illustration a normal action camera.

With that successful mind, size is key. The Osmo Nano camera is built from lightweight translucent integrative and weighs conscionable 1.83 ounces (52 grams) by itself. That’s astir nan aforesaid arsenic nan Insta360 Go Ultra but a touch heavier than nan Go 3S. Its capsule-like style is akin to nan Go 3S (but a spot bigger), while nan Go Ultra is much rounded. All of that is to opportunity that nan Nano is incredibly mini and ray compared to a GoPro Hero 13 aliases DJI’s Action 5 Pro — I hardly felt it erstwhile utilizing nan caller headband accessory

They connect together successful 2 ways, pinch nan surface facing either guardant aliases backward, utilizing DJI’s magnetic equine that it’s utilized for a fewer years now. Together they measurement 4.37 ounces, still little than a regular action camera. The Vision Dock tin wirelessly power nan camera without being connected, to a region of 33 feet. The equine besides allows nan Nano to link to DJI’s family of accessories, including a caller chapeau clip and lanyard.

During my testing, nan camera and module were easy to link successful either guidance acknowledgment to nan magnets and latches. To move from vlogging to nan beforehand view, though, you request to detach and reconnect nan Vision Dock. Insta360’s strategy is better, arsenic it conscionable takes a flip of nan X5’s surface to alteration modes.

The quality successful camera module sizes tin beryllium explained by nan sensors. Where nan Go 3S has a mini 1/2.3-inch sensor, some nan Nano and Go Ultra person larger 1/1.3-inch sensors that return up much abstraction but activity amended successful debased light. As for optics, nan Nano uses an ultra wide perspective lens pinch a 143-degree section of view, giving you nan expertise to move betwixt ultra wide and dewarped (square) video. The Go Ultra is somewhat wider astatine 156 degrees, while nan Go 3S’s FOV is 125 degrees. I recovered nan Nano’s section of position to beryllium an perfect discuss betwixt nan two.

Controls and features

The only beingness power connected nan Nano is nan record/power button, pinch nan Vision Dock holding everything else. DJI’s emblematic surface swiping and tapping actions are utilized to prime things for illustration sound power and surface brightness, on pinch video resolution, framework rate, RockSteady stabilization and D-LogM capture. Once you get utilized to swiping and tapping connected specified a mini display, these menus are responsive and fto you alteration settings quickly. However, nan navigation isn’t peculiarly intuitive truthful settings require immoderate clip to learn.

As pinch different caller DJI products, nan Osmo Nano has generous built-in memory, pinch 64GB (transfers astatine 400 MB/s) and 128GB (at 600 MB/s) options. Note that those speeds don’t impact video quality; they’re only nan rates astatine which you tin transportation footage to your PC. This soul representation is convenient arsenic it intends you don’t request to excavation astir for a microSD paper and it makes offloading faster. That said, it’s bully to person a microsSD slot arsenic good — nan Go Ultra only has a microSD retention option, and nan Go 3S only has soul memory.

Each module has its ain non-removable artillery pinch 530mAh and 1,300mAh capacities for nan camera and Vision Dock respectively. Those let operating times of up to 90 minutes for nan camera alone, aliases 200 minutes erstwhile paired pinch nan surface module, according to DJI. In comparison, Insta360’s Go Ultra camera tin tally for 70 minutes aliases a maximum of 200 minutes erstwhile docked to nan display.

Note that those specs only use erstwhile signaling successful 1080p astatine 24p. When shooting pinch nan Nano astatine a much emblematic mounting of 4K 60p, I recovered that artillery life was little than half that, astir 35 minutes for nan camera alone. However, that roseate to 49 minutes erstwhile utilizing DJI’s endurance mode, pinch RockSteady stabilization enabled but Wi-Fi turned off. I besides noticed that erstwhile I changeable successful 4K astatine 50p aliases higher pinch nan camera alone, it unopen down aft 20 minutes of continuous signaling owed to overheating.

The Nano’s camera has nary USB-C input truthful it must beryllium connected to nan docking position for charging. However, nan docking position unsocial tin accelerated complaint nan Nano camera to an 80 percent artillery successful 20 minutes. It takes astir 20 minutes to complaint some devices together to 80 percent, and 60 minutes for a afloat complaint — 20 minutes much than nan Go Ultra.

Other cardinal features see sound and motion power (tapping aliases nodding) to commencement recording, timelapse and Pre-Rec to prevention footage taken conscionable earlier nan grounds fastener is pressed. Insta360’s Go 3S does person a mates of features not recovered connected nan Nano, namely Find Me for iPhone if it’s mislaid and Dolby Vision HDR support.

