DJI ban: how the world’s biggest dronemaker is getting shoved out of the US

After launching exclusively in China last month, DJI is announcing wider global availability for its Neo 2 selfie drone, including Japan, Canada, the UK, and other countries where the company sells its drones. But as with the Mavic 4 Pro and 8K Osmo 360 camera, the Neo 2 won’t be available in the US. “DJI remains committed to the US market and serving our US-based customers. Like many global companies, we’ve had to adjust our market strategies as the local conditions and industry environment have evolved,” DJI spokesperson Daisy Kong told The Verge in an emailed statement.

The Neo 2’s upgrades include a lidar-based obstacle avoidance system to detect and avoid crash hazards, an improved following speed of nearly 27mph, better wind resistance, and a new gesture control system allowing the drone’s distance and position to be adjusted without a remote. For pilots who prefer a controller, the Neo 2 has an optional antenna that can be installed, but it’s not needed for autonomous flying. Without the DJI Neo 2 Digital Transceiver attached, the drone weighs 151 grams and can fly for up to 19 minutes.

This morning, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted 3-0 to let itself retroactively ban gadgets and radio components that it previously approved for entry into the United States, if the company that makes them is deemed a national security risk.

Officially, it’s a way to close loopholes and protect US networks from backdoors in Chinese telecom gear. But it could also give the Trump administration a new way to block Chinese consumer electronics that run on the open airwaves, starting with those from dronemaker DJI, even though the US government hasn’t publicly released evidence that they pose a threat.

I use a DJI Osmo Pocket 3 every single week to help film Today I’m Toying With, and I love it to pieces. The baby steadicam’s one of the most popular gadgets the company’s ever sold, because it’s so good at automatically capturing stabilized video of whatever I want, far better than a phone. What I don’t love is how DJI jacked up the price of this gadget twice this year — but a new sale brings it almost all the way back to pre-Trump tariff levels, and the clone version is now even cheaper.

The DJI Pocket 3 is now a flat $575 at Amazon, $585 at B&H, and $598 at Walmart. It’s $599 at Adorama and Best Buy and at Target and Micro Center, all down from $799.99 post-tariffs. That’s $200–$225 off.

DJI’s Osmo Pocket 3, the baby steadicam, is one of the most popular gadgets the company’s ever made. But you’ll pay a hefty Trump tax to get one in the US: $799 after tariff-fueled back-to-back price hikes this spring.

What if I told you DJI may have found a way to dodge those tariffs and pesky customs inspectors by offering a disguised version of the camera? What if I told you an entire new “US” company has quietly been erected to sell it on Amazon for far lower, even as low as $499 during Amazon’s big new sale?

Last October, dronemaker DJI sued the US Department of Defense, arguing it should no longer face the stigma of being listed as a “Chinese Military Company” and continue to risk business as a result.

It just lost.

In 2023, DJI created a massive hit with the Osmo Pocket 3, a tiny steadicam with a far bigger one-inch-type sensor that dramatically improved the quality of video you could get with so tiny a gadget. Today, the company may be doing the same with its most popular portable line of drones — and with better battery life than ever.

The DJI Mini 5 Pro is the company’s first compact drone with a 50-megapixel one-inch-type sensor, up from 1/1.3-inch in the Mini 4 Pro. At 15.19 x 11.11mm, it offers more than twice the sensor area, which could mean capturing more light; DJI claims 14 stops of dynamic range.

I know my way around a pair of joysticks — but I’d prefer to soar. I don’t want to think about filming while I’m flying. I’d rather explore.

Now, camera maker Insta360 is launching its first drone, under a new drone company, to serve that exact demand. It’s called Antigravity, and in January 2026, it’ll ship a flying 360-degree camera which — unlike today’s drones — will always come bundled with goggles that put you inside its virtual cockpit.

We knew DJI had a hard time importing its drones into the United States to the point that many shelves have gone bare, but it’s not just drones anymore. Today marks the first time it’s formally skipping the US with a non-drone product, its 8K Osmo 360 camera — and it’s not clear if it will ever officially stock it here, DJI confirms to The Verge.

But the Osmo 360 does have a page on DJI’s US website for the item — and like the Mavic 4 Pro, which similarly skipped the US, two camera retailers are offering the Osmo 360 anyhow.

DJI barely sells drones in the United States anymore. The shelves are bare; resellers are jacking up prices. It appears an unofficial ban at US customs is to blame. But on Amazon, you can now buy a drone that’s a dead ringer for the DJI Mini 4 Pro — the SkyRover X1 — for a reasonable $758. And that’s probably because DJI made it happen.

