This guide covers everything that you need to know about the DJI Fly app for Mavic Mini and Mavic Air 2, including the main features, functions, and various settings within the DJI app. We will show you around the app and make sure you understand the best way to fly each time you take your DJI aircraft out for a spin.
Contents
DJI Fly App: Versatile Flight Companion
DJI Fly app is an easy-to-use app that provides you with all the necessary tools for capturing incredible images and videos with Mavic Mini and Mavic Air 2 to share with your friends in just a few taps.
This new DJI app’s intuitive UI controls, flight tutorials, and editing tools are perfect for new drone enthusiasts, everyday flyers, and content creators. For seasoned photographers and videographers, DJI Fly app also provides integrated access to SkyPixel, a social media platform for users to create unique content. Whether you are an old-hand or a new flyer, DJI Fly app contains something for everyone!
Now let’s dive into what this fantastic little DJI app can do…
DJI Fly App: Home Screen
The DJI pilot app starts automatically when you first connect your smartphone to your Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2 remote controller. The home screen is minimalistic and streamlined, making it easy to find exactly what you are looking for.
Location Icon
Tap the location icon at the top left of the screen to view your current location using the map and check for useful location information.
You can display DJI Geo Zones on the map, which cover Restricted Zones, Authorization Zones, and more. 
Book Icon
Tap the book icon in the top right corner of the home screen to view tutorials, tips, flight safety information, and the user manual all within the DJI Fly app.
Album, User Profile, and SkyPixel Icons
The bottom left corner on the home screen has icons for accessing your album, user profile, and SkyPixel. By tapping the album icon, you can access helpful features such as templates for creating video clips to share on social media. Simply drag your drone videos into the video editor interface to make a cool new video.
Tap the profile icon to view flight logs or access the DJI Forum, DJI Online Store, and the Find My Drone feature. You can tap the SkyPixel icon to upload your content to DJI’s worldwide aerial photography community.
Go Fly Icon
Click the Go Fly icon on the home screen to connect directly to your Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2 and enter the Camera View to fly your aircraft.
DJI Fly App: Camera View
Whether you are brand new to flying drones or a seasoned professional, Camera View has everything you need to have a safe, fun flight experience from takeoff to landing.
Flight Status
Check important flight status parameters such as the GPS signal, battery level, photo and video options, gimbal settings, and the distance to the aircraft’s home point via easy-to-read status indicators and icons.
Flight Modes
Camera View allows the drone pilot to set one of three unique flight modes for your Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2: Position, Sport, or CineSmooth mode. Let’s take a closer look at how these modes work and the way they affect your drone’s performance.
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Position
Position mode is the default flight mode for your drone and enables access to essential aircraft functions, including GPS and obstacle sensors. This mode allows the aircraft to hover in place, making it ideal for taking stable shots, while the obstacle sensors stay active to ensure you have a safe, fun flight experience.
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Sport
Sport mode is designed for flying your drone with maximum speed and maneuverability. As a result, you won’t be able to access any of Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2’s QuickShots when operating in Sport mode. Users tend to use this mode for traveling quickly to points of interest for shooting photos and video. Make sure you use only use this mode in a safe, open area to experience just how fast you can fly!
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CineSmooth
CineSmooth is the ideal flight mode for shooting stunning, cinematic footage. Mavic Mini’s rotational movement is slowed and its control sensitivity is increased, ensuring you shoot the smoothest, most stable footage.
Aircraft Status
You can view the aircraft status indicator next to the flying mode indicator on the top left corner of the Camera View screen.
Tap the status indicator to view and set your max altitude, flight distance, and Return to Home (RTH) altitude. You can also check your drone’s remaining storage space and format your SD card. Let’s take a closer look at some of these settings under the aircraft status indicator.
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RTH Altitude
Setting the RTH altitude ensures your aircraft will fly at a safe and stable altitude when you control it to return to home automatically. This setting is especially useful when flying in areas surrounded by tall objects, such as trees or buildings. Before making this setting, we recommended flying your aircraft to a height of around 100 ft to check the surrounding area and make sure the aircraft can safely clear the tallest objects based on the altitude you’ve set.
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Max Altitude
You can also use the status indicator to set your drone’s max flight altitude manually. The max altitude is capped at 30 m during flight training and when you are not logged-in to the DJI Fly app.
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Max Distance
Max distance determines how far your aircraft can fly from the remote controller. Make sure to set a safe distance that will allow your aircraft enough time to return to home before the battery runs out.
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SD Card
Use this space to view your available storage space for photos and videos and format your SD card. Make sure to back up any important files before formatting your card.
