H.265 is a much better video codec and it's been going around for some years... even H.266 has been announced.

H.265 is optimized for 4K and has the same quality than H.264 for half the bitrate.

Mini 2 records at about 100Mbps, at that bitrate H.265 would have much more quality for the same file size... but the mini 2 uses H.264 instead.

I think H.265 should be the standard now, not H.264.

I guess the most simple answer would be that it costs a lot more computing power (up to 10x as much according to https://medium.com/advanced-comp ... market-26659303171a )

I think Gopro cameras use HEVEC since Hero 6, and lots of mobile phones do. Even Nvidia GPUs or the Oculus Quest 2 can encode HEVEC with no problems... but I don't know what kind of processor the Mini 2 mounts.

I use to record the entire flight and I like to maintain those files, so I'm currently reencoding all my videos to H.265 35Mbps max (slowest) quality on Media Encoder to save 2/3rds of the file size with minimal quality loss. And in the future I'll rereencode to H.266.

Just keep to "native" quality the ones that I appreciate the most, but it's a pity that the "native" quality uses H.264 instead of H.265.

On the photo side the camera already shoots in DNG, so everything's fine in that aspect, except that you cannot disable JPG and shoot only RAW.

I don't want H265 * instead * of H264, but both optionally. You can also set the data rates to high (100Mbit) or medium (70Mbit) and the sharpness to high / medium.
This could minimize many problems such as digital noise or artifacts, etc.!
Nevertheless, I have the choice of what I want for which application ...

DJI MM1 has Ambarella H22 SoC which is able to encode 4k@60 fps in both H.264 and H.265.

https://www.ambarella.com/news/ambarella-introduces-h22-a-4k-ultra-hd-soc-for-the-next-generation-of-drones-and-sports-cameras/

I don't know if DM2 uses the same chip, but if it does it should be possible to enable support for H.265.

As was already mentioned above CPU power and licensing are the main reasons why H264 is still around.

Not all TV can handle H265 codec yet

dji_MODDER Posted at 3-18 00:13
Not all TV can handle H265 codec yet

True, but most of them do.
Anyway, I would rather record and store clips in H.265 for better quality and then re-encode them in H.264 if needed. Many other drones allow you to choose between H.264 and H.265.

I also agree with that

For some reason DJI restricts H.265 to high end products.  Air 2 has it for instance but Pocket 2 does not...

Let’s hope for the Mini3!
Funny as it is, my Sony Bravia get‘s in trouble with 4K H.264 Videos with the sound - but H.265 runs butterly smooth! It‘s a shame and pain, that I have to export all my videos from H.264 to H.265 after cut, because this takes sooooo much longer….
DJI PLEASE HURRY UP WITH THE MINI 3!!!
Bring us:
1. Active Tracking
2. Obstacle avoidance
3. H.265
4. A little bit bigger sensor

Doesnt MS Media Player require you to pay for the honour of H.265?, I'm sure i get a popup saying it wants x amount, unless its for another codec it wants, perhaps it was for mkv lol

It is the hevc

Bashy Posted at 10-5 19:29
Doesnt MS Media Player require you to pay for the honour of H.265?, I'm sure i get a popup saying it wants x amount, unless its for another codec it wants, perhaps it was for mkv lol

It is the hevc

What do you expect, it's a Microsoft product, just use VLC, free and plays everything you throw at it including H.265

The most likely answers are:

1. Product differentiation, although this is a bit weird because they don't really advertise the use of HEVC/165 in the higher end systems
2. Cost. They may not want to pay the licensing fees for HEVC on the Mini 2 to keep costs down.

Marketing.

Some people's equipment can not play H.265, mine for one, as in the videos from an FPV and so far I have not found an option to switch it to H.264.

Huginn Kenningar Posted at 2021-3-16 04:18
I think Gopro cameras use HEVEC since Hero 6, and lots of mobile phones do. Even Nvidia GPUs or the Oculus Quest 2 can encode HEVEC with no problems... but I don't know what kind of processor the Mini 2 mounts.

I use to record the entire flight and I like to maintain those files, so I'm currently reencoding all my videos to H.265 35Mbps max (slowest) quality on Media Encoder to save 2/3rds of the file size with minimal quality loss. And in the future I'll rereencode to H.266.

Quote: "On the photo side the camera already shoots in DNG, so everything's fine  in that aspect, except that you cannot disable JPG and shoot only RAW."
DJI did it right.
If there was an option for shooting RAW only, the forums and customer support would get overwhelmed with pilots losing their head over the horrible photo quality. Millions of "bad pictures" would circle the internet, one ...storm triggering the next.
JPGs look good right out of camera, RAW photos need a lot of attention to look as good as the JPGs. Just imagine the masses of novices getting nothing but RAW looks out of their new toy - of course after switching to RAW because they heard others say RAW being the holy grail of picture quality.

That's the reason.

About H.264/H.265: As others already said: Licencing and computing power reasons. Don't forget the Mini 2's camera is an old acquaintance already used with the Mini 1 (if I don't guess wrong), with just the "4K" print at the front and a software tweak being the only difference.