There’s evidence suggesting so, and DJI was not able to deny the SkyRover X1 was a DJI product one day after we reached out.

Is DJI exiting the US drone market? The company says no — but it would not explain to The Verge what has changed such that it can’t even keep a single drone on shelves.

When I walked into my local Best Buy store today, June 24th, there were zero DJI drones available to purchase. There wasn’t even an empty spot for each drone to go. The entire DJI aisle had been swept clean of price tags, lockers, and products — save a handful of motorized gimbals, action cameras, a single lone RC controller, and an almost empty premium endcap spot where a flagship drone would normally go.

Today, DJI is officially announcing the Mavic 4 Pro, which could be the most versatile drone it’s ever made. It’s the first with a 360-degree rotating gimbal for footage that tilts, rolls, and offers true vertical filming. It’s the first Mavic to offer 51 minutes of battery life, tied with the old Mini 3 and close to the longest flight times DJI has achieved. It’s the first with a built-in 100-megapixel camera, which can also record 6K/60fps HDR, as part of its triple-camera array.

Another important distinction: it’s the first off-the-shelf DJI drone that won’t launch in the United States. Or at least, that was the plan — since we published this story, we’ve discovered that two US retailers are actually selling it anyhow starting at $2,699.

We’ve called DJI’s baby steadicam “almost everything I wanted my iPhone camera to be” and one of our favorite gadgets of 2023, but it’s just become a harder product to recommend. In April, DJI quietly hiked the US price of the camera from $519 to $619. Now, DJI has hiked the price again, officially listing the camera at $799 in the US.

That’s a $280 price hike in just two months, a 54 percent increase, and the company says it’s not a mistake. “The price you saw today is the current price,” DJI spokesperson Daisy Kong tells The Verge. We’re seeing that US retailers have already updated their listings.

Time is not on DJI’s side.

The world’s largest drone maker has less than a year to convince the Trump administration to save its products from an automatic US ban — at a time when drone fears have been stoked more than ever.

DJI will no longer stop drones from flying over airports, wildfires, and the White House, passing the buck to US law enforcement to prevent some of the worst forms of drone misuse. Some are suggesting the curious timing of that decision is political, coming just days before President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration, weeks after the New Jersey drone hysteria, and days after a plane fighting the LA wildfires got taken down by a DJI drone. Some even suggest this is China firing back at the United States for orchestrating the TikTok ban, which feels like a stretch to me.

Either way, DJI is now reacting to the whole vibe with an official blog post that claims the timing is coincidental.

For over a decade, you couldn’t easily fly a DJI drone over restricted areas in the United States. DJI’s software would automatically stop you from flying over runways, power plants, public emergencies like wildfires, and the White House.

But confusingly, amidst the greatest US outpouring of drone distrust in years, and an incident of a DJI drone operator hindering LA wildfire fighting efforts, DJI is getting rid of its strong geofence. DJI will no longer enforce “No-Fly Zones,” instead only offering a dismissible warning — meaning only common sense, empathy, and the fear of getting caught by authorities will prevent people from flying where they shouldn’t.

The US Senate has passed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the annual defense spending bill, and it may have major consequences for the world’s largest drone company — though not necessarily the immediate ban that China’s DJI feared.

While it did not contain the full “Countering CCP Drones Act” provisions that would have quickly blocked imports of DJI products into the United States, it instead kicks off a one-year countdown until its products (and those of rival dronemaker Autel Robotics) are automatically banned.

DJI, the world’s largest drone company, is suing to avoid being seen as a tool of the Chinese government. On Friday, it sued the US Department of Defense to delete its name from a list of “Chinese Military Companies,” claiming it has no such relationship to Chinese authorities and has suffered unfairly as a result of that designation.

Since DJI was added to that list in 2022, the company claims, it has “lost business deals, been stigmatized as a national security threat, and been banned from contracting with multiple federal government agencies,” and that its employees “now suffer frequent and pervasive stigmatization” and are “repeatedly harassed and insulted in public places.”

DJI tells The Verge that it currently cannot freely import all of its drones into the United States — and that its latest consumer drone, the Air 3S, won’t currently be sold at retail as a result.

That’s not because the United States has suddenly banned DJI drones — rather, DJI believes the import restrictions are “part of a broader initiative by the Department of Homeland Security to scrutinize the origins of products, particularly in the case of Chinese-made drones,” according to DJI.