The Garmin X310 is a 5-star dash cam that is compact, easy to use, and shoots 4K video with HDR at 30 fps. It ticks a lot of boxes, while also looking and feeling like a quality product, reliably recording high-quality footage, and packing several routes for upgrading – from a parking mode, to the option for live remote viewing and connecting several synchronized dash cams to one vehicle.
It all works very well, as Garmin dash cams have for years now, and the integrated polarizing lens is a nice bonus. But the X310 is expensive, and while 4K video is nice to have, it doesn’t offer enough to convince owners of Garmin’s last flagship, the Dash Cam 67W, a reason to upgrade. However, if you’re new to dash cams and have the budget, this is a fantastic option and one of the best dash cams available.
(Image credit: Future)
Garmin Dash Cam X310: price and availability
As of October 2024, this is the new flagship of the Garmin dash cam range. It is priced at $399.99 / £349.99 / AU$679 and is available now.
It sits above the equally new X210 ($299.99 / £259.99 / AU$499), the X110 ($199.99 / £199.99 / AU$349) and the entry-level Dash Cam Mini 3 ($149.99 / £149.99 / AU$249).
Garmin Dash Cam X310: specs
Garmin Dash Cam X310: Design
This is Garmin’s flagship dash cam, but it’s still remarkably compact, at 70 x 42.2 x 19.5 mm. It’s about twice the size of the tiny Dash Cam Mini 3, which considering the X310 has a 2.41-inch display on the back and 4K capabilities, is mighty impressive.
The simple, rectangular body houses two buttons on the right (for power and manually saving a recording), a USB-C port on the left, and a microSD card slot on the bottom. Garmin doesn’t include a memory card with this dash can, which feels a bit mean considering the high price and that this is their flagship model.
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Garmin’s fantastically simple windshield mount makes a welcome return for this generation of dash cam. It’s a short arm that attaches to the dash cam with a ball-and-socket joint for plenty of adjustability, then fixes to a magnetic metal disc, which then sticks to the windshield with adhesive. The disc stays on your windshield, while the dash cam can be removed whenever you like, then snaps back into place magnetically when you need it.
The whole mounting system takes up far less space than that of any other dash cam brand, and makes for a discrete installation.
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Garmin Dash Cam X310: Performance
The specs alone should be enough to tell all you need to know. It doesn’t feel long since 4K dash cams represented a brave new world, and a world where video quality didn’t necessarily live up to expectations. There are no such concerns with the Garmin X310.
By default, it records 4K resolution with HDR at 30 frames per second, and the footage looks fantastic. You could argue that 4K is overkill for a dash cam, and while you may often be right, there‘s no denying the quality displayed here. Videos are smooth and full of detail, with accurate colors and nice control over the exposure and white balance.
The X310 also lets you record in 1080p Full HD with HDR at 30 fps, or if you drop the HDR the frame rate can be cranked up to 120 fps. The latter is a perfectly good option, and results in even smoother footage that retains plenty of detail when paused, thanks to all those extra frames. But the default 4K option is probably what most buyers will stick with, and for good reason. This produces some of the best video I’ve seen from any dash cam – and certainly the best from one as compact as the Garmin X310.
Previously an optional extra, Garmin now fits its dash cams with an integrated polarizing filter. This is designed to reduce windshield reflections and on a sunny day we found it did a great job. The blue fabric dashboard of our test car (used for the daytime recording in this review) was practically invisible, and didn’t once reflect across the windshield.
(Image credit: Future)
Nighttime recordings lose some detail, naturally, and there’s more noise as the camera battles against the low light. Footage is still very good though, and while vehicle license plates generally aren’t readable on the move, they come into clear focus when stationary and in reasonably close proximity.
One small downgrade from Garmin’s previous flagship, the 67W, is how the lens field of view has shrunk from 180 degrees to 140. I always liked how Garmin’s lenses were wider than the competition, but losing 40 degrees in pursuit of a less distorted image – one that suffers less from a curved fisheye effect at its edges – isn’t such a big deal.
Using the X310 is as easy as ever. You don’t even have to create a Garmin account, if you don’t want to. Just insert a microSD card (there isn’t one included in the box), plug it in to the 12-volt (lighter) socket and away you go; it starts recording when the car is switched on. The 2.4in touchscreen can be used to adjust settings, like video resolution, so you don’t need to use Garmin’s Drive app either, if you don’t want to.
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That said, the app is used to handle software updates (one was available when we began our review), and it’s an easier way to access the dash cam’s settings menu. Here, I chose to switch off the collision warning system, since it twice alerted me to an imminent collision, despite my car being parked at the time. On one occasion there wasn’t even another vehicle passing by. The app is also where you set up Vault, an optional subscription service where recordings are uploaded to Garmin’s cloud storage via your smartphone’s internet connection. It’s a handy feature, but at £9.99 a month I feel it doesn’t offer enough, especially versus the Nextbase iQ smart dash cam with its connected features. I’m happy to have recordings saved to my microSD card instead, where they can be transferred to my phone manually.
Paying for Vault also unlocks the Parking Guard function, which requires a constant power supply (cables sold separately) and an active Wi-Fi connection, such as to a hotspot left in the car. With all that set up, the dash cam will alert your phone when it senses a collision (or potential theft) and provide a live view.
Lastly, Garmin’s voice control system works as well as ever. It’s a handy way to turn the microphone off, or manually save a piece of footage (although pressing a button or tapping the screen does the same thing).
Should you buy the Garmin Dash Cam X310?
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Buy it if...
You want 4K video This dash cam shoots 4K video with HDR at 30 fps. The results are fantastic, with lots of detail, accurate colors, balanced exposure and very little grain, even at night. There’s also an option for 1080p at 120 fps, if you prefer.
You need GPS Integrated GPS means all your video recordings include your vehicle’s speed and location, using GPS coordinates. These can act as crucial pieces of evidence if you’re accused of causing a collision.
You’d like the option for expansion Although it works great on its own, the X310 can be improved. Garmin sells a permanent power cable to enable the parking mode. After that, you can add a Wi-Fi hotspot to your car and access the dash cam remotely via the Drive app, then through the same app you can add up to three more Garmin dash cams, all recording in sync to provide 360-degree coverage around your vehicle.
Don't buy it if...
You’re on a tight budget This is an expensive dash cam and 4K video is very much a luxury that many drivers can do without. Dash cams can cost very, very little, and while we wouldn’t necessarily recommend the cheapest possible model, there are many alternatives that cost a third of the X310.
You want the smallest dash cam The X310 is compact for what it offers, but if you want one even smaller you should look at the equally new Garmin Dash Cam Mini 3 instead. It lacks a screen (and GPS) but is truly tiny.
You already have the Garmin 67W Garmin’s latest flagship, the 67W, is still a great dash cam. The X310 adds 4K video and a polarizing lens, yet costs over 50 percent more. If you have a 67W and it still works fine, the new model isn’t worth upgrading to.
How I tested the Garmin Dash Cam X310
I installed the Dash Cam X310 into two cars
I used the dash cam during multiple journeys, during the day and also at night
I set up the dash cam using the Garmin Drive smartphone app
I installed the Garmin X310 in two different cars and used it frequently for a variety of journeys during the day and at night. I tried out its various features and transferred video recordings to both my smartphone and computer for a closer look.
When it comes to compact dash cams, Garmin proves with the Mini 3 that it’s still the market leader. This is a tiny dash cam that shoots Full HD with HDR at 30 fps, and is so small it practically disappears behind your rear-view mirror, for a near-seamless installation. It also has a decent voice control system, and the smartphone app works well for adjusting settings and downloading stored footage.
That said, the Mini 3 is a very small upgrade on the three-year-old Garmin Dash Cam Mini 2 and, other than an integrated polarizing lens, offers no real incentive to upgrade. If you have an earlier Garmin Mini dash cam, then keep it. But if you’re looking for a very small Full HD dash cam, this one has to be at the top of your list, it's one of the best value dash cams out there.
Garmin Dash Cam Mini 3: price and availability
Launched in September 2024, the Mini 3 is part of a new family of dash cams from Garmin. As with previous generations of Dash Cam Mini, the 3 is Garmin’s entry-level model.
Available now, the Mini 3 is priced at $149.99 / £149.99 / AU$249. This makes it slightly more expensive than the Mini 2, which arrived back in the summer of 2021. The new model is available now.
Garmin Dash Cam Mini 3: specs
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Garmin Dash Cam Mini 3: Design
The new Garmin Mini 3 looks almost identical to its predecessor, except for how it’s now designed to be mounted horizontally instead of vertically. This helps it hide more neatly behind the central rear-view mirror of most cars, and means the microSD card slot and microphone mute button are now on the bottom of the device instead of the side.
There’s still a USB port on the right-hand side, but this has been upgraded to USB-C, and there’s still a big button on the rear for manually saving footage. This can be handy for when you witness an incident but aren’t directly involved.
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Garmin’s fantastic (and fantastically simple) windshield mount returns once again with the Mini 3. This attaches to the dash cam with a ball-and-socket joint, then sticks to the windshield with an integrated adhesive pad. There’s plenty of adjustability, but the ball of the mount is gripped tightly enough by the socket of the dash cam to prevent it from moving as you drive.
Also included in the box is a USB-C to USB-A cable and an adapter for plugging the dash cam into your car’s 12-volt socket. The adapter has a pair of USB-A connections, so you can power the dash cam and charge your smartphone at the same time. I’d have preferred a pair of USB-C ports instead, given that’s what almost all smartphones now use, but that’s a small criticism.
As with previous generations of Garmin Dash Cam Mini, a microSD card is not included in the box, so you’ll need to provide your own.
(Image credit: Future)
Garmin Dash Cam Mini 3: Performance
Despite its tiny proportions, the Mini 3 records HDR video at Full HD. It does so through a 140-degree lens with a built-in polarizing filter designed to cut down on windshield reflections. Apart from the addition of the filter, this is the same specification as the Mini 2 – and, as a result, the footage produced by the Mini 3 looks pretty similar too.
