Hubsan has recently announced the release of the Zino Mini Pro and the specs are absolutely stunning.
In this article review, we’ll see if they are real and I’ll cover everything there is to know about the drone in terms of specs, pricing, and release date.
I’ll keep it updated with the latest info about the Zino Mini.
The Hubsan zino Mini Pro is going to be shipped in the middle of JUNE 2021, as they have confirmed this on their site as well as on some retailer sites like banggood.
Hubsan currently has the drone in preorder mode so the shipping times may vary depending on where you buy it from. The quickest updates so far have been delivered by bangood.
I suggest you also check my comparison between the Zino Mini and the DJI Mini 2 in a new tab.
While the initial teaser video didn’t show the pricing of this new drone, Hubsan did recently create a page on their site with the updated pricing for the different types of combos you can get with the drone.
You can check the best Hubsan drones in my article where I compare them.
The zino Mini Pro costs $459 for the standard pack with just one battery and 4 propellers.
If you want to add more batteries, propellers and a bag it can cost you upwards of +$160 for the biggest package (or around $50 for each battery).
In this section we’ll go in depth with the incredible specs this drone boasts. If these are true, we’re in for a treat! Because I actually think it might beat the DJI Mini 2.
Let’s start with the camera, because this can make or break a drone, and is usually more important than the side gimmicks.
Wow! If this is true, it’s quite outstanding, as a 1/1.3 inch sensor is quite large and that means it can let a lot more light in, being pretty close to a one inch sensor like the DJI Mavic 2 Pro.
This can make the new Zino Mini pro one of the best low light cameras around.
Yet another stunning feat! The 6 times zoom of the Zino mini is quite a lot, and it’s not all electronic.
While it’s not hard for any drone company to make an “in-app” zoom that’s poor quality, this time Hubsan says it’s actually a mixed zoom type, which means it will be partially from the lens, with no quality loss, probably somehow using that large sensor size it has.
Even a 2x lossless zoom would be amazing on such a small drone
Taking 48 mp photos is something we’ve only seen in the likes of DJI Mavic Air 2 and that means it would make a great drone for professional photographers to get as much detail as possible
While I consider this more of a gimmick sometimes, it can still be useful to have HDR photos to capture great exposure photos without having to adjust anything in post processing.
It obviously comes with a 3 axis gimbal for the best stabilization possible, or else it wouldn’t be able to compete with the likes of DJI and Xiaomi FImi x8 Mini. It can also record in 4k, as expected.
Another very interesting spec is the bitrate, which means how much information the drone can record per second in the video.
Typically nowadays drones have 100 Mbps which is plenty, but the Zino goes over that to an astonishing 200MbpS. The encoding in H.265 is also one that you find in higher end drones and that provides an overall better image.
The Zino Mini has a pretty wide aperture, meaning that it lets a lot of light in, again perfect for low light situations.
It can’t take RAW photos as expected, but it would have seemed too good to be true if that was included.
Probably the most surprising fact for me is that the drone is under 250 grams yet still has obstacle avoidance sensors in the front back and even downward.
I thought it was close to impossible to make the drone this lightweight and still include the sensors and that’s why DJI has not added them to their Mini 2.
Yes, the Zino Mini Pro does have follow me mode through ATVT 3.0 AI Tracking as they call it, and it should be quite a good one at that, since the company has some history with creating drones with follow me modes.
They will probably include obstacle avoidance in the mix while the drone also follows you.
Just like the DJI Mini 2, it comes with bottom optical flow sensors, which are basically tiny cameras that can make the landing more precise and detect if the surface is good enough to land on.
What’s more, it also comes with Night LED on the bottom, to make it easier to land in low light scenarios (and make you look cool as if piloting an UFO… I know this from my Mavic 2).
We don't know much yet about the thermal verison of the ZIno Mini, but we do know that the price will be 3 times as much as the standard version, coming at $1499.
The camera is potentially the most expensive thing that raises the price to that level, but if this drone proves to be under 250 grams, it will be the first of its kind, since usually thermal cameras are quite large.
In this section we'll look at the more practical side of the specs, things like the Battery life, Range and the controller itself.
The controller looks a lot like the one on the older models of DJI Mavic, and it’s not a bad thing, as it’s quite compact.
It has a bottom compartment that you drag out to fit your drone in there (which is personally my favorite way to hold a phone in a controller.
The 1080p live stream is the most notable thing about the remote technology in this drone.
The DJI Mini only has 720p, so it’s not that clear, and there’s really no reason to use it with a tablet for example, as the image is too pixelated.
However a 1080p live stream completely changes the experience of flying a drone, as I’ve noticed that in my comparison of the Mini 2 and Air 2 (the air 2 having a 1080p live stream).
There’s no reason not to be excited by this metric, even though DJI has already provided this range for most of their drones. It’s frankly incredible that Hubsan managed to catch up in such a short time.
The 40 minute battery life is probably one of the hardest things to believe about this drone, yet Hubsan continues to keep this number the same.
The drone can also come with a multi charger that supports charging 4 batteries one after the other.
Of course, you can only fly for 40 minutes while in ideal conditions, with no wind and a speed of 25 km/h and until you deplete the battery.
However, that’s the condition of measure for every other drone.
So considering that, it’s quite a huge jump from the likes of the DJI Mini that can fly for 31 minutes (which was already plenty).
The drone seems to come with GPS and GLONASS, quite similar to the DJI series, which also has GALILEO added recently.
We don’t yet know what specific intelligent flight modes the drone will have, but it certainly has the hardware base to do pretty much anything.
So here are some of the intelligent flight modes the Zino Mini might have:
The app works with both android and iOS, which is good news and the battery of the transmitter can last for around 2.5h of use and comes in 3350mAh and is encased in the controller itself.
The most stunning thing is that all of this technology will be able to fit in such a small frame, just under 250 grams.
I think this is a great thing because it steps up the game for DJI to release a Mini 3 soon with similar features.
Here are the dimensions for the drone:
Expand: 202.54*161.2*61.6mm
Folding: 137*88*61.6mm
Folding (including blades): 137*94*61.6*
The Hubsan Zino Mini Pro is an outstanding drone when it comes to specs, and probably the biggest competitor DJI has in this market segment if they keep to their word.
