Store
DJI Pocket 2 vs Phone Gimbal: Which one should you choose? // Feat. Zhiyun Smooth-Q3
If you are planning to buy the DJI Pocket 2 you are probably wondering if you should buy a phone gimbal like the Zhiyun Smooth-Q3 instead? In this comparison will discuss image quality, stabilization, sound, ease of use, apps, photos & more!
🔗 BUY the Zhiyun Smooth Q3 https://geni.us/zhiyun-smooth-q3
🔗 BUY the DJI Pocket 2 https://geni.us/dji-pocket-2-combo
✨ WATCH NEXT ✨
- Zhiyun Smooth-Q3 Review https://youtu.be/w433VjjA--0
- DJI Pocket 2 Review https://youtu.be/j35Xy3ibRxc
- Google Pixel 4a Review https://youtu.be/7wNDXsDKoCg
✋ COME SAY HI!! ✋
- Instagram: @loic.bellemare.alford (http://bit.ly/lba_instagram)
- TikTok: https://tiktok.com/@loic.bellemare.alford
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/loic294
- Facebook: https://fb.com/lbaphotographie
📖 CHAPTERS 📖
00:00 - Intro
01:04 - Image quality
02:39 - Accessories
02:57 - Stabilization
04:04 - Sound
04:52 - Ease of use & gimbal modes
05:50 - Vlogging
07:09 - Apps, Slow motion, Hyperlapses & Timelapses
08:40 - Photos
09:25 - Why one is better?
10:10 - Conclusion
🖼 SHOP FOR PRINTS 🖼
- My online store: https://store.lbaphotographie.ca
🎶 MY MUSIC 🎶
- Affiliate link for Epidemic Sound: https://www.epidemicsound.com/referral/iu5gau/
📸 GEAR I USE ON YOUTUBE 📸
https://kit.co/loic.bellemare.alford/youtube-gear
- DJI Pocket 2 Creator Combo https://geni.us/dji-pocket-2-combo
- 128 gb MicroSD card https://geni.us/sandisk-extreme-128gb
- Canon 6D Mk https://geni.us/canon-6d-mkii
- Google Pixel 4a https://geni.us/google-pixel-4a
- Canon ZOOM LENS EF24-105mm F4L IS II USM https://geni.us/canon-lens-24-105
- Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8 Lens https://geni.us/canon-lens-16-35
- Canon EF 70-200mm f/4.0L-IS II USM Lens https://geni.us/canon-lens-70-200
- VANGUARD VEO 2 265CB CARBON FIBER TRIPOD https://geni.us/vanguard-veo-265cb
- DJI MAVIC AIR https://geni.us/lba-dji-mavic-air
🌍 MY PERSONAL WEBSITE 🌍
hello everyone today i have a pretty exciting video at least one that i think is exciting because it's a question that i asked myself a lot which is whether you should be getting the dji pocket 2 or a phone gimbal like design smooth 23 to get some better videos using mobile devices let's rule the intro for those of you who are new to this channel i'm like ben mahalford a young photographer and filmmaker on a journey to become better at this side both of these devices offer a pretty similar value proposition but they do it in a different way i'm going to be using my google pixel 4a and my friend's iphone for this review but i'm going to try to keep it as general as possible so it can also apply to your phone [Music] let's start by talking about image quality because this definitely one of the biggest difference between these two options the dji packet 2 has overall really great image quality it can capture anything between 1080p 24 frames per second and 4k 60 frames per second it has pretty good autofocus and the image quality i would say is usually slightly better than what most smartphones offer on the other hand when you're using a smartphone to capture some video it really depends on the device you have if you have an iphone a samsung device or a huawei device you're probably going to get pretty good image quality that almost rivals what the jack pocket 2 can get but if you're like me and you have a google pixel 4a the image quality just isn't as good in the video mode i'm not sure why but google over sharpens so much the image inside of the video modes that makes it almost impossible to look at on a bigger device because it's really just to see it on your phone and not really made to look at it on a tv or something like that the advantage of using a phone is that you can actually install other apps to get some better image quality so i tried using protig and filmic pro but they both have the same disadvantage the first one is that you cannot film at 4k because it starts dropping frames because it's just too much to ask for my phone to be filming 4k and also using a separate camera app to do it the second problem is that you don't get the really good image stabilization that you get from the default app so that's definitely another problem when using these apps because you end up with more shaky footage because you don't get any digital stabilization at all so if you want a really reliable device you can count down to get good image quality the dji pocket 2 is definitely a better choice but if you have a good phone that already takes really good video quality it's definitely not a problem to be using a gimbal you can still get really good results using it they both have the same pretty neat feature which is that they can use accessories on top of them in this case i'm talking about nd filters because this is very useful if you want to be getting some more synthetic results i'm not going to talk about water and filters inside of this video but definitely stay tuned for my video next week where i'm going to review the sandmark filters for my phone next week now let's talk about stabilization because this is the main selling point for both of these devices zhiyun smooth q3 has slightly better civilization because it's a bigger device so bigger device means more weight and more possibilities to stabilize the shot when you're holding it they both have the processing problem which is when you're walking around you still get this wobble going up and down because they're so small inside of your hand you cannot remove that completely i would say