Signal Strength and GPS
Check the small satellite icon on the top-right corner of the Camera View screen to view how many positioning satellites are currently connected to your Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2, and use the indicator next to satellite icon to check their connection strength. You can also use the Wi-Fi indicator in this area to check the signal strength between the drone and the remote controller. The Wi-fi indicator’s signal strength will change as you encounter interference during flight. Always check and make sure you have a secure connection to your aircraft before flying.
Battery
This indicator displays the battery life, temperature, voltage, remaining flight time, and information regarding the overall health of your battery.
Camera & Video Settings
With a sleeker and more efficient interface, DJI Fly app’s updated UI provides users with a clear, expanded view for shooting breathtaking shots. Tasks such as adjusting camera parameters, switching between shooting modes, and adjusting the gimbal angle can now be done with just one simple tap of your finger.
Photo Icon
Use the photo icon to select whether you want to shoot single or timed photos, and set the timer for timed shots anywhere from 2-60 seconds. You can also use this area to manually adjust the shutter speed from a range of 1/8000 to 4 seconds. Setting the shutter speed helps you control how much light and motion is captured by the camera, making it ideal for use with shooting tasks like capturing clouds moving across landscapes, waves crashing into the seashore, or busy night scenes.
Finally, you can adjust the ISO filter value anywhere from a range of 100 to 3200 for help with tasks such as taking nighttime photos or snapping images in dark settings without using a flash. However, try not to set your ISO value too high, or you may introduce a lot of noise to your footage.
Video Icon
You can tap this icon to choose between shooting in 2.7K or 1080p resolution, as well as manually adjusting the frame rate between a range of 25-60 fps. When using 2.7K resolution, we recommend setting a frame rate of 30 fps for clearer images.
QuickShots
Tap the QuickShots icon to choose one of four unique, automated flight patterns for capturing stunning video recordings with your Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2. Let’s learn more about each QuickShot and what makes them fun and unique.
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Rocket
For this QuickShot, your aircraft hovers at a low, wide-angle viewpoint, and then suddenly shoots upward at a fast speed like a rocket lifting off into space.
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Dronie
When using Dronie, the aircraft focuses on a subject and then flies backward at an upward incline while filming, making it a perfect choice for revealing shots of beautiful landscapes.
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Circle
In Circle, the aircraft keeps the camera focused on the subject in the center of the frame, while circling the subject slowly at a constant distance. This is an ideal QuickShot mode for showcasing an interesting perspective while highlighting a subject in the center of the frame.
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Helix
For this mode, the aircraft starts close to the subject and then flies upward in spiral-like motion. As the aircraft flies higher, the loops it makes get larger and larger, giving your shot an interesting helix effect.
Map, Location Info, and Auto Take Off
Tap the map at the bottom corner of the Camera View screen to view location information for your aircraft and the surrounding area. Check this map to find GEO Zones or areas with flight restrictions, locate your home point, and change the map overlays. The Auto Take Off button is also located just above the map, which comes in handy when you want to start flying without using your remote controller.
Flight Telemetry
Check your flight telemetry data next to the map and location information field. You can view a variety of different data, such as the current height (H) and flight distance (D) of the aircraft, or check the aircraft’s vertical and horizontal movement speeds.
DJI Fly App: Overflow Menu
Tap the three dots on the top right corner of the Camera View screen to open the overflow menu, which you can use to make important safety, control, camera, and transmission settings for your Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2, and view your aircraft information.
Safety
This menu allows you to update your home point, reset the gimbal, and connect to your aircraft. Setting the home point is vital so the aircraft knows precisely where to return to if it becomes disconnected from the remote controller while flying.
You can also calibrate the compass and the inertial measurement unit (IMU). The IMU controls the speed and altitude of your aircraft. If your drone seems to be drifting a lot by itself, calibrating the IMU may fix this issue.
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Flight Protection
Set important flight safety parameters such as the max flight distance and speed.
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Update Home Point
Use this setting to update your home point to your desired location. Your home point can be set as your aircraft’s takeoff position or the current GPS location of your mobile device and remote controller.
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Sensors
Adjust the sensitivity level of your aircraft to control how fast and smooth it reacts to user operations with DJI Fly app and the remote controller.
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Advanced Safety Settings
Make advance settings such as enabling the Emergency Propeller Stop, which allows the users to stop the aircraft propellers directly in the event of an emergency.
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Find My Drone
Worried you’ll lose your drone while flying outdoors? You can enable Find My Drone to record your aircraft’s last known GPS location and emit a sound and LED beacon to make it easier to find.
