Yuneec is a company that started as a manufacturer of remote-controlled aircraft for modelmaking enthusiasts. This company has produced some incredible features in their drones in recent years, including dual thermal and optical zoom cameras for drones and being one of the first companies to launch a ready-to-fly out-of-the-box drone.
This company continues to innovate and, in 2020, released its enterprise workhorse for surveying and other industrial uses.
Yuneec currently offers two commercial drones and has a range of legacy products that you can purchase online.
| Typhoon H3 | Typhoon Plus | Tornado H920 | H5S20 | Typhoon Q500 | |
| Model | YUNTYH3US | YUNTYHPRBPUS | YUNH920US | YUNH5E90S | YUNQ4KUS |
| Weight | 4.4 lbs | 4.4 lbs | 3.6 lbs | 4.2 lbs | 3.7 lbs |
| Flight time | 25 min | 28 min | 25 min | 28 min | 25 min |
| Max speed | 44.7 mps | 30.2 mph | 31 mph | 30.2 mps | 18 mph |
| Max Altitude | 1640 ft | 1640 ft | 1640 ft | 1640 ft | 400 ft |
Typhoon H Plus
the Typhoon H plus provides high image quality due to their collaboration with Intel Real Sense technology.
It has a 1 inch 4K camera and a load of smart flight modes, including follow me, point of interest, and cable cam.
Because the drone is for commercial uses in high electromagnetic radiation noise areas, it has been protected against electrical influences and, with a six-rotor design, is super stable and reliable.
The top features of this drone include:
- unlimited 360° gimble360 Gimbal rotation
- five rotors fail-safe mode – you can lose a motor and still fly back to your takeoff spot
- 4K video capture
- 20-megapixel photos
- ready to fly out of the box
- remote control with a 7-inch touchscreen
- a 1-inch sensor
It can fly for up to 28 minutes in calm weather and flight conditions. One of the interesting aspects of this drone is its six-rotor system that can automatically switch to 5 motors if one of the motors or propellers fails.
Something that a drone with only four propellers cannot do.
This drone also has “team mode” that allows you to independently control the drone and the camera separately by two remote control systems.
This feature allows one person to focus on piloting the drone whilst the other one can focus on capturing the best photo or video.
It uses sonar for collision avoidance and can react independently to obstacles, creating a safer flight path for the drone while it is flying.
The drone comes with a dedicated remote control with a built screen for flying with confidence. No more using your smartphone to view the drone’s heads up or first-person view. All of the on-screen display items are perfectly configured for the screen.
Yuneec have managed to create a powerhouse of a drone with the Typhoon H Plus.
Yuneec H520E/520
Yuneec have gone all out with this drone, creating a professional-grade aircraft that can rival some of the best in its class.
This drone is designed with the inspection industry in mind and has six rotors for a super stable flight and a long focal length that allows the drone to fly a safe distance from anything it is inspecting. The data can be shared instantly with the ground station or delivered directly in 4K video or 20-megapixel photos.
The features of note of this drone include:
- up to 360° gimbal rotation
- five rotors fail-safe mode
- three-axis gimbal
- up to 20 minutes of flight time
- hot-swappable cameras – brilliant for people needing to capture different images quickly
- remote control with integrated 6-inch touchscreen
- dater pilot mission planner
- and radio communication for a 3 km range
This drone has a fantastic feature for you for those interested in data security. There is no data transfer to remote servers, and it shares the information directly with the ground station. Now involuntary data transfer to servers in Germany, China, or globally.
Hot-swappable payloads
The hot-swappable payload features mean that you can swap out for a range of cameras that extends the capacity of this drone to:
- 30 times zoom camera (E30Z/X)
- 20-megapixel camera with 1 inch Sony sensor (E90/X)
- Dual thermal and RGB camera (E10T and CGOET/X)
If you are in the market for a reliable, stable and precise drone for monitoring and surveying, this drone may be one of the most affordable and best drones for you currently on the market. Some people do not like to use DJI for privacy reasons – something that this drone tackles had on.
Yuneec have doubled down on the professional and enterprise models of drones whilst leaving their hobby level drones aside.
However, there are plenty of legacy products that you can purchase through other websites that still give you access to affordable and feature-packed drones.
Legacy Products
In the early days of this company’s drone manufacturing activities, they focused on consumer-level drones for the average hobbyist.
