78 T3 MARCH 2022
Te s te d
Autel Evo Nanon order to take on the consumer
drone giant DJI, a company needs to
design and build a drone that’s as
good, if not better; a drone equipped
with an excellent camera, a rock-solid flight
controller and transmitter, an exceptional app
and some decent autonomous flight modes. Well
we’ve found that drone: the Autel Evo Nano.
The Evo Nano weighs just 249g and that means
that, like the DJI Mini and Mini 2, it can be flown
in more places than drones above the 250g
weight limit. This is a key selling point because
most casual users only fly occasionally when,
say, on holiday or shooting a family gathering.
The last thing you want to have to do is jump
through complicated legal hoops.
Having flown numerous DJI drones, for the
first time we’ve found a model that didn’t give us
the heebie jeebies on its first flight. It was quite
windy on the day and the titchy Autel Evo Nano
performed extremely well. In fact, it felt as smooth
and reliable as any model in the DJI roster.
But while you can have the best flying drone
in the world, it’s no good if the camera’s not up to
scratch. Thankfully the Evo Nano excels here.
The camera is married to a three-axis gimbal for
image stability and fitted with a very efficient
1/2-inch CMOS sensor capable of shooting
48-megapixel stills and video in a number high
resolutions – 4K at 30 frames per second, 2.7K at
up to 30fps and 1080p at up to 60fps.
Straight out of the box, the video blew us away
with its sharpness across the frame, its depth of
I
Weighing less than 250g and shooting sharp-as-a-tack 4K video,
this sensational mini drone is coming for DJI’s crown
Autel Evo Nano
SMALL FLY
WE’RE IMPRESSED Excellent
1/2-inch sensor; superb 4K video;
ravishing 48MP stills; three-way
obstacle avoidance; under 250g.
WE’D IMPROVE Firmware
update a bit glitchy.
THE LAST WORD The first
small consumer drone we’ve
seen that’s capable of giving DJI
a thoroughly good innings. This
little bird is the first non-DJI
drone to win a full five-star
accolade. And deservedly so.VERDICT
Find great deals on the Autel
Evo Nano at: bit.ly/t3autnanocolour and rock-steady stability. For a drone of
this size, we were more than happy with the
results which, given the larger sensor, were a tad
better than what we’ve seen from the DJI Mini 2.
We’re struggling to work out how Autel’s R&D
bods managed to squeeze in three-way obstacle
avoidance – downward, forward and rearward- without exceeding the 250g weight limit.
Another cool thing is the way it warns you on the
phone screen by showing the distance to the
object in front or behind. Very handy.
We were also impressed by the visual feed on
the iPhone 11, which was crystal clear. Amazingly,
its live view quality is way above the Mini 2’s
720p – at up to 1km it’s a magnificently sharp
2.7K and over 1km it’s a not-too-shabby 1080p.
The Autel Evo Nano comes with a decent array
of autonomous flight modes. Dynamic Track 2.1
automatically follows a moving subject, Rocket
shoots a vertical ‘dronie’, Fade Away starts close
to the subject before zooming off into the
distance, Orbit performs a perfect circle around
the subject and Flick tracks in towards a static
subject before flicking around in the opposite
direction. They are all simple to activate and
make difficult cinematic shots easy to execute.
We never thought we’d see the day where we
gave a full five stars to anything other than a DJI
drone but the little Autel Evo Nano has impressed
so much in so many areas that it’s a veritable
shoo-in for anyone looking for a small
lightweight drone capable of shooting
sensational hi-res footage on a regular basis.
£ 599
autelrobotics.com