That’s no bad thing. Footage is sharp and clear, with nicely balanced exposure and enough detail for easily reading vehicle license plates, street signs and road markings; all the things you rely on a dashcam to pick up with great clarity. There were practically no reflections at all in the footage we captured, even on a sunny autumn day, and although not Hollywood quality, the 1080p video (at 30 frames per second) looked plenty good enough for such a tiny dashcam.
Nighttime footage isn’t as clear, of course, but even well after sunset there’s enough detail to work out what’s going on. Vehicles and road markings are clearly visible, however number plates cannot be read as reliably as they can during the day. I also noticed some reflection on the windscreen from my car’s infotainment display, but this was upwards in the top of the camera’s view and well out of shot.
Day and night, the Garmini Mini 3 produces very good footage, especially considering how tiny this dash cam is. Although I obviously couldn’t test the crash detection function, I noticed how the dash cam saves a portion of footage when the driver brakes firmly. So even if you don’t actually hit anything, you’ll have evidence of what could have been a near-miss. As ever, the sensitivity of the dash cam can be adjusted in the app settings menu, which is handy if you find it triggers too easily, such as over speed bumps or potholes.
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As for additional features, the Mini 3 has access to Garmin’s voice control tech. It’s always worked pretty well, throughout the history of the Garmin Dash Cam range, and is equally good here. You can ask the dash cam to manually save a recording, or turn the microphone on/off. It’s a nice-to-have but something you’re unlikely to use frequently.
As with other Garmin dash cams, the Mini 3 has a parking mode that alerts your smartphone when a collision is detected while parked. However, this requires a hardwiring kit to give the camera a constant source of power (sold separately), an active WiFi connection and a subscription to Garmin’s Vault cloud storage service. For some buyers this will add unnecessary expense and complexity, but if you can provide the all-important WiFi connection it can turn your dash cam into a round-the-clock surveillance system.
Another fringe-case feature of Garmin dash cams is how up to four can be synced up together. That way, you can have one facing forwards and one rearwards, then even a couple facing to the sides if you have a large vehicle that might benefit from 360-degree recording. Remember though, each dash cam will need a 12-volt or USB socket for power.
(Image credit: Future)
Should you buy the Garmin Dash Cam Mini 3?
(Image credit: Future)
Buy it if...
You want a distraction-free dash cam Since there’s no screen, there’s absolutely nothing to distract you. It’s even possible to mount the Garmin Mini 3 behind the rear-view mirror, so it’s almost completely out of the driver’s sight.
You can manage without GPS If you just need video – without speed, direction and location data – this is the dash cam for you. GPS data can be added to recordings if you sync the Mini 3 with a compatible Garmin dash cam equipped with GPS.
You don’t need 4K video Unless you have a big budget, there’s every chance you can do without 4K video from your dash cam. The Full HD footage of the Mini 3 looks plenty good enough for its purpose, and compared to 4K takes up far less storage space too.
Don't buy it if...
You already have the Mini 2 The new Mini 3 is a very small upgrade on the three-year-old Mini 2, so if you still have that dash cam and it’s working fine, we recommend you stick with it.
You want GPS As with the previous two generations of Mini, Garmin’s smallest dash cam lacks GPS. This adds location, speed and direction-of-travel data to your recordings, so if you feel you need those metrics you’ll have to look elsewhere.
You prefer dash cams with displays Since it’s so small, the Mini 3 has no display. This means you’ll need to use the free Garmin drive app to adjust settings and check the camera’s point-of-view during the setup process. It also means you can’t view footage on the dash cam itself, and instead recordings need transferring to your phone or computer.
How I tested the Garmin Dash Cam Mini 3
I installed the Mini 3 into my own car
I used the dash cam during several journeys, during the day and also at night
I set up the dash cam using the Garmin Drive smartphone app
I installed the Garmin Dash Cam Mini 3 in my own car and used it over the course of a couple of weeks. This included journeys during the day and at night, and gave me a good opportunity to inspect how the camera performs in various lighting conditions. I also tried out the Garmin Drive app, which is used to see a live view of the camera and adjust settings during the setup process.
The Oura Ring Generation 4 is better than the Samsung Galaxy Ring – provided, that is, you subscribe to the $5.99-a-month Oura Ring membership program. It’s more comfortable thanks to the lack of nodules, it’s got theoretically better heart rate, blood oxygen and skin temperature recognition thanks to the way its sensors are designed, an AI ‘Oura Advisor’ service, sophisticated women’s health tracking insights, ‘stress’ and ‘resilience’ metrics along with all the features available on the app to previous-gen Oura Ring users.
It’s a wonderfully-designed Ring, supremely comfortable to wear at night thanks to the lack of protruding inner nodes, easy on the eye, and available in six metallic finishes, all externals comprised of tough titanium. The redesigned app is great, providing detail and context missing in other smart rings with the use of timelines and easy-to-add ‘tags’. Battery life is good, with the Oura Ring matching expectations and lasting around six days as advertised with multiple workouts.
Automatic workout tracking also works terrifically, and is now able to be used for more than walking and running. The ring is able to correctly identify up to 40 different workout profiles, and I really enjoyed this aspect: it correctly identified running and yoga after I listed them as two of my most common workout types. I tried one of the guided meditations from the app’s Explore content section and felt as though it was comparable to other mindfulness services, like the Calm app. It really does feel like a futuristic wearable in every respect, from its design to its performance.
However, it’s also pricier than its contemporaries. The Samsung Galaxy Ring and Ultrahuman Ring Air are expensive wearables, but once you buy them, that’s it. The Oura Ring is also a premium device, starting at $349 / £349 (Australia pricing is TBC) with the added subscription acting as a paywall to access almost all features other than your Readiness, Activity and Sleep scores. I can understand a premium device demanding a premium price (I recently gave the pricey Garmin Fenix 8 a coveted five-star rating) but the ongoing nature of the subscription means the Oura Ring does lose half a point in the value stakes.
Garmin also continues to add new features to its devices via software on a regular basis, just like Oura. Unfortunately, Oura makes you pay for these, and only gives you a one-month free trial; comparable services, like Fitbit Premium, often give you six months free as an incentive to sign up. That said, it’s a really excellent service, and I can’t recommend it enough – if you can afford it. If you’re on a budget, though, rival smart rings offer almost as much versatility in a better-value package.
Oura Ring 4: Price and availability
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$349 / £349, with Australia prices TBC
$5.99 subscription (priced in USD across all regions)
Some colors incur an additional cost
As previously stated, the Oura Ring 4 starts at $349 / £349, with Australia pricing TBC as it’s currently unavailable in that region. Some designs and colorways cost more, with Rose Gold being the most expensive at $499 / £499.
The Oura Ring Membership, which is required if you want to unlock the ring’s full potential, costs $5.99; you get one month free when you purchase the ring. As mentioned above, If you’re going to buy the ring, you really have to subscribe to see its full potential.
The Oura Ring’s closest rival, the Samsung Galaxy Ring, costs $399 / £399 (around AU$750). That’s $50 / £50 than the base-model Oura Ring, but with no subscription attached, and other smart rings tend to hover around this price or cheaper. I don’t think the subscription is poorly priced, but as with a Whoop or a Fitbit, it smarts to pay a premium for the device, only to then have to keep paying in order to access your own data.
Value score: 3/5
Oura Ring 4: Design
(Image credit: Future)
Simple and elegant
More comfortable than the Generation 3
Redesigned app
The Oura Ring 4 is beautifully designed, and makes several leaps forward ahead of its competitors. All colorways are made of titanium now, with options of Black, Silver, Brushed Silver, Gold, Stealth (gray) and Rose Gold available. A notch on the underside of the ring shows which orientation it should be worn in.
It doesn’t have the concave design of the Samsung Galaxy Ring to protect its surface: its body is more of a traditional ‘straight’ wedding ring design. It’s tough, and should withstand a bit of beating up, but if you care about the look of your ring you will want to go careful. After a week of wear I can see some very light scratching on the surface of my Brushed Silver model, and I’m certainly too nervous to wear it to the gym without gloves.
However, the important changes here are on the underside of the ring. Gone are those skin-contact nodes, and in their place are flat sensors. These sensors are, Oura says, better at detecting signals than those on the previous models, and the ring can now be twisted 30 degrees in any direction and still take an accurate sensor reading thanks to the option of new pathways for the LED’s signals to travel. The other upside of the ring’s lack of three-dimensional nodes is that it’s more comfortable than ever to wear, especially for sleeping. It’s quite thick for a ring (but not for a smart ring, I suppose) but unlike even the best smartwatch it can be worn either to bed or during the day, and in either case you could genuinely forget you’re wearing it.
The Ring now has more sizing variety than ever, ranging from sizes 4 to 15. The larger sizes offer slightly longer battery life, up to eight days in comparison to the old Oura Ring’s maximum of seven. Of course, it also means those with slender fingers and thicker fingers can get an Oura Ring too.
The app has also seen a comprehensive redesign. Following the lead of Fitbit Premium, all content is organized across three tabs (Today, Vitals and My Health), with additional granular features available via a drop-down menu at the top-left of the screen. It’s simple and intuitive to navigate, showing your scores at the top of the page and providing options to break each one down into more detail if you want to. It’s really intuitive to use, and a logical progression from the old app.
Design score: 5/5
Oura Ring 4: Features
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Sleep, Activity and Readiness scores
Underpinned by other metrics such as Resilience
AI health tool
There’s a whole bunch to talk about here. The Oura Ring 4 goes some way towards making itself a real fitness tracker, rather than a passive health monitor, by automatically detecting up to 40 kinds of workouts. It still doesn’t have onboard GPS (understandably, as it’s tiny) but it can crib from your phone’s GPS if you enable location settings.
The three main scores are Sleep, Activity, and Readiness, and each one can be broken down into an inordinate amount of granular detail. Activity, for example, can be broken down into separate factors such as ‘move every hour’, ‘meet daily calorie goals’, ‘training frequency’ and so on. The Timeline, a feature unique to Oura as far as I know, allows you to add context to binary data by adding tags at certain points like ‘alcohol’ or ‘yoga’ or ‘grief’. If a tag doesn’t suit your needs, you can save your own note, which creates a comprehensive health journal, and a better reason to scroll back through the app.