one advantage is that if you're using your phone and using usually the default apps on your phone there's pretty good digital stabilization so you can use that to enhance the stabilization you already have with the gimbal and get even better results on the google pixel 4 you can even use the cinematic pan option to get super smooth shots this is also one of the down points because it really depends on your phone so if you have an iphone a high in samsung or most high end phones you're going to get really good stabilization but if you don't have that inside of your phone only using the gimbal can give very rare valuing this results they're not always the best [Applause] one thing that lots of people don't understand when starting to take some videos is how important audio is you can get away with pretty bad video quality but you cannot get away with bad audio quality and this is a huge advantage for the dji pocket 2 because it's wireless microphone in the creator combo kit allows you to get clean and crisp audio even meters away and even if you have some pretty terrible noise from the waterfalls in the background here by using a little lavalier microphone like this if i take my phone we're just gonna see that the audio quality isn't as good at all because you get all the audio from the background inside of your main video so this is a fun one because you cannot control this and you cannot connect a microphone directly to it because it's going to mess up with the balance on the gimbal so this is a huge advantage when you're using the dji pocket 2 is that you get pretty good audio quality without any of the downsides when using the wireless microphone it is built inside of it one thing that's really great with both devices is how easy they are to use so with only one click you can start and stop recording on both devices with one click you can actually change the gimbal modes and finally using the joystick you can easily reframe your shot without having to think about it too much they both also have pretty similar options when it comes time for gimbal modes but designs move q3 has more or f6 or gti pocket 2 only has three and that's because it's a 5 axis gimbal so has a little bit more possibilities but in the end having more gimbal modes doesn't mean that you're going to get more diverse shots it's just going to have to move your hand a little bit more when using the jet pocket too but you can in the end get exactly the same shots with both devices so here it's both a win for both devices [Music] front facing screen pretty good audio that's built in that's what i'm using right now to record this it's actually a really good option for vlogging because it was designed task specifically i think that overall it does a pretty good job the only problem i have sometimes is like in situations like this my face might be blurry because the autofocus sometimes has a little time hard time getting my face in focus designing smooth q3 plus my phone also is a decent option for vlogging you won't get the autofocus problem because the post fix focus lens but it also means you're getting everything in the background that is perfectly sharp and you don't get this nice black ground blur when taking videos other little problems that the sound is not as good from my phone just don't get as much microphones are all around to compensate and get better audio but overall the gimbal works really well with my phone and you can get super smooth shots when taking a video one fix to get better video quality would be to turn around the phone but you would lose scene yourself which can be a problem when filming these types of video because you don't really know what you're filming and if you're in the frame or not so i prefer just using different facing lens even if it means i don't get as good video quality [Music] let's talk about the mobile apps and the features that are unlocked when using them with both of these gimbals the mobile apps look almost identically the same and have pretty much the same functionality one problem i had is that i updated the firmware for the science move q3 today and it doesn't want to connect anymore to the gimbal so i cannot show it to you right now dji pocket 2 has a pretty big advantage is that you have a pro mode inside of the app which allows you to get much more settings and really customize the video photos and everything to get exactly the look you want to have another thing about the dji pocket 2 is that you can use it wirelessly you can just put it down and use the app to control it wirelessly from somewhere else so this is really good when you're filming yourself or that you need to control it to see multiple things and don't want to be beside the camera all the time this is not possible when using a gimbal because the phone needs to be on the gimbal to be able to capture the video now let's talk about a few of these modes so first of all you have hyperlapses that are just pretty bad in both cases because they just speed up the video and it's pretty shaky in the end then you have time lapses and they're not the greatest results when you use the default settings on both of them but on the phone you can use another app to capture some pictures and create your own timelapse afterwards you can also get some rough pictures when using the dji pocket too so both of them allow to get pretty good results when you want to put a little bit more work inside of it to be able to customize everything then the last mode is slow motion and it's not the greatest slow motion because it caps at 1080p in both