Control
The Control menu allows you to switch between flight modes, and change the gimbal mode between Follow (default) and FPV. For the gimbal, Follow Mode provides stabilization along all three axes for shooting smoother footage. In comparison, FPV mode unlocks movement along all three axes for a more dynamic shooting experience. You can also set whether the app and aircraft data is displayed using the imperial or metric system depending on your needs.
The Control menu can also be use to make more professional settings, like gimbal pitch speed and smoothness, and recalibrate the gimbal.
Gimbal calibration can be used if you experience any pitching issues with Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2.
Finally, you can use this menu to set the control stick mode for your remote controller (Mode 1, 2, or 3). Doing so changes the way your aircraft responds to the movement of the control sticks. If you are experiencing issues controlling the aircraft, you can also recalibrate the remote controller via this menu.
Camera
Tap the Camera menu to make advanced, professional settings to your drone’s camera. You can set parameters such as the image size (4:3 or 16:9) or format your SD card. We recommend using a 4:3 size when shooting to give you more room to work with in post-editing.
Advanced Shooting Settings
These advanced settings include histogram, grid lines, and an over-exposure warning. Each setting provides unique options to tighten up your aerial photography sessions.
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Histogram
This setting allows you to change the exposure settings by providing a graphical view of the pixels in a frame. Using the histogram improves the exposure for high-contrast shots, like capturing a sunset with tall objects in the foreground.
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Gridlines
Use the gridlines to help you line up your subject exactly where you want it in the frame.
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Overexposure
Enabling this setting makes zebra stripes appear on areas with high overexposure in image previews and in Camera View. Using this warning helps you know when to adjust camera settings to match the brightness of an overexposed area.
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Anti-Flicker
The anti-flicker feature helps reduce the impact of shooting in unsteady lighting, like cityscapes with bright fluorescent lights.
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Cache Limit
Your Cache Limit is based on the max storage space of your device. Be careful when using the Auto setting, as shooting after your cache limit is reached will result in excess footage being deleted.
Transmission
Use the Transmission menu to enable settings that improve communication between your aircraft and the remote controller. Avoid flying your Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2 near rocks, trees, and metal structures that cause interference to achieve the maximum transmission range.
Channel Mode
Set the transmission channels for your aircraft and remote controller. Use Auto mode to pick the best available channel for your surrounding environment. If you want to set your transmission frequency manually, note that low frequencies are more favorable for long-range flights, but the video quality will decrease on the live feed. Using higher frequencies is more optimal when flying at closer distances.
About
The About menu contains important aircraft information, including the current aircraft firmware, DJI Fly app, and Fly Safe Database versions. You can also view detailed information such as the name and model of your aircraft, check for available updates, view battery information, and check other important serial numbers and information.
DJI Fly App: Professional Drone Video Editing Software
DJI Fly app’s built-in Editor interface includes multiple video templates, music options, special effects, and other useful features to help make editing your photos and videos quick and easy. The drone video editing software features an intuitive video timeline interface with multi-track editing capability for quick and easy modifications to your footage.
The DJI video editor also allows you to adjust the screen orientation of your footage between Portrait and Landscape so you can view your footage the way you think is best.
Editing Suite
Use DJI video editor’s built-in editing tools to convert videos to HD, edit multiple clips at once, and create your own interesting cinematic content. You can also adjust the brightness, saturation, and contrast to add a professional feel to your photos and videos.
Share Your Work
Upload your creations to SkyPixel directly from DJI video editor and interact with DJI’s growing community of aerial photographers. Enjoy stunning work from around the world, show off your creations, and access unique competitions with just a simple tap.
DJI Fly App: Compatibility
Make sure to regularly update DJI Fly app and your Mavic drone’s firmware whenever possible, so you don’t miss out on useful new updates and features.
Conclusion
DJI Fly app is a simple and easy-to-use new introduction to the DJI family of smartphone applications, featuring comprehensive tutorials and guides that will help your Mavic Mini or Mavic Air 2 get off the ground and flying in no time. Whether you are new to aerial photography and flying drones, or an experienced old hand, DJI Fly app includes user-friendly tools to provide you with the inspiration for creating high-quality content. This new DJI app brings simplicity back to being a drone pilot, and it is excellent for the everyday flyer or content creator who is looking for straightforward features to create magical moments.
Recommended articles:
– Mavic Series Comparison: Which Drone Should You Get?
– Mavic Mini FAQ: Everything You Need to Know