You can identify trends using specific information, such as deep-sleep states or heart-rate variability over a year. Other interesting metrics include Resilience, which details how well you respond to sources of stress, and Cardiovascular Age, to identify how healthy your heart might be. If you’re 32 and you have the heart of a 25-year-old, it’s likely that you’re doing pretty well. If you have a 45-year-old heart? You might want to do a bit more cardio.
Elsewhere, the app packs an AI health tool called Oura Advisor under the beta-testing program, Oura Labs. Asking this AI questions like “How can I improve my running speed?” offers good (if generic) advice, and responds to follow-up questions. Women’s Health tracking is reportedly detailed and accurate (although, of course, I haven’t tested this particular feature myself). All this builds on an absolute ton of app-based features that were already available in previous versions, ready for health nerds to dive into. Full marks.
Features score: 5/5
Oura Ring 4: Performance
(Image credit: Future/Matt Evans)
Battery performs as described
Metrics are interesting and easy to navigate
Automatic workout tracking is responsive
I really enjoyed using the Oura Ring 4. I drained its battery down, which for my Size 10 ring took five and a half days of constant use, including several workouts. It was comfortable to wear, and I only took it off a handful of times, such as when doing the washing up. The Ring picked up two separate runs automatically, and offered comparable stats to my smartwatch, minus the more specific stride and cadence information I get from Coros.
Sleep tracking was highly accurate: Oura boasts some of the best sleep tracking in the business, said to be comparable to a professional polysomnography machine, and it didn’t disappoint. It clocked a night of ‘fair’ sleep when my wife and I stayed with a friend, including the correct periods of wakefulness and an accurate wake-up time, rising to ‘good’ when I was back in my own bed the following evening. I added a ‘stay elsewhere’ tag to that night on my Timeline, and I can reuse that tag whenever I sleep in a bed that’s not my own from now on.
(Image credit: Future)
The metrics I received were interesting and easy to navigate (however, they are orientated for long-term use, so Oura is still calculating things like my Cardiovascular Age as it requires around two weeks of use to do so), and the in-app meditation content was more or less comparable to alternatives such as Calm. I completed several different sessions, and enjoyed the experience both times.
Performance score: 5/5
Oura Ring 4: Scorecard
Oura Ring 4: Should I buy?
(Image credit: Oura)
Buy it if...
You’re excited about wellness
Data nerds are going to love the depth they can go into with this tiny device.
You want to track sleep
Oura’s sleep-data harvesting is pretty much the gold standard.
You hate smartwatches
This is the device to replace your smartwatch while you wear a snappy analog number.
Don't buy it if...
You’re on a budget
Oura’s ongoing subscription is essential, making its already-premium price a bit of a slap in the face.
You need GPS
Need dedicated GPS data for outdoor sports? Save your cash and get a good running watch.
You like staying connected
Want a wearable for maps, checking Whatsapp messages, and taking calls? Smart rings aren’t for you.
Also consider
How I tested
I wore the Oura Ring for a week, draining the battery down completely and sleeping with it every night. I went on several runs, comparing its health stats to those from a Coros smartwatch, and tried some of its in-app meditation content. I tested Oura’s Health Advisor service, the Timeline functionality, and dove into the app as much as possible.
Xiaomi's Redmi launched the Redmi Watch 5 Active last month, and today, the brand introduced the Redmi Watch 5 Lite.
The Redmi Watch 5 Lite looks similar to the Watch 5 Active but packs an always-on AMOLED display instead of LCD. It measures 1.96" diagonally and is brighter with 600 nits peak brightness. Its resolution is also higher (502x410 pixels) and supports 200+ cloud watch faces, of which 50+ are customizable, and 30+ are always-on (AOD).
The Redmi Watch 5 Lite runs HyperOS and is compatible with smartphones running Android 6 or iOS 12 and above. It also comes with Alexa and...
If you're after a budget-friendly fitness tracker then look no further than the Honor Band 7. It's remarkably similar to the Huawei Band 8 and the Xiaomi Smart Band 7 and, with similar prices, it's difficult to set them apart.
The Honor Band 7 boasts an incredible 1.47-inch AMOLED display which is lovely to look at and engage with. Color graphics are displayed with clarity and brightness, even when outside in the bright sun. The display itself is large enough to present enough health and fitness data so you can avoid needing to launch the app too often.
Tracking data seems pretty reliable across the board, although if you want the most accurate results then you'll need to invest in one of the more expensive trackers that you can find in our best fitness trackers guide. If you'd just like to keep track of steps, heart rate and Sp02 levels, then the Honor Band 7 has everything you need.
I knew there wasn't going to be the luxury of onboard GPS, but I was disappointed to find that tethered GPS could only be activated from a connected phone rather than from the tracker itself. This unnecessary additional step proved to be rather annoying especially when I wanted to just get up and go without getting my phone out of my bag or pocket.
Despite this, I actually really enjoyed using the tracker. It was a pleasure to interact with and I'm not sure you'll find anything better for the price.
Honor Band 7: Price and availability
(Image credit: Future)
$59.99 US
£49.99 UK
Around AU$96.50
The Honor Band 7 is available for $59.99 in the US and £49.99 in the UK, which equates to around AU$96.50 in Australia. This is priced very similarly to other budget fitness trackers, such as the Huawei Band 8 and the Xiaomi Smart Band 8 Pro.
The only customization in terms of colorways on offer is the color of the bands, with the three options being: Meteorite Black, Pink, and Emerald Green. Make sure you choose wisely, because the band is not removable.
For the price, you'll get a large AMOLED screen, 96 workout modes, and 14 days of battery life.
Value score: 4.5 / 5
Honor Band 7: Design
(Image credit: Future)
1.47-inch AMOLED screen
Thermoplastic polyurethane(TPU) not metal
Three band colours
The design of the Honor Band 7 is almost identical to that of the Band 6. Considering Honor is releasing a new version every two years, it's disappointing not to see some level of upgrade in the size and design of the screen.
The standout feature of the Band 7 is its 1.47-inch AMOLED screen. It's big, bright, and beautifully responsive. The fact that the screen is full-color rather than mono means all the extra details and interface graphics Honor has taken the time to include really pop. I had no issues with fingerprint marks, and the interface transitions were smooth and reliable.
The tracker itself is made of thermoplastic polyurethane (TPU) with a spray coating applied to make it look metallic. Despite it looking great, there's no getting away from the fact that it is still of plastic construction, especially when you touch it or get up close to it.
The band comes in three different colors including Meteorite Black, Pink, and Emerald Green. The version I was testing is the pink one, although it's more of a rose gold color in reality. The silicone band is unfortunately non-removable, which is admittedly common for budget fitness trackers like this. It's usually used as a feature to set more premium alternatives apart, although some cheaper trackers like Fitbit Inspire 3 can also detach from their bands.
At 29 grams, it is double the weight of the Huawei Band 8, but it is still comfy and light to wear. I had it on all day and all night for a couple of weeks and had no problems whatsoever with it feeling uncomfortable.
The software interface is where the tracker excels. The graphics are beautifully designed, with just the right amount of data included on each screen. The homescreen can be customized using a range of watch faces, with each one displaying different stats.
The design ethos is replicated in the Honor app, which enables users to see a significant extra level of detail and reports on heart rate, oxygen levels, and activities tracked.
Design Score: 4/5
Honor Band 7: Features
Detailed heart rate and step count info
Optical heart rate and SpO2 sensor
GPS tethered from phone only
One of the most used features of any fitness tracker is the step count. The Band 7 tracks these while displaying the results in a graphic that shows how much progress has been made. The number of steps is tracked with accuracy and presented alongside the number of exercise minutes and active calories burned. Considering most users only want tracked steps as a guide, the accuracy level is more than sufficient.
The optical sensor tracks both heart rate and Sp02 levels. These are available on most fitness trackers, and, even though the results were far from inaccurate on the Band 7, you'll definitely find more reliable results on more expensive trackers such as the Garmin Vívoactive 5.
The stress tracking feature is calculated using heart rate variability collected during manually-activated stress tests, while automatic sleep tracking also uses heart health data to collect information.
Aside from health tracking, the Honor Band 7 can also record data when exercising. By picking from a range of different workout modes, including running, cycling, and rowing, users are presented with a set of analytics, including the time, heart rate, and steps.
GPS tracking can be activated by tethering it to your smart phone. My biggest issue with this fitness tracker is that this GPS functionality can't be activated from the tracker, even if it is close to the connected phone. Workouts that require GPS tracking must be launched from a phone instead. This is an annoying and unnecessary step that makes the process of launching workouts more involved than it needs to be. Nevertheless, a good chunk of features for a band at this price.
Features score: 4/5
Honor Band 7: Performance
(Image credit: Future)
Quick and responsive
Generally accurate tracking data
14 days of battery life, 10-12 days for heavy usage
The 180mAh battery on the Honor Band 7 is really good, and I was surprised given how much the device costs. The advertised length of battery life is 14 days, an amount of time that very much matched my experience, especially during weeks in which I wasn't doing much exercise.
As soon as I started using it for my daily commute alongside other exercise activities, I found the battery draining more quickly. No surprises there. Even though Honor promises 10 days for heavy usage, I actually found it to be nearer to 12. It's always nice when the reality is better than expected.
Charging a watch like this every couple of weeks is no trouble at all, especially considering it takes less than an hour to go from empty to full charge. You'll want to keep it within the magic 20-80% to maximize the life of the battery but that's easily done by keeping an eye on the battery life through the watch interface.
When it comes to metrics, I ran stress tests at different times of the day and during different events in my everyday life. I generally found the Band 7 would report my stress levels as normal even at times when I felt noticeably stressed and could tell that my heart rate was raised. I certainly didn't feel like I could trust it.
Automatic sleep tracking provides data that is broken down into sleep stages and the duration of each stage. It's almost impossible to verify the reliability of this data, and fitness trackers are not renowned for being the most reliable anyway. That being said, during my testing period, I was up numerous times during the night and I did find that the tracker was able to identify every one of them.
The tracker itself has a waterproof rating of 5ATM, which means the Honor Band 7 is theoretically able to withstand pressures up to 50m depth, an industry standard among smart wearables these days. I never made it this deep, but had absolutely no problems wearing it in the shower or submerging it in water.
