Drones

Portable Walkera Vitus 320 drone takes on the DJI Mavic

Portable Walkera Vitus 320 drone takes on the DJI Mavic
The Walkera Vitus 320 features a gimbal-stabilized 4K camera
The Walkera Vitus 320 features a gimbal-stabilized 4K camera
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Walkera Vitus 320: folding camera drone
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Walkera Vitus 320: folding camera drone
Walkera Vitus 320: will fit in a backpack or even pocket
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Walkera Vitus 320: will fit in a backpack or even pocket
The Walkera Vitus 320 features a gimbal-stabilized 4K camera
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The Walkera Vitus 320 features a gimbal-stabilized 4K camera
Walkera Vitus 320 is similar to the DJI Mavic in form factor
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Walkera Vitus 320 is similar to the DJI Mavic in form factor
Walkera Vitus 320: folding remote controller holds your phone as a screen
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Walkera Vitus 320: folding remote controller holds your phone as a screen
Walkera Vitus 320 allows you to play augmented reality games
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Walkera Vitus 320 allows you to play augmented reality games
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Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, they say, and if that's the case, then there's a heck of a lot of flattery going on between Chinese drone manufacturers. The Vitus 320, from Walkera out of Guangzhou, bears a strong resemblance to the Mavic, from DJI out of Shenzhen.

The Vitus is a super-portable, folding quadcopter. Its blades also fold in half for super-quick setup and teardown. It sports a 4K, gimbal-stabilized camera, dual GPS flight stabilization and a miniature controller with arms that fold out to hold your phone as a screen. It'll fit easily in a backpack or even cargo pocket. So far, so Mavic.

Its obstacle detection functionality is actually slightly better than the Mavic's, keeping an eye out to the front, left and right of the drone where the DJI effort only stops you from crashing into things forwards. But the DJI gear can see further than Walkera's 5-meter detection zone.

Walkera Vitus 320 is similar to the DJI Mavic in form factor
Walkera Vitus 320 is similar to the DJI Mavic in form factor

Its camera also offers a wider angle of view at 85 degrees against the Mavic's 78.8 degrees, which will be handy in some situations and less useful in others.

Some automated flight seems possible, with the addition of a Smart Follow mode that uses a similar visual tracking algorithm to DJI's ActiveTrack. But there's no mention of automated point-of-interest circling, pre-planned flight paths or tap to fly.

Walkera Vitus 320: folding remote controller holds your phone as a screen
Walkera Vitus 320: folding remote controller holds your phone as a screen

It's reasonable to expect that the Vitus will have a much smaller transmission range than the Mavic's ludicrous 7-kilometer range. On the other hand, flying so far away is almost always illegal, and pretty stressful to boot. A shorter range won't ruin many shots for most pilots.

Perplexingly, Walkera has built in an augmented reality pew pew game that lets you treat your aerial camera system like a toy. I'm not sure I can see that catching on.

Walkera Vitus 320 allows you to play augmented reality games
Walkera Vitus 320 allows you to play augmented reality games

The Vitus 320 is a couple of hundred dollars cheaper than the Mavic at US$799.

Source: Walkera Vitus 320

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1 comment
1 comment
Brian M
With regard to range, its not so much the absolute distance that's important, its 7km range is more of an indicator on how well its also going to perform closer to base. Using the Phantom 4 pro+ the image is so much better than conventional FPV video systems at the MK1 eyeball range or nearer.
Don't really understand why other manufacturers have not tried to implement COFDM (Coded orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing) type technology would be the perfect way to compete with DJI.
Might add to the cost a little, but its the killer feature than DJI has.