DJI drones may be flying under the cloud of a looming US ban, but it doesn’t look like that’s going to stop the Chinese giant from releasing some new flying cameras in 2024 – with the latest leaks revealing a DJI Mavic 4 is seemingly en route.
Some new leaks shared by regular DJI leakers @OsitaLV (below) and @Quadro_News show what appears to be a DJI Mavic 4 drone with a new, large gimbal setup housing a Hasselblad-branded triple camera.
The inclusion of three cameras and that Hasselblad branding mean this is likely a DJI Mavic 3 successor, rather than the more amateur-friendly DJI Air 3S drone we also saw leaked in June.
The Air series typically has two cameras, while the Mavic 3 Pro packs in three lenses for maximum versatility. On the Mavic 3 Pro, those included a main Four Thirds 20MP Hasselblad camera, plus two telephotos (one a 70mm equivalent with the Mini 3 Pro‘s 1/1.3-inch sensor, the other a 166mm camera with a 1/2-inch sensor).
Unfortunately, the camera modules shown in the new leaks don’t have any markings, so we don’t yet know what kind of sensor or lens upgrades they might get. But that new camera unit does appear to be larger than the Mavic 3’s, so some improved image-capturing powers do look on the cards.
DJI drones on the rise again?
These new leaks don’t give us any hints about a possible release date for the DJI Mavic 3’s successor, but the fact that this is the first one we’ve seen for a possible DJI Mavic 4 suggests it could be behind the DJI Air 3S on the release schedule.
The DJI Air 3 was announced on July 25, 2023, before hitting shelves in August of that year, so it’s possible that DJI could be following a similar schedule for its successor. The original DJI Mavic 3, meanwhile, landed back in November 2021, with the Mavic 3 Classic following a year later and the Mavic 3 Pro arriving in May 2023.
Exactly how a Mavic 4 model might sit alongside the latter isn’t clear, but when the original Mavic 3 was launched it was a step-change for DJI’s cameras, moving them up to a Four Thirds sensor for the first time. So there’s a chance DJI could be planning something similar for a Mavic 4.
DJI certainly doesn’t seem to be winding down the Mavic 3 series, because it’s just released some new firmware for all three models in the range. It also recently launched an impressive video (above) showing the Mavic 3 Pro climbing from base camp to the top of Mount Everest.
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