Performance score: 4/5
Honor Band 7: Scorecard
Buy it if...
Don't buy it if...
Also consider
How I tested the Honor Band 7
I wore the Honor Band 7 non-stop for two weeks and thoroughly enjoyed doing so. During this time, I used every single feature and carried out a range of different exercise workouts, including running, swimming, and cycling. Throughout all of this I kept track of my heart rate, my stress levels, and my oxygen levels, amongst other similar health measureables.
I used the app to control the device as well as run a number of more advanced tests that were not possible with the watch on its own.
The Casio G-Shock Rangeman GPR-H1000 will stand out on any wrist thanks to its bold, angular design – and, in this model's case, punchy yellow finish. This watch screams tough at first glance and Casio is selling on that basis. It might be big enough to get knocked as you wear it, but it's built to take every hit, making it a contender for the best running watches.
It comes with an optical heart rate sensor and full GPS to place it in the running against even the best Garmin watches out there. In fact, this has the Garmin Enduro 2 squarely fixed in its sights, competing on the more extreme tracking with a thermometer, barometer, pressure sensor, altimeter and more onboard. While the Casio tracks well, it doesn't offer maps. This makes it a little limited as a true adventure companion.
However, the Rangeman does pack in solar charging, which will enable you to continue using basic functionality even once the bulk of battery life has been consumed. Although note that with a battery life that lasts up to two months and up to 19 hours in GPS tracking mode, the watch has you covered.
Despite looking chunky, a soft urethane band and double-pin buckle actually mean the Rangeman is comfortable to wear and effortless to find the right fit – presuming your wrist is large enough to pull off this over-sized statement watch.
G-Shock Rangeman: Price and availability
The G-Shock Rangeman is available now worldwide, priced at $499.99 / £479.99 / AU$999.99.
There are two versions available, the yellow GPR-H1000-9 model reviewed here, and a black variant named the GPR-H1000-1. Other than color differences, they're essentially the same model and share an identical price.
Since launch, both models have been available on various third-party websites at a reduced price. At time of publishing, the Rangeman can be bought for as low as £375 / $480 / AU$725.
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G-Shock Rangeman: Design
Comfortable strap and accurate clasp
Rugged exterior
Too chunky for some
The G-Shock Rangeman is all about that chunky, rugged design and bold looks, which makes it both unique and attractive. But it's worth saying right from the outset that if you have a smaller wrist then this watch might feel a little bulky and heavy. That said, its super comfy strap and very accurate clasp system – plus relatively low weight at 92g – ensure it's as comfortable as a statement watch of this kind can be.
Primarily, this is a button-based beast, so you won't have to suffer touchscreen fingerprints or difficulty controlling screens while taking part in sport or activity. But the flip-side is that you have to scroll through the menus to get to what you want. That said, G-Shock menus are very intuitive, having been developed over many generations of watch, and since the buttons are all mud- and water-protected, they work well. If I have one gripe here it's that the up and down options are on the left, which means you need to use your thumb, rather than fingers, which I found a little awkward or at least took some getting used to.
The display is a negative MIPS, which is a far cry from the color displays on other watches of this kind – and a shock, if you're moving from an AMOLED. That said, it's super clear in daylight, gets you a long battery life, and also offers high contrast so that even underwater it's very clear to read – which was actually helpful when swimming.
The Rangeman has a waterproof rating of 200 metres, yet after a half-hour pool swim the watch's screen appeared to fill with a bubble of some sort that was visible across the screen, and remains still now. The watch works fine, but is now showing this odd line that's definitely worrying. In reality, we'd hope that you could send this back to Casio for a replacement if you suffered the same.
The companion app from Casio is decent and allows you a way to control the watch without all those menus. So if you want to re-order the sports available or setup the data screens, for example, you can do that far more easily through the app, which makes it genuinely helpful. The app is also a better, clearer way to view any data –sleep scores and daily steps metrics, for example.
Design score: 3.5/5
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G-Shock Rangeman: Features
Tracks many sports
Offers so many sensors
Lacks music
The G-Shock Rangeman is absolutely crammed full of features and sensors, delivering the ability to track nine activity types: trekking, running, biking, gym workout, interval timer, pool swimming, open-water swimming, trail running, and walking. And while taking part in an activity, you have access to data such as distance, direction, altitude, climbing speed, time, pace, heart rate, and burned calories.
Swimming offers stroke count, distance and heart rate, as well as a timer with the option to record splits – so all you could want from a swimming watch then. This works both indoors in a pool as well as outdoors for open water swimming, where the GPS can also help with your data readouts. The screen is fantastically clear above and underwater, and I found the stroke count accurate when compared with the Garmin Forerunner 965.
The lack of onboard music, available with most Garmin watches now, was certainly missed here; there's no option to connect headphones and enjoy music during activities. While it isn't a deal breaker, it certainly would have been a welcome feature at this price point.
Solar charging is a great addition here, since it helps to keep the watch function going for pretty much forever. While the GPS and heart rate tracking might leave you out of battery for the sports modes, you'll still have access to the G-Shock time and date basics. The features the watch part offers include a stopwatch, a 60-minute countdown timer, world times, four different alarms, power saving, and a full auto backlight that illuminates for either 1.5 or five seconds, depending on your preference.
While this doesn't pack all the dedicated surf smarts of the G-Shock G-Lide surf watch, you do still get helpful tide data such as 3,300 points for the tide graph. You also have phone notifications – although, on this screen they're a faff to read. I found myself simply using them as an alert before reaching for my phone – helpful, if you want the phone on silent.
It soon became clear while testing the G-Shock Rangman that wearing it to bed for sleep tracking was not the most comfortable. I did get used to it, but it was never what I'd call a comfortable experience – but this would apply to all brands of "oversize" watch. During the day, there was no slipping this under a sleeve either. As such, the watch was on show constantly, clearly getting attention with that bright yellow finish.
To be clear, this is a comfy watch, and that strap fits perfectly. It's just chunky, and if you find yourself knocking it on things at first, don't be surprised. This shouldn't worry you, however; that tough exterior appears to be able to handle more than a knock or six. That said, there was an issue with the display on this test unit.
After swimming, it looked like half the screen was filled with water; I pressed down and this moved about under the surface of the screen's top-cover. The watch continues to work just fine, only the screen has this half-filled finish. You can see it in the picture below, where it looks like a trick of the light showing the top third as lighter; but this is water or, perhaps, air inside? Either way, it's disappointing when Casio claims that the G-Shock Rangeman is good for a 200m of diving depth – double that of most Garmins.
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In use, the watch performed well. Heart rate was a little on the high side, and quick to jump when compared to a Garmin and chest strap, but this generally levelled out after a while. For cycling, the Rangeman was helpful, where adjustments appeared quickly; but for running , where pure accuracy is ideal, this could have been a little smoother. GPS worked well, with the watch adapting quickly and recording metrics such as speed, pace and distance accurately.
While the menus are dense, the watch is intuitive to navigate, meaning you can access lots of data relatively easily while exercising. It's only really the smaller screen that limits you here, with it often far easier to wait and view the dive data once it had synched.
Performance score: 3.5/5
G-Shock Rangeman: Battery Life
Two months standby
19 hours with GPS
Solar powered extras
Casio has certainly used all that chunky G-Shock frame space well when it comes to batteries, since the Rangeman offers up to two months off a single charge. For use just as a watch, that time is extended further thanks to the solar charging smarts, which sees the watch keep going for basics such as time telling.
As you'd expect, it's with GPS use that a smartwatch battery is really tested, and in this regard the Rangeman achieved 19 hours in GPS mode – although that's with intermittent location acquisition. In reality, with it left turned on, battery is nearer to 14 hours. Still, that's plenty for most exercise sessions, while an easy to attach bespoke clip-on charger that uses USB, will bring the Rangeman back to full charge in just a few hours.
One of the great things about this watch is that you can keep using the Rangeman as a watch alone for months, without charging – say , if you're injured and don't need GPS tracking – topping it back up once you're back to activities.
The Polar Vantage V3 is the update to Polar’s flagship premium multisports watch, which launched back in 2020. So we’ve waited a few years for its successor and Polar has rewarded that wait with some big features.
The headline addition might be the new AMOLED screen, but Polar has also introduced its new Elixir biosensor that can now deliver blood oxygen, skin temperature and heart rate via ECG to arm you with more metrics. It’s also adding offline maps and dual-frequency GPS to deliver more accurate outdoor data.
While the Vantage V2 was a solid offering from Polar, the Vantage V3 sees things step up a notch and it now feels like a better match for the competition. It's meriting an inclusion in our best running watch guide.
I’m still not entirely convinced its core heart rate powers are the best, but the Vantage V3 is definitely a multisports watch that stands out for all the right reasons.
Polar Vantage V3: Specifications
Polar Vantage V3: Price and availability
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$599.90 in the US
£519 in the UK
$899 in Australia
The Polar Vantage V3 was announced in October 2023 and is available to buy now directly from Polar and a small collection of retailers currently. It has a current RRP of £519 in the UK, $599.90 in the US and $899 when purchasing it in Australia, around the same asking price as the Garmin Forerunner 965.
Value score: 4/5
Polar Vantage V3: Design and screen
New AMOLED touchscreen
Heavier than Vantage V2
Nicely textured buttons
The Vantage V3 is Polar’s performance watch, so unlike its Grit series, it’s offering high grade materials, all while keeping things relatively light and comfortable to wear day and night.
It still measures in with a 47mm case like the V2 but is now thicker at 14.5mm compared to the 13mm thick case on the Vantage V2. It’s also got heavier, jumping from 52g to 57g. Those changes ultimately don’t alter the experience of strapping the V3 on. It’s still a pretty sleek-looking watch with aluminium in the case and the bezel to give it an attractive metallic frame.
The strap attached to that case is a workout-friendly silicone one, though you wouldn’t think it at first glance as Polar has clearly tried to give it the appearance of a traditional watch strap. I’m not sure I entirely love the feel of it though as it sits very snug towards and can pull at hairs. Both strap and watch case are waterproof up to 50 metres depth, which does mean you can use it in water but is a downgrade on the stronger 100 metre waterproofing available on the V2.
