Skyrover S1: A new king cheap drone for the US market?

The new Skyrover S1 – and its controllers – looks a lot like a cross between some of DJI's cheaper lighter drones, but it's not exactly the same – and perhaps it's even better. It's just launched in the USA, too, so we've not had chance to offer our full verdict.

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Skyrover S1: was $349 now $289 at Amazon

Boasting a 1/2-inch 48MP Sony sensor on a gimbal, this drone can capture 4K video at up to 60fps. The battery can handle up to 40 minutes, and the controller has a sprung grip to use your phone as a live-view monitor.

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The Skyrover S1 boasts a 7.45 mile (12km) video range, a little longer than the DJI Mini 4K drone that it is priced similarly to, and forward which the Mini 4K doesn't have at all.

Otherwise the design is similar, with a camera on a gimbal that can capture smooth footage but, if you want to shoot for social media in a portrait format, you can – you just have to operate in a cropped mode that misses on a lot of the pixels (unlike, say, the DJI Mini 3).

It was first thought that SkyRover was a brand that was using DJI tech but side-stepping the US ban on the brand, and certainly the first SkyRover X1 seems a lot like the DJI Mini 4 Pro, albeit a lot more colorful.

A few more months have passed, and, interestingly, the new S1 has its own shell design, not seen on DJI products precisely. And let's face it, the folding four-leg design is hardly just DJI anymore (the company's original Mavic 1 having really hammered the ideas into consensus, but being a long time back now, in 2016).

Other signs that things are truly different are things like taking a drone that shoots 4K video and using phrases like "True 8K clarity unleashed" on the company website – which SkyRover does, like many low-cost brands. It's not strictly wrong (the company is referring to the drone's still images), but in my experience DJI has never made a claim quite so misleading under its own brand.

The software on the controller, though, does look very similar, even the subject tracking graphics (and those features are all there).

Will this make it into our best drones guide or best drones for beginners guide? It looks like it's got the tech and the value, but, as yet, we have not been offered a review model.