cases but it's pretty neat to have it in both of them we need to quickly capture something but again this could really depend on your phone and not the gimbal for the slow motion both device can take photos but i'm not sure why you would buy a gimbal to take some photos dji pocket 2 can take some pretty good pictures especially if you take them in raw and it's doing afterwards but here a phone is just going to blow out the results from the high pocket 2 because the phone especially my google pixel 4 with computational photography can get way better results in the end so if you're buying a gimbal for photos i'm not sure why you would do it but just stick with your phone because you're probably going to get better results by only doing that i want to try this video by letting you know which one is the right for you if you already have a phone that takes pretty good video in this case just go and buy a phone gimbal it's going to do pretty much everything you need and you're gonna have very smooth results they're gonna help you get more cinematic results in the end you could add an nd filter like this one and you can get a really great setup for not too much money this gimbal is only 89 so it's definitely worth it if you want to step up your video game without having to spend too much money if you want to get more control on your shots or you want to have more advanced features then in this case the dji pocket 2 is a great option the other really great thing with this gimbal is actually that's super small so you can go in your pocket like the name says which makes it really easy to bring around with you so which one would you choose let me know in the comments below if you enjoyed this video please let me know by hitting the like button below and also consider subscribing to get more content on photography and filmmaking i'm gonna have my video right here about the my review of designing smooth for free and right down here i'm gonna have my video about a review of the jet pocket too so definitely go check out both of them if you want to learn more about both of these options see in the next one bye
Video Links
- 🔗 BUY the Zhiyun Smooth Q3
- 🔗 BUY the DJI Pocket 2
- Zhiyun Smooth-Q3 Review
- DJI Pocket 2 Review
- Google Pixel 4a Review
- Instagram: @loic.bellemare.alford ()
- TikTok
- My online store
- Affiliate link for Epidemic Sound
- https://kit.co/loic.bellemare.alford/youtube-gear
- DJI Pocket 2 Creator Combo
- 128 gb MicroSD card
- Canon 6D Mk
- Google Pixel 4a
- Canon ZOOM LENS EF24-105mm F4L IS II USM
- Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8 Lens
- Canon EF 70-200mm f/4.0L-IS II USM Lens
- VANGUARD VEO 2 265CB CARBON FIBER TRIPOD
- DJI MAVIC AIR
- http://bit.ly/loicba
What is this video about?
If you're considering stepping up your mobile video game, you've probably asked yourself: should I get a dedicated gimbal like the DJI Pocket 2, or go with a phone gimbal like the Zhiyun Smooth-Q3? I tested both extensively, and the answer really depends on what you already have and what you're trying to achieve.
Image Quality is where things get interesting. The DJI Pocket 2 delivers consistent 4K video with solid autofocus across all phones. But here's the thing—if you already have a flagship phone (iPhone, Samsung, Huawei), you're probably getting image quality that rivals the Pocket 2 anyway. The catch is phones like my Google Pixel 4a tend to over-sharpen video, making it look harsh on larger screens. Third-party apps like ProRes or Filmic Pro can help, but they often drop frames at 4K and sacrifice the gimbal's digital stabilization, so you're trading one problem for another.
Stabilization is the main selling point for both devices. The Zhiyun has a slight edge thanks to its larger size and weight distribution, but both suffer from processing wobble when you're walking. The real advantage comes from your phone's built-in digital stabilization—pair that with the gimbal and you get genuinely smooth results. On Pixel devices, cinematic pan is a game-changer for silky-smooth shots.
Here's something most people overlook: audio quality. Bad audio will kill your video faster than bad video quality. The DJI Pocket 2's wireless lavalier mic gives you clean, crisp audio from meters away, even in noisy environments. With a phone gimbal, you're stuck capturing whatever your phone's built-in mics pick up—and that's everything, including unwanted background noise.
Ease of use is comparable—both let you start/stop recording and change gimbal modes with a single click. The Zhiyun has more gimbal modes, but that doesn't necessarily mean more creative options; you can achieve the same shots on both with slightly different hand movements.
For vlogging, the DJI Pocket 2 was built for this with its front-facing screen and clean built-in audio. The phone gimbal works too, but you lose the selfie-facing benefit and get softer audio. The Pocket 2 also lets you shoot wirelessly—place it down and control it remotely from your phone app, which the gimbal simply can't do.
Photography? Skip both gimbals and just use your phone. Computational photography from flagships like the Pixel will always outperform a gimbal setup for stills.
My recommendation: If you already own a phone that shoots solid video, grab a phone gimbal—the Zhiyun at around $89 is a steal for the stabilization bump. But if you want more control, better audio, portability, and advanced features like wireless operation and raw photo capture, the DJI Pocket 2 is worth the investment. It's pocket-sized, packed with features, and delivers on every front.