Around that aluminium case lies five physical buttons and they still have that nicely textured finish that makes them nice to press, even with sweaty or wet fingers. That surrounds a 1.39-inch, 454 x 454 resolution AMOLED touchscreen with Gorilla Glass on top to protect it against scratches. Along with the added pop of colour it’s a bigger display, and while there is a thin black bezel around the edge it’s well hidden by Polar’s predominantly black coloured watch faces.
It's a great AMOLED panel, with deep blacks, good max brightness and I’ve had no issues viewing it indoors, outdoors or in a swimming pool. The screen can be kept always-on with the raise to wake gesture support not as responsive as I’d have liked. What is nicely responsive is the software running on the V3. It’s slick, doesn’t lag and is a massive improvement on the experience of interacting with its predecessor.
When you need to charge it Polar includes a proprietary charging cable that clips into the port just below that new sensor array. It’s not the most secure of charging setups, and you just need to be mindful it’s out of the way of anything that might knock it out of place.
Design score: 4.5/5
Polar Vantage V3: Features
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Dual-frequency GPS
Free offline maps
Elixir sensor array
The Vantage V3 takes everything that was good on the V2 and aims to make improvements in some pretty important departments.
On the tracking front, Polar’s introduced dual-frequency GPS to enhance outdoor tracking accuracy for activities like running, when using the watch near tall buildings, in bad weather or densely forested areas. It’s now also adding free offline maps to join the existing turn-by-turn guidance offered by the Komoot app support.
There’s still over 150 sports profiles offered and Polar is bolstering one sport in particular, promising additional swim metrics including automatically detecting swimming style.
Around the back of the watch is where you’ll find Polar’s new Elixir sensor array, which sees a change in the design of the optical setup that’s now capable of capturing blood oxygen, skin temperature, take ECG heart rate measurements, with the upgraded Gen 4 version of Polar’s optical heart rate sensor also in tow.
Polar continues to offer rich sleep and training features, so you’re still getting access to its Training Load Pro and Recovery Pro insights, with Polar’s FitSpark suggested daily workouts and FuelWise fueling reminders for endurance athletes also still on board. It’s added the voice guidance support from the Ignite 3 along with the Work-Rest-Guide, which uses heart rate data to dictate when you should rest between workout sets.
On the smartwatch front, Polar still keeps things simple once again, offering the ability to view your notifications, change watch faces and control music playback on your paired smartphone. The added AMOLED screen and boost in CPU performance certainly makes these features much nicer to use day-to-day.
Features score: 4.5/5
Polar Vantage V3: Performance
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Welcome dual-frequency GPS accuracy boost
Heart rate still so-so
Delivers good battery life and overall performance
The V3 is Polar’s premium multisports watch, so it’s giving you the best the company has to offer in watch features. It’s bringing in the dual-band GPS support it debuted on the Polar Ignite 3, it’s boosting the mapping and navigation features it introduced on its Grit outdoor watch and the new Elixir sensor aims to offer boost in accuracy to improve the reliability of sports, wellness and sleep tracking.
Polar’s dual frequency GPS, which like Apple, Garmin and Suunto among others, means the V3 can use the L1 and L5 frequency bands to enhance positioning tracking accuracy. I wasn’t massively impressed with it on the Ignite 3 where Polar first introduced it, but it’s certainly more reliable here on the V3. I’ve been using it alongside Garmin and Suunto’s similar modes and while just slightly off on the distance tracking compared to the Garmin and Suunto, it wasn’t enough to cause any concern. Mapped routes inside the Polar Flow app didn’t raise any alarms either.
Polar says it’s also boosted the swimming metrics on offer, so I hit the pool along with the Form Swim Goggles and Garmin Forerunner 965, two swim trackers I know deliver good tracking accuracy in the water. Despite delivering good core swim data, I can’t say I saw anything particularly groundbreaking here. You’ll get quickest pace and average pace stats along with average and max cadence metrics and that’s really about it.
Then there’s the reliability of that new Elixir sensor, which promises an upgraded optical heart rate sensor, though I can’t say the accuracy has been massively upgraded for me. Even on steady paced workouts I found the optical heart rate sensor tended to report lower average heart rate readings and maximum heart rate readings seemed higher against a heart rate monitor chest strap. It’s not a terrible performer, but it’s also not the best performance I’ve seen from a wrist-based heart rate monitor. If in doubt, pair up an external heart rate monitor.
Polar’s Elixr sensor array also brings new blood oxygen tracking, skin temperature tracking at night, and ECG measurements when you hold your finger on the top physical button for 30 seconds. All of these new metrics place the onus on your simply tracking and analyzing trends, which can help you decide whether you should be taking it easy or you’re in good shape to have a strenuous day.
That insight also works in tandem with Polar’s rich sleep tracking, something that does separate it from the sports watch competition. Along with core sleep tracking stats, it’s offering you nightly recharge measurements, nightly skin temperature and the boost from sleep insights, which feels similar to Garmin’s Body Battery energy monitor. Crucially, the sleep data is some of the most reliable I’ve come across on a watch and it held up well against the Oura Ring Gen 3’s great sleep tracking.
Another big positive is that unlike previous Polar watches, comprehensive sleep tracking doesn't show a huge drain on battery, which on the whole, is a big improvement on the Vantage V2. There’s now a bigger 488mAh capacity battery, which Polar says can last for up to 12 days in its daily watch mode and 61 hours in training mode, up from 40 hours. I found the Vantage V3 could last a week with regular tracking using the top GPS accuracy mode. When you opt to keep the screen set to always-on, you’re going to get less than 5 days, and using features like GPS will see a further dent too.
Performance score: 4.5/5
Polar Vantage V3: Scorecard
Polar Vantage V3: Should I buy?
Buy it if...
Don't buy it if...
Also consider
Garmin Forerunner 965
Garmin's top-tier running watch, now with an AMOLED screen.
The Sony Xperia 1 V is the best Sony phone for 2023. It’s a great example of how Sony’s approach to phone design is a little different to that of the competition. And a big part of this approach is keeping a lot of older things the same as they always were.
This handset is a lot like the Xperia 1 IV, but with a new processor and some other tweaks. If you bought last year’s model, you should feel pretty good about that. But is it dynamic enough to compete with phones like the Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra and iPhone 14 Pro Max?
That part is a little less clear. It doesn’t drip in that sense of “newness” that propels a lot of shiny, expensive tech, which may lead you to question if it is really worth the high asking price. However, it is going to appeal to a key kind of tech traditionalist.
Who’s that? The person who wants a top-tier phone with a headphone jack. The Sony Xperia 1 V has one.
Its camera software is also inspired by Sony’s dedicated cameras, offering a completely different feel to most of the best camera phones. Is it better? Again, that’s up for debate and not everyone will love how it feels. But the way Sony does not blindly follow the pack remains refreshing.
Sony Xperia 1 V review: price and availability
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Out now
Starts at $1,399 / £1,299 / AU$2,099
The Sony Xperia 1 V launched in June 2023, a year after the similar Xperia 1 IV. These are expensive phones. You can expect to pay $1,399/£1,299/ AU$2,099, matching the pricing for the last model.
It has 256GB storage. In some territories there’s as 512GB version too. However, it is less appealing an upgrade than it would be in an iPhone, as the Xperia 1 V has microSD memory card support.
Value score: 3 / 5
Sony Xperia 1 V review: Specs
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Sony Xperia 1 V review: design
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Dimpled glass Gorilla Glass Victus rear
Classic Sony boxy design
Has a headphone socket
The Sony Xperia 1 V adopts the same design style as all the previous Sony Xperia flagships: the monolith. It’s a squared off-slab. And while it means this phone doesn’t exactly scream “new”, it is recognizably Sony in a way other manufacturers, other than Apple, can’t quite achieve.
I find this design makes the Xperia 1 V and its predecessors seem a little chunky, relative to their actual specs. This phone is just 71mm wide and 8.3mm thick, very similar to last year’s Sony Xperia 1 IV.
This year, though, we get some new textures. The Sony Xperia 1 V’s back is textured glass, with an embossed dot pattern that, well, makes it feel much less like glass. Its aluminium mid-frame has a series of embossed lines running along it too. This is Sony trying to make the Xperia 1 V stand out from its predecessors, but in that classic low-key Sony way.
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It continues to reject a few newer conventions of flagship phone design too. The Sony Xperia 1 V has a 3.5mm headphone jack socket, now a true rarity in all but the cheapest phones. It uses a side-mounted fingerprint scanner, not an in-screen one. This is a notably poor scanner, though. Slower, less responsive and less reliable than the norm, it lets the phone down and the reliability (or lack thereof) is inexcusable, even if this phone cost half as much. We felt the same about the sensor on the Sony Xperia 1 IV too.
Build quality is otherwise excellent, though. The Sony Xperia 1 V has Gorilla Glass panels on front and back, using second-generation Victus series glass up front, original Victus on the back, and it boasts IP68-certified resistance against dust and water. The Xperia 1 V can handle submersion in water to a depth of 1.5m.
As usual, Sony uses a SIM tray you can prise out with a fingernail, and on the other side of this tray there’s room for a microSD slot. This is another unusual touch in a top-tier phone. A fairly good set of stereo speakers finish off the outer hardware.
They do come with a silly extra, though, called dynamic vibration. It fires off the vibration motor in time with any sound played. This works well enough for gaming but doesn't really have a function anywhere else.
Design score: 3.5 / 5
Sony Xperia 1 V review: display
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High-quality, flat 4K OLED display
120Hz refresh rate
No notch, but extended screen surrounds
The Sony Xperia 1 V has a 6.5-inch OLED screen that mines the same excesses as the previous models in the series: a very tall shape and ultra-high resolution. This is a 4K screen, with a 3840 x 1644-pixel count.
According to a hardware scraper app, its default render resolution is 2560 x 1096 pixels, but the real-world effect is a complete absence of pixelation, even if you get your eye as close to the screen as you can, it's worth noting that true 4K resolution only kicks in when compatible content is detected.
Color and maximum brightness are great, and the OLED panel has effectively perfect contrast by design. The display's refresh rate also peaks at 120Hz.
