JJRC H86 Review – A Decent Beginner-Friendly Drone With A 720p Camera

Hi and welcome to my review of the JJRC H86 Jokull drone, one of the latest toy drones to hit the market and one that comes with some cool features.

When it comes to toy drones, there is a huge range of choices to choose from, you really are spoiled for choice and the JJRC H86 Jokull is another one you can add to that list of choices.

JJRC is a well-established RC toy company that has released a lot of low-cost drones over the past few years.

If you are looking for a cheap beginner-friendly drone to have some fun with then carry on reading this review of the JJRC H86 Jokull drone as it may be what you are searching for.

JJRC H86 Jokull Review

Despite being a cheap toy-grade drone, the JJRC H86 has a nice overall design and does not feel like a drone that costs less than $100. It’s built from ABS plastic and is very lightweight, weighing just under 200g which means if you live in the UK, Canada or the USA, you will not need to register the drone.

If you live anywhere else, it’s most likely that there is no registration required if you just want to fly for recreational purposes, however, I still advise you to look up what the rules are wherever you live just to be safe.

It’s a medium-sized drone measuring around 19*19*10.7 cm, it comes with some propeller guards which will extend the size of the drone if you install them, which I highly recommend you do if you are a complete beginner.

The drone has a cool all-black colour scheme and has a nice JJRC logo on the top. As it is a very cheap drone, it comes with brushed motors, these will require some regular maintenance to keep them in optimal conditions and they are a bit noisy but other than that, they work as they should.

One of the cool features of this drone is its LED lights that are situated underneath each rotor if you fly at night (not recommended if you are a beginner), it really provides for cool spectacle and looks like a light show if you fly the drone on its top speed.

The LED lights also serve another purpose and that is to indicate when the drone compass is fully calibrated, something you will be required to do before every flight.

There are also a couple of LED lights on the front and beneath them is the HD camera, now, I want to make clear that this is not a 4k camera, despite what it says on the product page. I have seen many drone companies make exaggerated claims about their drones and the camera is one of the features that are usually overhyped.

This is unfortunate because no one is buying a toy drone to take professional-level videos and images so there is no need for this hype.

The drone has a flight time of around 10 minutes, which is short but again this to be expected from a cheap toy drone. It’s powered by a 3.7v 1500 mAh LiPo battery, this fits neatly into the back of the drone and it takes a couple of hours to fully recharge.

As you only get 10 minutes of flight time, I advise you to purchase at least one more battery to extend the flight time, this will save you from having to wait a couple of hours for the battery to recharge before you can fly again.

One aspect of the drone I really like is its remote controller, now some controllers are big and not very well designed, however, the JJRC H86 controller is not one of them. It has a kind of curved design which feels comfortable in your hands. All of the controls are easy to identify and has a range of around 80 meters in good conditions. It has a smartphone attachment on the back and takes 4 AA batteries which are not included with the drone package.

A really cool feature of this controller is the LCD screen that will display vital telemetry data about the drone, like height, distance, battery level and speed mode.

If you use the FPV features (which you will), you will need to download the JJRC F drone app, this is a decent app and is easy to use. However, please be aware that it has not been updated for a while so may cause some issues.

JJRC H86 Camera

One of the main features of this drone is its camera, it’s a decent camera that will allow you to take some nice videos and images.

It has a 120° wide-angle lens that will capture more details in your videos and image and it can be adjusted 90° up or down, although you will have to do this manually and cannot be done via the remote control.

Its FPV video feed is in 720p resolution and is pretty nice quality, as there is no micro SD card slot for the drone, you will need to record your photos and videos on your smartphone, so do make sure you have enough memory for this.

For a drone that costs less than $60, this is a pretty good camera, however, please do not be fooled by the product page where it says it is a 4k drone, the images may be of 4k quality but it does not record video footage in 4k, which is what most people may think when they see the advertisement page.

Flight Performance

The overall flight performance of this drone is good, especially for a toy drone, even without GPS, it hovers alright, there is some movement, but that is to be expected. I would not advise anyone to fly it in any kind of windy conditions unless you are very experienced. It has a couple of speed modes and n the highest, it does zip around quite fast. The video streaming quality is good, however, you must keep the drone within 50 meters, otherwise, it gets choppy or completely breaks up. You can also do some cool 360° turns at the push of a button which is cool and will impress family and friends.

Final Thoughts

If you are looking for a beginner-friendly drone, the JJRC H86 is a good choice, the drone is suitable for everyone and comes with some decent features. It has an HD camera and some cool features that will make it more enjoyable to fly, to find out more click on the button below. However, if you want a better alternative, I highly recommend the DJI Tello drone which I believe to be the best drone for beginners.