Finally! This years' generation of action cameras is the first one where all 3 major brands (GoPro, DJI, Insta360) have flagships with GPS recording capabilities. We have put them through an exhaustive test with Telemetry Overlay and Telemetry Extractor.

The GoPro is the only one that includes an internal GPS module, which means the other two need to be paired to an external GPS remote accessory in order to receive location, altitude, and speed data. This is sometimes an advantange and sometimes a drawback. Which one it is depends on each user's situation and recording habits, to some extent.

The analysis consisted of 6 sections, and you can see them in detail in the video, but these are the key takeaways summarized. 

GPS Quality in good conditions

When the cameras (and the remotes) can access the sky directly, the signal from the GPS satellites is usable in all four cases (GoPro, DJI, and the two Insta360 remote options: a basic one called GPS Action Remote and a fancier one with video preview called GPS Preview Remote). This results in a good GPS path that can be overlaid on the roads of a map with no visible deviation when zoomed out. When zooming in, the GoPro HERO13 Black and the Insta360 GPS Action Remote were the closest to the correct lane of roads, while the DJI Osmo Action GPS Bluetooth Remote Controller (yes, unnecessarily long name) and the Insta360 GPS Preview Remote drifted significantly more, but were still usable. Elevation data behaved similarly, the the GoPro being the closest to the known Google Maps altitude of the road, closely followed by the Insta360 Action. Again, the DJI and Insta360 preview options deviated significantly more, but not to the point where they were unusable, considering that GPS altitude is expected to show some inaccuracies, given how the GPS system works. Finally, speed values were good and consistent across the board.

Precision and frequency

The GoPro, the DJI, and the Insta360 Preview options record GPS data at a respectable 10Hz (10 samples per second). This is  enough for displaying smooth movement and making some acceleration calculations. The Insta360 Action remote, on the other hand, only records one sample per second, which will require from interpolation in order to display smooth movements over a map. Unfortunately, the Insta360 Preview remote records the data with fewer decimals than its rivals, so even if its frequency is good, the location and altitude changes become sudden, as more decimals would capture finer details in the data.

GPS Quality in difficult conditions

Since the GoPro has an internal GPS antenna and it needs to point at the sky, we would expect the other cameras to perform better when recording upside down inside a vehicle: their remotes can be left in a good position, GPS signal-wise. Surprisingly, the GoPro held quite well in some of the tests, but at some point the advantage of the remotes started to show. Among the remotes the DJI one managed to record more accurate data in a difficult urban environment.

More sensors

In addition to the GPS data, all three cameras record exposure metrics and some level of accelerometer (sensor-based) data. The GoPro and the DJI also record usable pitch and roll values (the Insta360 may do this to, but we are not able to access the data). Finally, the DJI Action 5 Pro is the first of the bunch to include a barometer sensor that records pressure-based altitude data (really accurate for elevation changes) and depth data when underwater. Unfortunately, the barometric sensor malfunctioned in some of the tests (Tip: blow on the camera model logo before going underwater. This seemed to help a couple of times, but it may have been a coincidence).

Syncing external data

Thanks to Telemetry Overlay, videos from all 3 cameras can integrate professional activity data from third-party trackers: cycling, motorsports, aviation, sailing, skiing… you name it. Both Insta360 and DJI have data synchronization (mostly with Garmin) features in their official software options, but with Telemetry Overlay this (and way way more) is also possible with GoPro cameras (and any other camera, really). A key to syncing external data is having accurate timestamps in the video. A GPS module provides that, and with the GoPro (especially HERO11 and newer) this means syncing external data is usually automateds. Interestingly, the timestamps form the DJI remote seem to be recorded in the wrong time zone. Nothing that Telemetry Overlay cannot fix, but not ideal: we are hoping for a fix via a firmware update. The Insta360 sometimes shows a offset of about one or two seconds, which is not even noticeable most of the time, and again it can be adjusted in Telemetry Overlay.

Convenience

This is the most subjective point of the analysis, but being forced to using a remote in order to record GPS data seems slightly less convenient. A remote can be handy in many cases, but GoPro has a separate remote accessory as well (not required for GPS data). Another important point is the time it takes to find a GPS signal with each of the cameras or remotes. The GoPro tended to be the quickest consistently.