There’s little to criticize here, if also little to significantly separate the Sony Xperia 1 V from its peers, other than one typically quirky Sony trait. This screen has no notch, no punch hole. Instead, the front camera sits in a little blank expanse of bezel above the screen. Phone makers tend to try to eliminate as much of this surround as possible, but Sony isn’t like everyone else.
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As you can probably tell from a glance, the Sony Xperia 1 V’s display is completely flat. There are no curves here, bar the very slight rounding-off of the corners of the display panel.
Sony does not offer loads of ways to customize how the Sony Xperia 1 V screen looks. You can either use the Creator Mode or Standard mode. The latter is described as being more vivid, but there’s no grand shift in saturation to be seen here, and both modes look tasteful. There’s no way to drastically cut down color pop to reserved sRGB levels, but we can’t imagine many doing so these days anyway.
There is a separate section that lets you alter the color temperature. This changes how “warm” or “cool” the Sony Xperia 1 V display appears.
Display score: 4 / 5
Sony Xperia 1 V review: software and performance
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Has some “pro” style apps
Good performance, but some thermal throttling
Gets warm when doing very little at times
The Sony Xperia 1 V runs Android 13 with a light Sony-made interface and a bunch of wallpapers that bring the software that signature Sony look. However, there’s little to offend or annoy here.
Sony uses a conventional Android layout, and the standard approach to the drop-down notifications bar. There are a few little Sony tweaks, though.
You can, for example, create folders in the app drawer, and choose the order of your apps rather than just arranging them in alphabetical order. Of course, it’s all optional and you can just leave the Sony Xperia 1 V to sort out the order too.
Sony’s value-adding strategy is more about preinstalled apps than anything to do with the interface.
Music Pro is a multi-track recorder app, a very stripped-back take on a DAW (digital audio workstation) app like Reason or Logic. External Monitor, another app, lets you use the Sony Xperia 1 V as a USB-connected display. The prime use case is as an external monitor for one of Sony’s mirrorless cameras. But it’s not limited to that.
We’ll cover the Cinema Pro, Video Pro and Photo Pro apps in the camera section of this review, but Sony’s pitch is clear. It wants us to consider the Xperia 1 V a professional tool as well as a normal phone.
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The Sony Xperia 1 V has the best chipset you could hope for at the time of its launch, the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2. This is a flagship processor that addresses one of the key issues of the Gen 1 version: throttling.
Last-generation phones were capable of some amazing benchmark results. But they often weren’t indicative of real-world performance, as you could lose 50% or more power after just a couple of minutes thanks to heat build-up.
Is the Sony Xperia 1 V much better in this respect? We can’t use our usual methods to tell, as Sony has blocked certain apps – including 3DMark – on review devices.
However, we did dig out an app called CPU Throttling Test, which shows you how much performance is lost over time. Performance loss starts at the two-minute mark, and by eight minutes or so the Sony Xperia 1 V is reduced to around 60-65% of its original power. The minimum recorded over a 15-minute test was 59%, which happened in both runs we tried.
It’s not ideal, but we saw drops to 46% performance in the Sony Xperia 1 IV.
Sony has had its own issues with heat in its phones over the years and, unfortunately, we’ve had some of this with the Sony Xperia 1 V, in another sense. We’re not talking about overheating here, just the phone getting hotter than it should when performing light activities. This does not happen consistently, but we have felt the phone often get warm when streaming audio.
However, we’ve had zero obvious performance issues in real-world use. And games run very well on the phone.
Software score: 4 / 5
Performance score: 4 / 5
Sony Xperia 1 V review: cameras
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Has a multitude of cameras apps
Good general image quality
Doesn’t match the best in extreme situations
Impressive-sounding zoom is optically soft
The Sony Xperia 1 V has three rear cameras. It’s an unusual and high-end array, the most eye-catching of the three being a 3.5-5.2x 12MP zoom with a true optical zoom lens. Lens elements visibly move as you move between those two focal lengths. Such a zoom has only been seen in a handful of phones since smartphones became a thing.
Our other two lenses are a 12MP ultra-wide and a 48MP (technically 52MP with an effective 48MP area) primary wide camera. All three of these, and the selfie camera up front, use Sony sensors. Skip on a few paragraphs if you just want to know what the photos the Sony Xperia 1 V are like, as we have to touch on Sony’s photography ethos first.
Sony doesn’t approach photography like the other phone makers, in a repeat of what we’ve seen throughout this review. It still uses a two-stage shutter button on the side of the Sony Xperia 1 V. You half depress this button to focus, and push all the way down to capture an image.
Don’t want to do so? No problem. There’s a Basic mode that feels much more like the standard way of shooting with a phone, using the touchscreen. It’s how I used the Sony Xperia 1 V, most of the time.
And if you like to think the old ways are the best, you can switch to other Program, and Manual modes, designed to offer a layout comparable to one of Sony’s Alpha-series cameras.
(Image credit: TechRadar)
Good idea? Yes and no. It makes doing things like switching between the focal lengths feel clunky. The real value here is in putting the options that you can’t change after the shoot at your fingertips, and these aren’t always as useful as you might think.
The top ones are shutter speed and exposure. And, sure, ISO sensitivity, but you should want the lowest ISO you can get away with, given phone camera grain and noise aren’t exactly pretty. If you’re not shooting with a tripod, the amount the manual style of control actually adds is limited because you’re dealing with a fixed aperture lens.
And even if the Sony Xperia 1 V did have a variable aperture lens – like on the likes of the Xiaomi 13 Ultra – it still would not give you that much additional creative control, thanks to the crop factor of these cameras. A change in setting is going to be at most a switch from a very small aperture to a very, very small one.
The Sony approach makes a lot more sense with video, in the Cinema Pro and Video Pro apps. One of the clear giveaways you’re an amateur shooting with a phone is the way the exposure and focus switch too rapidly. The phone approach to video is to constantly check if it’s in focus, and exposed correctly. And if not, to sort that out as soon as possible. However, you don’t want that for a pro-looking shoot where ideally you’d have a focus puller and controlled lighting. In Cinema Pro, you lock in your settings before you start shooting, to avoid all that jittering about.
Sony Xperia 1 V camera samples
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A zoom camera alters the foreground’s relationship with the background, often with pleasing results. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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Extended zoom modes make it much easier to get closer to insects without the risk of getting stung. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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A true triple camera array is ideal for holiday shooting, when you can’t always get that close to your subject. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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We can’t help but notice the optical zoom’s lens is a bit soft next to the prime lenses seen in the competition. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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Here’s a duck, shot with a more extreme zoom setting. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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The Sony Xperia 1 V typically has good color handling. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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Low-light images are good, but not best-in-class. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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This shot gives you an idea of the quality of the ultra-wide camera, and its lens distortion. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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An extended zoom is always useful when shooting pictures of animals. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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You’ll occasionally see some epic lens flare when shooting bright light sources at night, as seen here. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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This is an image shot at 2x zoom, which we don’t actually recommend as it’s fairly easy to let it’s a digitally zoomed picture. (Image credit: TechRadar)
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We like how the Sony Xperia 1 V doesn’t tend to oversaturate greens in the way many phone cameras do. (Image credit: TechRadar)
How are the Sony Xperia 1 V’s photos? Excellent, but at this level they fall down in some important areas that can’t be explained away by saying the Sony approach just leans towards a more “pro” style.
That said, this camera still avoids all the issues of the much earlier models in the series. They had processing that looked bad up close, with coarse, jagged or strangulated detail. All of that is gone, and the Sony Xperia 1 V now has a more relaxed approach to detail rendering in most cases than, for example, the Huawei P60 Pro.
Color is respectable too, lacking the kind of obvious oversaturation that makes nature scenes look a little unreal.
The ultra-wide uses a quality 12MP sensor, one that sports a less zoomed-out field of view than some. Sony typically manages to keep the color tone and image character between the wide and ultra-wide cameras consistent; largely avoiding the sense you’re slumming it with the ultra-wide, during the day at least.
The zoom camera is easily the most catchy-sounding of the three rear sensors, though. It can move smoothly between 3.5x and 5.2x zoom, using a genuine optical zoom lens; a true rarity in the smartphone space.
As with any capable zoom camera, the Xperia 1 V’s is going to seem like a revolution in fun for your mobile photography, if this is to be your first time with a periscope zoom. Long-range photos that would once have been total mush will now look sharp. Or, well, sharp-ish. The phone's zoom camera is a reminder that prime lenses (that are those with a fixed focal length) are typically much sharper than optical zoom ones like this.
The 5.2x mode is lossless in theory, but in reality it looks very soft. You can see this when you look down at a per-pixel level, but it also even more obvious when shooting images with very high light contrast, causing a slight smearing effect.
(Image credit: TechRadar)
We compared its 10x results to those of the Huawei P60 Pro. The Huawei results were significantly sharper, and not just because of more advanced processing. There is genuinely more detail there. The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra is going to do even better at 10x, thanks to its dedicated 10x camera too.
The ability to compare one ultra-zoom camera phone to another is a rare privilege. However, any keen photographer may notice the Xperia 1 V has an unfortunate tendency to leave parts of the image overexposed in high contrast scenes at times. This might be where part of the scene is covered by trees, but the rest is bright-but-cloudy sky, for example. The Sony Xperia 1 V just doesn’t try quite as hard as the competition to retain highlights in these high light contrast scenarios.
Similarly, low-light results, while good, are also a cut below the best from Samsung, Huawei and Google. There’s more noise, less detail, and a tendency to record more motion-blurred images despite the use of OIS in both the wide and zoom cameras. A lot of this stuff, bar the occasional notably-overexposed image, only becomes obvious in direct comparison with another top-tier phone. There is another factor to consider, though.
The Sony Xperia 1 V’s preview image is quite poor too. What you see in the camera app as you compose your picture doesn’t look all that much like the final image, because it does not properly estimate what effect dynamic range processing will have.
This also means your subject is typically much less visible on the screen too, as it will look darker and dimmer than it will in the final picture. That matters when shooting outdoors on a very bright day.
Are things looking bad for the Sony Xperia 1 V camera? Not at all. It’s still largely a blast to use in its Basic mode, has a very high hit rate of shots and top-tier image quality. We’re just not sure it competes particularly at $1,399/£1,299 in all areas.
