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DJI officially launched their Mavic Mini in November 2019 following a long period of speculation by DJI fans.
In this article, we will cover how does the new Mavic Mini fare against the cheaper DJI half-brother DJI Ryze Tello.
In short, Mavic Mini seems to be developing into a huge hit: it has much more attractive design, is more than 50g lighter and gives out an impression of a very compact device.
Mavic Mini is a drone for hobby pilots and price tag is definitely raising eyebrows – at just $399, it has the perfect balance of features you’d expect from a high-quality drone and a great price.
Tello is an affordable drone that you can buy for under $100 but don’t let the price mislead you into thinking that this is an impotent toy drone – in spite of its toy drone price, it can proudly sit in the same room with the big boys as you will see below.
Let’s take a look at the tech specs for the Mavic Mini and see how it holds its ground in comparison to the Ryze Tello.
Here are two guides that you also might find useful: complete guide on Mavic Mini and review of DJI Ryze Tello.
DJI Mavic Mini
DJI Ryze Tello
Mavic Mini vs DJI Ryze Tello at a glance
Mavic Mini vs DJI Tello: Camera
The DJI Mavic Mini comes with a 3-axis gimbal and a 12-megapixel photo resolution. The maximum video resolution is 2.7k at 30 fps or 1080p (FullHD) at a maximum of 60 frames per second.
Ryze Telllo is a much cheaper and simpler model with no gimbal stabilization, only a 5-megapixel camera and shoots 720p video, which can easily be controlled via the app.
Mavic Mini vs Tello: Flight Time & Battery
The Mavic Mini remote controller has a battery capacity of 2600 mAh. It takes about 120 minutes to fully charge with the DJI 18W USB charger and you can fly around 30 minutes with it.
The 1100 mAh battery that powers the Tello provided about 13 minutes of flight time.
Mavic Mini vs Tello: Features & Modes
With QuickShot video modes called Dronie, Rocket, Circle and Helix, the DJI Mavic Mini offers a total of four user-friendly recording modes for creative aerial photography. Depending on the desired mode, the DJI Fly App also offers various settings for flight altitudes and distances. In addition, the subject or object to be recorded can be manually selected for each mode – similar to the familiar ActiveTrack function. The DJI Mavic Mini doesn’t feature the recording modes Asteroid and Boomerang – well-known from the DJI Mavic Air.
The Ryze Tello drone has an automatic take-off and landing system, so you don’t have to worry about how much thrust you need. Just select the symbol in the interface and let the Tello Drone take off with a swipe. During testing this worked extremely well, both take-off and landing are smooth and safe. Compared to other low-cost mini-drones, the Ryze Tello Copter can clearly demonstrate its VPS (Visual Positioning System) advantage and convinces with its stable height and positional stability.
Mavic Mini vs Ryze Tello: Range
Mini has up to 4km controller range which is unprecedented in this price segment.
In the standard connection between Smartphone (Samsung S8) and Tello Drone I got a maximum of 30-40 meters before a warning message was shown on the display. It said that the connection was too bad. Bad is also the right word, because the commands are only executed moderately cleanly and also otherwise it feels increasingly unsafe. So it’s better to stay at a distance of 20-30 meters.
Price
The only segment where Tello can easily take the victory as it costs 4-5x less than Mavic Mini. You do get approximately 4-5x less enjoyment and quality so it balances out in the end.
Conclusion
Mavic Mini is clearly the better drone, no doubt about it. However, if you are still on training wheels or never flown a drone before, Ryze Tello is a great option before you move onto the next step in the pilot evolution cycle which would be Mavic Mini. In the end, you stay in the family and go another level higher to Mavic 2 Pro or even DJI Inspire (if you end up with a drone-related career).
We did a bunch of comparisons of Mavic Mini against other drones, check them out below:
- Mavic Mini vs Parrot Anafi
- Mavic Mini vs Mavic Air vs DJI Spark
- DJI Mavic Mini alternatives
- DJI Mavic Mini vs Mavic Air 2
Also make sure to have all the needed gear for your Mavic Mini by checking out our recommendations in this article.
DJI Mavic Mini
