Potensic Elfin Review – A Decent Cheap Mini Drone With An HD Camera

Hi and welcome to my review of the Potensic Elfin foldable drone.

In the world of low-cost drones, Potensic are one of the more established and trusted drone brands. I have reviewed many of their drones on this site and overall, they come with some good features and are fun to fly.

Drones are everywhere now, one of the best things about the huge explosion of consumer drones is that there are a lot of good cheap drones to choose from and as you shall see from this review, the Potensic Elfin is one of them.

Potensic Elfin Review

So, I want to start off by mentioning that the Potensic Elfin is a mini foldable drone, it’s so small, it can fit on the palm of your hands (unless you have really tiny hands hehe).

One thing I like about Potensic drones is that they come with nice carry case and the Elfin comes with a nice black case that has a real premium feel to it. It’s a nice bonus as it saves you money from having to purchase one separately, especially if you going to be travelling with the drone.

This is a foldable drone, which is my favourite type of drone as it makes the drone more compact and easier to carry around. Not that the Potensic Elfin will be any trouble to travel with, especially since it weighs less than 100g, which is important to note because it means if you live in the UK, Canada or the USA, you will not need to register this drone.

Still, as drone laws are subject to constant updates as technology advances, I advise you to check what the rules are wherever you live just to make sure that you are following the law.

Now, this is not a GPS drone, but it does have an optical flow sensor for flight stabilisation which is helpful when you are trying to hover in one place. For completely drone pilots, you get a set of propeller guards that will minimise any damage to the drone should you crash it now and then and you most likely will.

The drone is powered by 3.7v 1100 mAh lithium polymer battery which provides it with a flight time between 8-10 minutes, which is to be expected for a toy drone that costs less than $100. It’s a decent flight time, but there are drones at a similar price range with a better flight time such as the DJI Tello drone.

Another added bonus that comes with this drone is that you get an extra battery, which will help you extend your flight time by quickly changing the battery without having to wait for the battery to fully recharge.

As you would expect from a cheap drone, it comes with brushed motors, so to keep them in optimal conditions, you should clean them on a regular basis.

The remote controller is bigger than the drone itself, however, it is a nice looking controller and comfortable to hold. It’s powered by 3 AAA batteries which are provided with the drone package, this is another bonus as usually you only get the battery for the drone and not the controller.

There is a smartphone attachment that pulls out from the middle and most of the buttons are easily identifiable through their icons. On the top, there are buttons for taking photos/videos, headless mode and speed mode.

To get access to the drones other features like FPV & gesture control, you will need to fly the drone with the Potensic Toy app which is available on both the Google Play Store and Apple App Store. It’s a simple app, although it is relatively new so, you might have some issues connecting with the drone and some of the features may not always work.

If you want more options for drones under $100, click on the button below.

Potensic Elfin Camera

One aspect I don’t like about smaller drone companies is that they tend to exaggerate the capabilities of some of the features this is especially true when it comes to cameras. The Potensic Elfin comes with a standard HD camera but on its product page, it claims it is a 2k camera, which it is not.

It’s a cheap drone that is targeted for beginners who are just looking to have some fun so I don’t see the need to exaggerate the capabilities of its camera. Having said that, the quality of the video and photo taken by the camera is surprisingly good as is the FPV feed to your smartphone. You will notice some lag, but that is to be expected and as there is no DVR on the drone, you will have to record your videos and photos on your smartphone.

One other I must mention is that the camera angle can be adjusted but you will have to do it manually and not remotely while you are flying the drone which is a little disappointing.

Other Features

Despite being a cheap drone, it does come with cool features that will make it more fun to fly. One of these features is called gesture control and this allows you to capture images or videos by making certain hand gestures. This is a nice feature, especially if you are in a group and want to take a quick selfie photo.

Another feature is called trajectory flight, this is a hands-free flight mode where you can draw a flight path on the app and the drone will fly along it. However, this feature is a hit and miss and without GPS and having a very short range, its not very useful and a little gimmicky.

You can control the drone via the app but it is a little awkward as the controls are not as sensitive and the FPV feed will be obstructed with the in-app control sticks.

Flight Performance

Overall flight performance is very good, especially if you fly it indoors, it’s stable and smooth and quite fast as well. It has a couple of speed modes that you can switch between and the optical flow sensor helps it maintain a steady altitude during flight and hover steadily if you let go of the controls. As it is a very light drone, I would not advise anyone to fly it in any sort of windy conditions but if you do make sure to install the propeller guards. The range is around 50 meters and flight time is 8-10 minutes.

Final Thoughts

This is a pretty decent beginner-friendly drone, its fun to fly and is suitable for indoor flying. It comes with some decent features and an HD camera, it’s not my favourite drone in this price range, that goes to the DJI Tello drone, however for its price, it may be worth buying.