For video, the Sony Xperia 1 V can shoot at up to 4K resolution, 120 frames per second. And there are three different apps you can use to capture.
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There’s the normal route, just using the camera app. Then Video Pro has an interface based on Sony camcorders, offering much better control over manual focus and manual zoom. This can be a fun one to use.
Cinematography Pro is based on the experience of Sony pro-grade video cameras, and may be slightly intimidating to some because it puts a lot of stuff, and numbers, in front of your eyeballs. However, this one is ideal for times when you want to manually set, for example, your shutter speed and ISO manually before you hit the shutter button. You can also see the area outside of the actual frame in the preview image, which is neat.
Would we use it for casual video capture? Probably not. But if you want to make a short film, you’ll want to use Cinematography Pro, or Video Pro.
Care about selfies? The Sony Xperia 1 V has a 12MP selfie camera. We are fairly happy with its results. It can reproduce a good amount of detail, and holds up well in poor lighting, even if you don’t use the screen as a fill flash.
However, it doesn’t compare all that well with the selfie camera of the Huawei P60 Pro one modern-day photography champ. That selfie cam renders lots more detail in good lighting, and has more powerful dynamic range optimization.
Camera score: 4 / 5
Sony Xperia 1 V review: battery
(Image credit: TechRadar)
Poor charging speed
Good, reliable one-day-plus battery life
Supports wireless charging
The Sony Xperia 1 V has a 5,000mAh battery, just like the Sony Xperia 1 IV. While the mysterious occasional heating up of this phone is never going to be a good indicator of battery life, I was entirely happy with how long it lasted in the day-to-day.
The phone tended to last around 1.5 days of moderate use during review, and can be relied on for fairly heavy days of use.
At one point during testing I had to trek across the country, from a 7am start to getting home at just before 11pm. Despite lots of audio streaming, some YouTube streaming, a bit of tethering to a laptop, and route planning using the phone, the Xperia 1 V still had about 25% charge by the time I got home.
It’s a phone I've not had to worry about dying early in the day. Apart from one particularly bad day when the Xperia 1 V seemed to spend almost the entire day borderline hot — something definitely was awry there. An hour of streamed video took 6% off the battery, suggesting it’s good for up to around 16.5 hours.
Sony does not offer particularly good charging, though. We’ve been spoilt by companies like Xiaomi and OnePlus, which offer charging up to a stupendous 150W. The Sony Xperia 1 V is stuck on 30W, the least you’ll find in any of the top-tier Androids.
Our Sony Xperia 1 V did not include a charger, but we have plenty of compatible 30W-plus chargers about. So does it get to the old silver standard of 50% in one hour, as Sony claims? Charging from a completely flat battery, the Sony Xperia 1 V reached 43% charge after 30 minutes with charger one. And 47% with charger two.
If you start charging the phone when it’s at 1% rather than dead, reaching 50% in 30 minutes may be feasible. Still, this is very poor charging speed for an Android this expensive. After 45 minutes, it had reached 60%.
It does support 15W wireless charging, though, and reverse wireless charging, which are convenient extras that don't necessarily crop up on every flagship.
Battery score: 3.5 / 5
Should you buy the Sony Xperia 1 V?
Buy it if...
You want to use wired headphones This is one of the few high-end phones that has a headphone jack socket, making it ideal for the audiophiles out there who still like to use cabled earphones and earbuds.
You want a unique camera The Sony Xperia 1 V has a powerful, an unusual, camera array. As well as a real optical zoom that slides between 3.5x and 5.2x, it has pro-style camera apps inspired by Sony’s dedicated cameras.
You don't want something too big Like the iPhone 14 Pro, this is a top-spec phone that isn’t a pocket-filler. It is only 71mm wide. And while it is quite tall and boxy, a lot of other phones feel large by comparison.
Don't buy it if...
You want speedy charging If you like the idea of a phone that charges in minutes, don’t get the Xperia 1 V. We couldn’t even get its 30W charging to reach to the original fast charge standard of 50% in 30 minutes.
You want a fast fingerprint sensor The fingerprint sensor is surprisingly tetchy, as we found in last year’s Sony Xperia 1 IV. It’s the kind of issue we don’t typically see in much cheaper mobiles, making it a head-scratcher in a phone this expensive.
You want the best camera for night or zoom shots Don’t buy into the hype of this phone’s camera too much. While great, the image preview is weak, and the Samsung and Huawei rivals at this price perform better at night and in extreme zoom scenarios.
Sony Xperia 1 V review: Also consider
The Sony Xperia 1 V is fairly similar to its predecessor. It doesn’t shake things up too much in this series, but as such does feel quite distinct from the competition. Even when placed next to phones with some of the same specs. Here are some other key models to consider.
Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra This phone may not have a motorised optical zoom camera but it is still the king of the zoom. It has separate 10x and 3x zoom lenses, for unbeatable results when your subject is miles away. This phone also supports, and incudes, an S-Pen stylus. However, it’s significantly bigger and heavier than the Sony.
Apple iPhone 14 Pro If you like the idea of a smaller flagship phone, it’s the iPhone 14 Pro rather than the Pro Max, you need to look at. The camera is a bit more forgiving than Sony’s, with fool-proof processing.
However, with a photographer’s eye the Sony can at times look more natural, for the same reason. We still prefer the iPhone as an all-rounder for video capture, though.
How I tested the Sony Xperia 1 V
(Image credit: Future | Alex Walker-Todd)
Review test period = 2 weeks
Testing included = Everyday use as my main phone, web browsing, GPS navigation, video streaming, gaming, calls, podcast and music playback
Tools used = Geekbench 5, Geekbench 6, 3D Mark, multiple power adapters
My time with the Sony Xperia 1 V coincided with some notable events. I got to take it across the country, to a wedding in the lake district, for example.
As well as an opportunity to take some unusual photos, this sort of trip is great for assessing battery life in a more challenging scenario. However, much of my observations in this area come from using the Sony as my one and only phone, which is the norm throughout a review period.
I also had the chance to test drive the Xperia 1 V’s zoom camera in a truly challenging situation, watching Blur at Wembley Stadium from the cheap seats, right at the back of this 80,000-plus visitor venue.
The Sony Xperia 1 V and I have been places, and this also means you tend to get to see what other people feel about its design, how good they think the pictures it takes look. However, the boring stuff matters too. Can its speakers make a podcast audible while you’re cooking? How bright does the screen look while you’re outdoors? These are elements I always pay attention to.
Formerly known as Keep Truckin’, in 2022, this company changed its name to Motive after building the company with the former name for the prior 9 years. The reason for the name change was that they wanted to apply the services they could provide, namely connectivity and automation, across more than just the trucking industry, such as to agriculture, energy and field service. The goal was to be able to scale these businesses via an integrated platform for managing the physical operations.
Motive is a larger player in fleet management operations, with over 120,000 customers served, covering the whole spectrum from small businesses to Fortune 500 companies, with everything in between. Among its clients, Motive can count Flying Star Transport, Kansas City Limousine, Sierra Mountain Express, and West Coast Distributing. Motive claims that its customers through its technology have a 22% reduction in accidents, a 20% improvement in utilization, and an impressive 25% reduction in insurance premiums.
Motive fleet management: Pricing
Motive is unfortunately yet another example of opaque pricing in this area of fleet management. On their website, we were not able to find any specific prices, nor were we able to discern the pricing structure or tiers available of plans. Rather, the company expects potential customers to be in touch for a custom quote. While we respect the process of pricing the plan once you understand the needs, and that a new customer may not even be aware of what the options are, we still think that some more information upfront to potential customers would benefit everyone.
Searching around the internet, we are able to glean some info, although it may not be the latest prices. Still, at least it gives a ballpark of what to expect.
The Motive ELD runs a one-time cost of approximately $150 for the device, with subscription fees starting at about $25 each month. Electronic logs can range in price from free on up to $50 per month. Overall, these prices look to be affordable among fleet management plans, and with the insurance and accident reduction benefits indicated, can easily pay for themselves over time.
Motive fleet management: Features
Motive Fleet Management is a comprehensive solution designed to help businesses efficiently manage their vehicle fleets. Here are some key features typically associated with Motive Fleet Management:
Vehicle Tracking and GPS: Fleet management systems typically include GPS technology to track and monitor the location of vehicles in real-time. This feature enables businesses to have a clear overview of their fleet's movements, optimize routes, and improve overall efficiency.
Asset and Maintenance Management: Fleet management systems often offer tools to track and manage the maintenance and servicing schedules of vehicles. This feature helps businesses ensure that vehicles are properly maintained, reducing the risk of breakdowns and maximizing their lifespan.
Fuel Management: Effective fuel management is critical for fleet operations. Fleet management software may include features that help monitor fuel consumption, identify inefficient driving patterns, and detect instances of fuel theft or unauthorized usage. These capabilities enable businesses to reduce fuel costs and improve overall fuel efficiency.
Driver Behavior Monitoring: Many fleet management systems incorporate driver behavior monitoring to encourage safe and responsible driving. These systems can provide insights into factors such as speeding, harsh braking, and aggressive acceleration. By monitoring and addressing poor driving habits, businesses can enhance safety, reduce accidents, and minimize vehicle wear and tear.
Route Planning and Optimization: Optimizing routes is essential for fleet efficiency. Fleet management systems can analyze traffic patterns, road conditions, and other factors to suggest the most efficient routes for drivers. This feature helps minimize fuel consumption, reduce travel time, and enhance customer service by ensuring timely deliveries.
Vehicle Diagnostics: Fleet management solutions may integrate with the vehicle's onboard diagnostics system to monitor the health and performance of individual vehicles. This allows businesses to proactively identify maintenance issues, schedule repairs, and avoid costly breakdowns.
Reporting and Analytics: Fleet management systems often provide comprehensive reporting and analytics tools. These features enable businesses to generate customized reports, analyze fleet performance metrics, and gain valuable insights into areas for improvement. Data-driven decision-making helps optimize fleet operations, reduce costs, and increase overall productivity.
