360 Action Camera

I have this and have used it on a few dives. I find the lighting to be the biggest struggle, as the sensor seems to struggle when moving from areas that are brighter to shadow and takes a while to adjust. This has resulted in missing some shots. I’ve had success editing the lighting afterwards to make the images less bright. Overall, I’d give it a 5/10 for performance, and 8/10 for value.

I had this, it was no good. Costco has the GoPro max 2 for 299 right now. I picked up 2 of them.

The GoPro one was on sale for $299. I already have 6 GoPro Cameras, 4 of which I use all the time, I just decided to stay in the same Ecosystem. I also have an Insta360 One which was my first 360 camera. Sure, the Insta Software on the Mac is better than what is offered through GoPro but I will grab clips off my phone and then dump them to my computer to put them together into the video. I would never have considered the Max 2 at the retail price of $619 each including the bundle with the pole, 2x batteries, memory card and a set of the replaceable lenses. $299 was a heck of a deal for what you get. The user replaceable lense was a MAJOR selling point for me, yes, the Insta360 5 has them now but the GoPro just works and is easier.

My bike has a USB out on the controller, charge my phone and if I get a small hub can also charge the camera. It mostly maintains the battery on my phone, rather keeps it from draining quickly.

If you’re just using it for yourself and aren’t trying to grow a following or anything wild just yet, AKASO 360 cam has done right by me! It’s about $170 on Amazon for just the camera and batteries kit and I think it’s about on par with a barebones X4 action camera. It shoots well, gives me 4k 60fps with really great image stabilization (I ride a thumpy 1 cylinder 400cc) and it gets the job done. There’s more expensive kits with a ton of accessories and it’s only like $50 more. I couldn’t justify buying a $500 360 camera for me just riding around the city not doing wheelies or zany antics in traffic so that $170 was a sweet spot for me.

If you can’t afford a brand new GoPro or Insta360 and have reservations about open box then just buy one of the smaller brands. AKASO is the 360 camera I bought for $175 on Amazon, came with two batteries and a little neoprene sleeve. I’m not a YouTuber and don’t have a social media following so I didn’t need the latest and greatest technologies, just something that’ll record my ride in case I crash or something interesting happens. If you’re dead set on “name brand” then just find an older model. You don’t need 8k 120FPS to record yourself going to the grocery store or commuting to work so don’t look for those crazy resolutions. 1080p is still perfectly serviceable.

Akaso 360 is pretty good for under $200

Definitely functional, if you're not an artist or photographer it passes the good enough test. In brighter environments it's 90% as good as a gopro for scuba footage

Depends on why you want it. For vlogging, the ace pro is a great camera. If you want it as a dashcam, I personally wouldn't want an expensive camera on my helmet all the time, so I use a cheap Akaso for that and switch to the insta when I actually care about my footage.

One cent under $70 and you can get it by tomorrow. Quality is likely shit and 90% of the reviews are fake. I rented a Hero 7 back in 2019 for a trip. Came home and bought an Akaso, had I not had the experience with GoPro I would have probably kept it. Comparing the two it was night and day. It may work for your use case, if not you can just return it. https://preview.redd.it/zpf8gv6acmbg1.png?width=960&format=png&auto=webp&s=aa81856dd3fce5483398c88649b504666a1317d5