They were one of the first companies to produce a fly out of the box drone and managed to find a gap in the market between toy drones and more expensive mid-grade photography drones.
Mantis Q
The Mantis Q is a very small but powerful drone perfect for taking around with you on your daily travels. The drone can stay in the air for a maximum of 33 minutes.
It is also packed with a load of user-friendly and fun features, including:
- face detection
- 4K video resolution
- visual tracking system
- 44 mph top speed in sports mode
- and voice control
- Return to home
It has a load of fun vision-based tracking and face detection systems.
Simply smiling at the drone can take a photograph from up to 13 feet away, and in gesture control mode will detect a hand waving and take a photo on command.
You can use this drone with or without the controller to get the ease of use and the piloting experience that is often much more user-friendly and something that other drone pilots will be familiar with.
Tornado H920
This drone is a hexacopter perfect for professional photographers.
The arms pull and pack down so that the drone can be carried in a small box.
The drone has an impressive array of automatic flight features, including:
- Orbit
- point of interest
- journey
- follow me mode
- returns to home
This drone may be an excellent option if you are after a quality legacy drone for photography purposes and do not want to spend money on the most recent drone release.
Yuneec Typhoon Q500
this drone 1D 2015 popular photography award for an outstanding product.
Even though it is a relatively old drone, it can still provide everything that you want at a fraction of the price of a new model drone.
It is ready to fly out of the box and carries a 4K hundred and 20 frame per second camera.
It has a three-axis gimbal that allows you to take super smooth shots, and a digital video downlink will ensure that you can see and follow the live images from the camera via the remote control.
It has an impressive array of modes, including:
- watch me
- follow me
- return to home
- up to 25 minute flight time
You can completely control the video resolution and white balance through the app, making this one of the best legacy photography drones.
If you don’t mind a drone is a little bit older than others in the market, you should consider purchasing this drone for your photography at an absolutely bargain basement price!
About Yuneec
In the year 1999, this corporation was established in Hong Kong. They began as a maker of remote-controlled aircraft for modelmakers but have expanded their product line to include drones.
The Typhoon Q 500 quadcopter was the company’s first drone, released in 2014. It had a three-axis gimbal and a 1080p camera capable of 60 frames per second recording. This drone was remarkable at the time, demonstrating that this business was one of the forerunners in drone technology. Hexacopters are the emphasis of this firm since they are more stable in high winds and provide greater lift for bigger cameras and equipment.
In 2016, the business released the Typhoon H, the first ready-to-fly semi-professional hexacopter. It was integrated with Intel’s real sense technology, which allowed the drone to identify and autonomously avoid obstacles, which was groundbreaking in 2016.
They also introduced a drone dubbed the breeze in 2016, a 4K selfie drone designed to capture market share from DJI and its tiny drone consumers. Although the breeze is not a folding drone, it is still compact and portable.
This firm is forward-thinking, and its drones were co-engineered with other companies like Leica. There are intelligent flying modes such as journey mode, orbit, follow me mode, curved cable cam and fantastic hardware.
Yuneec Drone buying guide
If you are considering buying a drone, then Yuneec is a manufacturer that has been around for a long time and can provide you with quality drones.
They seem to be moving away from the consumer and hobby market and focusing much more on enterprise models.
The good news is that you can still pick up some of their previous drone models on Amazon and other marketplaces for a bargain price.
Here is a quick summary of what you need to consider when buying a Yuneec drone.
Price point
Yuneec offers a huge range of price points for their drones, and you will be able to find some of their powerful order drones at a much lower price than other newer drones with the same features.
The more money you spend on a Yuneec drone, the better hardware you get. Typically this comes as a better camera and more stability features.
Professional photographers should stick with the higher end of the Yuneec product offerings, whilst hobby drone flyers will be able to choose from all of their currently available and legacy drones without any issues.
Hot-swappable cameras
One thing I like about the new Yuneec flagship drones is the interchangeable hot-swappable cameras.
It would help if you considered whether or not this is an important function for your use case.
Suppose you are an industrial user of drones and need to collect multiple different types of images for an industrial or surveying purpose. In that case, you may like the extra functionality these hot-swappable cameras can provide.
Final word – The best Yuneec Drones on the market
Yuneec may not be the first drone factory you think about, but rest assured, they have been hard at work making sure that their drones have the best in market features, just like the bigger players in the drone market.
If you are in the market for a drone, you’d be silly to look past the drones which Yuneec offers.