Integration and Scalability: Fleet management solutions can integrate with other business systems, such as accounting or dispatching software, to streamline operations and improve data accuracy. Additionally, these systems are often scalable, allowing businesses to easily add or remove vehicles and adapt to changing fleet sizes and requirements.
It's important to note that specific features may vary depending on the fleet management software provider and the needs of the business.
Motive fleet management: Support
The support for Motive is decent. There is 24/7 direct support available with a toll free number listed. There is also the option for a chat that starts with a bot, and can transition to support as needed. Finally, there is a direct email address. This is pretty complete, with the only options missing ones that are less used these days, such as snail mail and fax. While we appreciate that the hours are listed as 24/7, there is no turnaround time indicated.
There is also a Help Center for those that want the resources to deal with the problem themselves, which includes a search bar. It consists of a series of FAQ’s, organized around multiple categories including Dispatch & Workflow, Tracking & Telematics and Maintenance. We did not find any webinars, or video content.
Motive fleet management: Final verdict
Motive has an overall C- rating with the Better Business Bureau, and the 1 star rating, almost 100 complaints in the last year and that it is not accredited back this up. Aside from that, we like the feature set, and the 24/7 phone support, but would like to see some more pricing info upfront.
When DJI released the Mini 3 Pro in 2022, it felt like the company was turning its back on true beginner-friendly drone models. Sure, the Mini 3 Pro is small, highly portable, and sits within the regulator-friendly sub 250g category, but some of the features on offer—and indeed the price—are geared more for advanced users and professionals.
It made sense commercially that the Mini 3 Pro was launched first, but with the release of the Mini 3, beginner drone enthusiasts now have a more affordable option to consider.
From the outside, DJI’s two Mini 3 models look almost identical – the main difference is the absence of obstacle avoidance sensors on the Mini 3, which is one of the main limitations of this less expensive model.
DJI Mini 3 specs
Sensor: 12MP 1/1.3-inch CMOS sensor Equivalent focal length: 24mm Video: 4K up to 30fps, 2.7K at up to 60fps, FHD at up to 60fps Stabilization: 3-axis mechanical gimbal Collision avoidance: No GPS: GPS, Glonass and Galileo Flight Times: Up to 38 minutes Maximum flight speed: 35.8mph Size: 148×90×62 mm folded / 251×362×72 mm unfolded Weight: 248g (with battery & microSD card)
Collision avoidance is incredibly useful whether you’re an absolute beginner or an experienced pilot, but it is something you can live without. Neither the Mini 2 nor the original Mavic Mini had obstacle avoidance and both dominated the entry-level drone market. Other key downgrades include lower video specs, no 48MP photos and no subject tracking (Follow Me).
It’s not surprising that the Mini 3’s features have been pared back, but on the whole, it’s still a high-quality portable drone capable of capturing photos and videos in both landscape and portrait format. 12MP photos can be captured in both raw and JPEG, while video can be captured at up to 4K and 30fps. And despite not having collision avoidance, you can still enjoy Quickshots automated flight patterns.
(Image credit: Future)
DJI Mini 3: release date and price
Released December 2022
Available in five main kit options
Basic RC-N1 kit costs just $559 | £519 | AU$829
Touted as a less expensive and more basic version of the Mini 3 Pro, the DJI Mini 3 was both announced and released in December 2022. Since many of the main features are conserved between the two models, users can select the option that best suits their individual needs and, of course, their budget.
The Mini 3 is available in five main kit options: drone only, for those who already own a compatible controller, which costs $469 | £439 | AU$699 ; the RC-N1 controller kit for $559 | £519 | AU$829; the DJI RC (smart controller) kit for $699 | £669 | AU$1019; the RC-N1 Fly More Combo at $718 | £678; and the DJI RC Fly More Combo for $858 | £828. In Australia, the Fly More Combo Plus bundle costs AU$1188 and add the remote controller to that bundle the costs is AU$1378. The bundles include two Intelligent Flight Batteries Plus (47 min max flight time), but these take the weight of the drone above 249g.
Price Score: 4/5
(Image credit: Future)
DJI Mini 3: Design and controller
Lightweight 249g folding design
Two controller options
Increased flight time over Mini 3 Pro
If you’ve seen the Mini 3 Pro, you already have a good idea of what the Mini 3 looks like since the two are nearly identical. The main visual difference is that the Mini 3 doesn’t have collision avoidance sensors. But like all Mini models, the Mini 3 sports a folding design where the propeller arms fold in for convenient storage and transportation. Folded dimensions are 148×90×62 mm and unfolded are 251×362×72 mm, and the drone including battery and microSD card weighs just 248g.
The Mini 3 offers a slightly longer flight time than the Mini 3 Pro using the same 2453mAh Intelligent Flight Battery. The maximum advertised flight time is 38 minutes compared to the Pro’s 34 minutes, but taking into consideration environmental factors as well as the default charge level of 25% when Return to Home is initiated, flight time in reality is around 25 minutes. These numbers come from winter testing and we think flight times will improve during the warmer summer months.
(Image credit: Future)
There are two controllers available and the less expensive option is the standard kit that comes with the DJI RC-N1. This is the same controller that you get with Mavic 3 models, Mavic Air 2S, Mavic Air 2, and the Mini 2. At the top, this controller has a phone holder where you can store the phone connector cable when not in use.
The other controller option is the DJI RC Smart Controller, which features a 5.5-inch touchscreen with 700-NIT brightness. The DJI RC is faster to set up and much more convenient – plus the screen is clearer in sunlight than some mobile phone screens
Design 5/5
(Image credit: Future)
DJI Mini 3: Features and flight
12MP 1/1.3-inch sensor
Level 5 wind resistance
Quickshots flight patterns
DJI drones are well-known for their ease of use, and the Mini 3 is no exception. Set up is incredibly easy with controls providing a generally positive flight experience with no perceptible lag between input and execution. There are three main flight modes available: Cine, Normal and Sport. Cine is the slowest with reduced control sensitivity for capturing smoother video footage; Normal is the most commonly used mode; and Sport is the fastest of the three with a top speed of 35.8mph.
Wind resistance up to Level 5 (up to 24 mph) is as advertised, and the Mini 3 can fly in these conditions with the flight mode set to Sport. It’s a small and lightweight drone, but nowhere near as powerful as a Mavic 3. Against 24 mph winds, it can drift, and controls become less responsive as the drone fights against wind gusts.
In terms of features, the main point of interest for most people will be the camera, which can be rotated 90° between landscape and portrait format. All photo and video functionality is available in both orientations. The camera houses a 12MP 1/1.3-inch sensor and provides a 24mm equivalent focal length alongside a fixed f/1.7 aperture with a focus range between 1m and infinity. Shooting modes include Single Shot, Timed, Auto Exposure Bracketing, Panorama Sphere, 180°, Wide Angle and HDR.
(Image credit: Future)
The camera is the same as the one on the Mini 3 Pro, but 48MP shooting in Raw and JPEG is not available on the Mini 3. However, you can easily increase the size of the 12MP Raw files using Adobe’s Super Resolution in Lightroom and Adobe Camera Raw. When we tested the Mini 3 Pro, the in-camera interpolation of Raw files was pretty much identical to Adobe’s Super Resolution, so despite the absence of the feature in the drone, you can still achieve similar results in post-production and essentially, the only cost is time.
A time-saving feature that beginners will welcome is the inclusion of Quickshots. These are automated flight patterns that allow you to capture interesting video footage with ease. There are five options available and all can be shot with the camera set horizontally or vertically. One thing to bear in mind here is that the Mini 3 doesn’t have obstacle avoidance sensors, so you have to be sure that there are no obstacles nearby that the drone could potentially crash into while performing Quickshots.
Collision avoidance is a useful feature, but one that has been omitted, presumably to help reduce cost and differentiate the two Mini 3 models. There are downward vision sensors that help with hovering accuracy and work in tandem with GPS, Glonass and Galileo global satellite positioning. This keeps the drone in position as it is hovering when the controls are released. Then there are several Return to Home functions that automatically fly the drone back to the take-off point in various scenarios including when the battery is low and when the connection between the controller and drone is weak or dropped. Some RTH functions need to be initiated by the pilot, while others, like low battery RTH, are initiated by the drone.
Features and performance 4/5
(Image credit: Future)
DJI Min 3: Image quality
Raw and JPEG photo capture
Video up to 4K at 30fps
Excellent image quality overall
Overall image quality is excellent considering the small size of the camera and sensor, which is incidentally larger than the sensor used in the Mini 2. Images are sharpest in the center, with a drop-off in sharpness as you move towards the edges of the photo frame, but this isn’t the same case for video footage.
ISO handling is also excellent across the ISO 100-3200 range, with natural color present and little to no color or luminance noise visible. This is thanks to DJI’s dual native ISO technology, first seen in the Mini 3 Pro, which helps these tiny drones to produce better image quality at higher ISO settings than some more expensive drones with larger sensors. So, combined with the fast f/1.7 aperture, 2.4 μm size pixels and DJI’s chip-level HDR technology, photos and videos can be captured in low light conditions with fantastic results.
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Photos can be captured in JPEG and raw, with the former providing decent results straight out of the camera, and the latter providing more advanced users increased editing control. Video is slightly more limited than with the Mini 3 Pro, but you can shoot in 4K at up to 30fps, 2.7K at up to 60fps, and FHD at up to 60fps. And when shooting at 24/25/30fps, HDR video is captured.
There’s only one video profile option of Normal, with no Log profiles available, and the maximum video bitrate is 100Mbps – so not ideal for a professional workflow. Enthusiasts, however, may prefer the Normal profile anyway since this kind of footage is easier to handle than Log footage and doesn’t require color grading.
If you intend to shoot video, even at a basic level, it’s recommended that you use ND filters to achieve the correct shutter speed for natural-looking movement. An ND filter set is available separately from DJI and in a nutshell, the 180-degree rule for video suggests that the shutter speed used should be roughly double the frame rate of the video being captured. So, if you shoot at 30fps, the ideal shutter speed is 1/60 sec – easy.
Image and video quality 4/5
(Image credit: Future)
Should I buy the DJI Mini 3?
Buy it if...
Don't buy it if...
Also consider
If our DJI Mini 3 review has you wondering about alternatives, here are two rivals to consider:
