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Photogrammetry and surveys Archive

Mavic Air 2: is it a good drone for photogrammetry?

Published on 3 min read By AerialClick

Archive article. Article from 2020: the Mavic Air 2 is no longer in production. The equivalent model today is the DJI Air 3S; for professional photogrammetry we recommend the DJI Matrice 4E. Discover the DJI Matrice 4E

This week, DJI announced its latest drone, the Mavic Air 2. It has an impressive list of features and technical specifications, including a 48 MP camera, 34 minutes of flight time and top-level video transmission.

Let's look at some of its features

  • 48 MP photos and 4K / 60 fps video
  • Maximum flight time of 34 minutes
  • 1080p video transmission at 10 km
  • HDR
  • Hyperlapse 8K
Mavic Air 2 1.jpg

But is the MAVIC AIR 2 also good for photogrammetry?

Mavic Air 2 2.jpg

The short answer is no, this is not a good drone for land surveying.

It is an excellent drone for personal photos and videos, but its specifications, although impressive, add no advantage for surveyors, and the features surveyors care about will be better served by other aircraft such as the Phantom 4 series of drones.

The drones we recommend are designed to collect data for creating a topographic or planimetric survey using photogrammetry.

Does the 48 MP camera take better photos?

At first glance, the most impressive feature of the Mavic Air 2 is its 48 MP camera, however this is a bit misleading, and it is certainly not an improvement over the 20 MP sensors on the Phantom 4 or Mavic 2 drones.

This drone uses a ½" CMOS sensor, which has only 25% of the sensor surface area of larger drones such as the Phantom 4 series, which have 1" sensors. This further reduces the sharpness and overall quality of the images, even though the raw "megapixel" count is higher.

The Mavic Air 2's camera is extremely impressive for its size and it would make an excellent personal drone. However, when it comes to photogrammetry, the camera quality is not as good as that of other products on the market and it should be avoided for photogrammetry applications where accuracy is essential.

Mavic Air 2 4.jpg
Mavic Air 2 5.jpg

How does the Mavic Air 2 compare with other DJI drones?

If you want to use the Mavic Air 2 for surveying, the answer is "better not". Drones such as the Phantom 4 Pro v2 and the Phantom 4 RTK will offer significantly better accuracy than the Mavic Air 2. Below, we have ranked some of the most common drones by their overall quality in high-precision surveying applications.

DJI product rankings

  1. Phantom 4 RTK

  2. Phantom 4 Pro V2.0

  3. Mavic 2 Pro

  4. Mavic Air 2

A combination of image quality and geolocation makes the Phantom 4 series far superior to any Mavic.

Is the Mavic Air 2 a good drone for photogrammetry?

Overall, the new Mavic Air 2 is a fantastic drone equipped with fantastic sensors and is well designed for its purposes. However, photogrammetry is not its purpose and it is NOT a good drone for Land Surveying.

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Topics: DJI Air 3S DJI Mavic 4 Pro DJI Matrice 4E photogrammetry RTK mavic air 2

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