The Nano tin besides beryllium controlled utilizing nan DJI Mimo smartphone app, though nan Vision Dock’s distant power makes that unnecessary astir of nan time. That app besides lets you edit video, but Insta360’s Studio app is superior for that acknowledgment to its much complete editing toolkit and Shot Lab AI module that lets you do immoderate neat effects pinch little-to-no activity required. DJI is decidedly good down its rival successful this area.

Video and image quality

A large trading constituent of nan DJI Nano is that it produces high-quality video pinch faster framework rates than rival cameras. You tin seizure 4K astatine up to 60 fps, aliases 120 fps successful slow mobility mode, compared to conscionable 4K 30 fps for nan Go 3s. It besides supports afloat sensor 4:3 4K video astatine up to 50 fps. The Go Ultra maxes retired astatine 60 fps astatine 16:9 4K and 30 fps astatine 4:3 4K.

Thanks to nan large 1/1.3-inch sensor, video is agleam and crisp consecutive retired of nan camera erstwhile shooting successful daylight. DJI has improved nan colour capacity compared to its older products, pinch hues that are much natural. Where sharpening was overly fierce connected models for illustration nan Action 5 (which makes video look artificial) DJI has toned that down connected nan Osmo Nano. And if you don’t for illustration nan default application, you tin alteration it successful nan settings.

Like nan Action 5 Pro, nan Nano tin sprout video pinch 10-bits of colour successful some D-LogM and regular modes. The second gives users other move scope without having to messiness pinch tricky log settings. My penchant is still to sprout D-LogM past use DJI’s LUT successful post. That yields much earthy colors and gives you up to 13.5 stops of move scope successful challenging lighting conditions, for illustration tree-lined trails connected a sunny day.

The larger sensor besides makes nan Osmo Nano superior to nan Go 3S and astir adjacent to nan Insta360’s Go Ultra successful debased light. When I changeable nighttime cityscapes and successful indoor bars, it delivered cleanable video pinch comparatively debased noise. For moreover little ray situations, some nan Nano and Go Ultra person nighttime shooting modes called SuperNight and PureVideo, respectively. Both activity good if you don’t move nan camera excessively fast, owed to nan truth that they harvester aggregate frames into one. If I moved nan camera excessively rapidly, it caused mobility blur and different issues. The Insta360 Go Ultra is somewhat amended successful this regard.

DJI’s RockSteady 3.0 reduces camera shingle successful normal daylight shooting conditions, though it’s not rather up to GoPro’s canny smoothing algorithms. When I tested it while walking, stabilization fell isolated a spot successful nighttime shooting owed to nan little shutter speeds, pinch noticeable blur and pixelization complete crisp jolts and bumps. To debar that, it’s champion to boost nan ISO level and shutter velocity manually. The company’s HorizonBalancing, meanwhile, reliably corrects tilting up to 30 degrees to support video level.

As pinch DJI’s different caller action cams, nan Osmo Nano connects to nan company’s Mic 2, Mic 3 and Mic Mini via its proprietary OsmoAudio nonstop connection. That offers higher value and a much reliable relationship than Bluetooth, while allowing you to usage 2 mics astatine nan aforesaid clip for interviews aliases multiperson action scenarios. The Nano besides has dual built-in microphones for stereo recording, but successful my testing, nan tinny audio was only bully capable for ambient sounds and not voices.

Wrap-up

It’s absorbing to watch DJI effort to drawback up to different institution for a change. With nan Nano, it leaned connected its camera acquisition and mostly matches aliases thumps its main rival successful position of video quality. However, nan institution is still lagging down successful a fewer areas, peculiarly its editing app — thing that’s important for galore creators.

DJI seems to beryllium alert of that and priced nan Nano overmuch cheaper than rivals. In Europe and nan UK, nan Nano costs €279 (£239) for nan 64GB combo and €309 (£259) for nan 128GB combo, some of which see nan Vision Dock, magnetic chapeau clip, magnetic lanyard, protective case, high-speed charging cablegram and dual-direction magnetic ball-joint adapter mount. That compares to €429 for nan Insta360 Go Ultra, which has nary built-in representation and includes less accessories, and €400 for nan Go 3S pinch 128GB of soul storage.

As pinch different caller DJI products, nan Osmo Nano isn’t officially coming to nan US conscionable yet. However, nan institution is featuring it prominently connected its US site, truthful there’s dream that it will beryllium sold connected Amazon and different sites soon.