The DJI Osmo Action 6 ($436) is the first action camera with a square-format image sensor, ideal for content creators who want to shoot once and deliver video to both wide- and tall-screen devices. It records at up to 4K120 for slow-motion, at 8K30 for delivery to high-resolution displays, and uses a bright F2 aperture lens to improve video quality in dimly lit interiors. The camera captures pleasing video with saturated colors and smooth motion, gets excellent battery life, includes 50GB internal storage, and sports the tough, waterproof build you expect from an action cam. The Osmo Action 6 is a solid follow-up that offers enough upgrades over the Action 5 Pro (which is still available for $319) to justify spending a bit more, and earns our Editors' Choice award in the process.

Design: A Small and Tough Go-Anywhere Cam

There's not a lot of variation in design among action cameras. Manufacturers have settled on a small, boxy design with front and rear displays and a wide-angle lens as the de facto standard for the category. The Osmo Action 6 colors within the lines; it's small enough to mount in a tight space (1.3 by 2.9 by 1.9 inches HWD), light enough to wear on a helmet (5.3 ounces), and built to survive rough-and-tumble handling. It can survive drops and work underwater to 65.6 feet without an external housing.

(Credit: Jim Fisher)

The Osmo Action 6 drops the "Pro" designation from its predecessor, the Action 5 Pro, though I'm not sure what DJI's logic behind the name change is. The Action 6 is pretty much an Action 5 Pro with a few more recording modes and features. Maybe DJI just thinks the word Pro is overused in product names. I won't argue the point—if everything is referred to as 'Pro,' the meaning of the word is diluted.

Names aside, the Action 6 is virtually identical to the 5 Pro on the outside. The camera uses an ultra-wide lens with fixed focus to capture action. It features DJI's RockSteady digital stabilization to smooth out handheld footage, and it works with the same magnetic mounting system as recent entries in the series to secure it to a helmet, vehicle, or the like. The Osmo has dual displays, one on the front and one on the rear, both with touch support. Likewise, it has only two buttons: a large Record control at the top and a mode switch on the left. It also supports voice control.

(Credit: Jim Fisher)

The Action 6 uses the same battery as earlier models, dating back to the Osmo Action 3. That's good news for anyone upgrading or for creators who use multiple action cameras to capture a scene from different angles and don't want to keep track of which battery goes into which camera. The Action 6 has very good battery life among action cams. It gets 112 minutes of 16:9 4K60, 92 minutes of 4:3 4K60, or 84 minutes of 8K30 per charge, and didn't overheat at all during the rundown testing. The Action 5 Pro lasts a little longer, at 126 minutes at 4K60, while the GoPro Hero13 Black lags behind with just 80 minutes at 4K60.

(Credit: Jim Fisher)

The camera includes 50GB of internal storage space, a slight increase from the Action 5 Pro (47GB), and it supports microSDXC memory cards. It includes Wi-Fi and Bluetooth for pairing with the DJI Mimo smartphone app (available for Android and iOS) for file transfers, remote control, and over-the-air firmware updates, as well as a USB-C port for charging and wired data transfer. Mimo is useful and includes some templates to help you get started with editing, but DJI does not have an answer to GoPro's subscription service and its tight integration with the Quik mobile app. You'll have to pay for it, but GoPro subscribers get unlimited cloud storage with automatic uploads from the camera, plus an AI-powered Highlight edit that compiles your best shots from the day into a bite-sized clip.

(Credit: Jim Fisher)

You can record audio with the built-in mic, or pair the Action 6 with one of DJI's wireless mic kits for clearer sound. The Mic Mini and Mic 3 are the latest, and the Osmo also works with the Mic 2 and USB-C microphones.

DJI sells the Osmo Action 6 as a Standard Combo with a single battery, magnetic quick-release mount, and adhesive sticky mount for $436, or in an Adventure Combo with three batteries, a multi-charger, two magnetic quick-release mounts, an extension stick/tripod, and adhesive mount for $536.

Controls and Interface: Buttons, Touch, and Voice

The Osmo's control scheme is typical among action cameras. It has only two buttons: a prominent Record button at the top to start and stop clips or take a still image, and a Quick Shift (QS) button on the left to cycle through capture modes. By default, QS only swaps between video and photo, but you can add others, including SuperNight, Portrait, Subject Tracking, Slow Motion, Time-lapse, Hyperlapse, and Playback. I'm glad you can pick and choose which modes you want to cycle through with Quick Shift, given the sheer number included in the Osmo—if anything, the camera has too many modes.

(Credit: Jim Fisher)

Because there are only two buttons, most of the changes you'll make to camera settings are done via its touch interface. The interface includes icons to switch to playback, change the capture mode, set resolution and frame rates, and adjust manual exposure settings on the main screen. There's also a full setup menu (swipe down to get to it). Both the 1.5-inch front and 2.5-inch rear displays use the same touch interface and OLED panels. The rear screen is roomier and easier to navigate, but the front screen is usable and convenient when you're self-recording.

(Credit: Jim Fisher)

The camera supports voice commands, but they're pretty limited. You can say "start recording," "stop recording," "take a photo," and "shut down," and that's it. Voice control is most useful if you've got the camera mounted out of reach or you're wearing giant gloves for cold-weather sports.

Video and Image Quality: Ignore 8K, Shoot in 4K, and Be Happy

The Osmo Action 6 didn't launch with 8K recording; it was added in a post-release firmware update, but now offers 8K30 capture in addition to 4K120 and 1080p240. All modes support 10-bit color, either a standard color or a flat D-Log M profile, standard NTSC and PAL frame rates down to 24fps, and superb digital stabilization. The Osmo also supports time-lapse and hyperlapse, in-camera 4K slow motion, and 38MP stills in JPG or Raw DNG format.

You may be enticed to record everything in 8K, a bleeding-edge feature with more pixels than most TVs. But there's not much, if any, actual improvement in detail at 8K versus 4K with the Action 6. I took a look at some frame grabs from different scenes recorded at both resolutions, viewing the 8K grab at full magnification versus the 4K zoomed into 200%, and, to quote a famous meme from The Office, they're the same picture. This makes sense on a technical level—the Osmo uses a Quad Bayer sensor that reads out every pixel for 8K, but merges multiple pixels to create an oversampled picture at 4K, and encodes both resolutions at the same compression rate.

Both 4K and 8K video looks great in moderate to bright light. The 4K capture mode supports frame rates and aspect ratios that you can't get from 8K, which is locked at 16:9. At 4K, the Osmo also supports 4:3 up to 120fps, and a 1:1 square aspect at up to 60fps. Both of the boxier looks get more picture height than 16:9 and are useful for creators who want to pull out 16:9 widescreen and 9:16 vertical video from the same footage. This is a feature that's missing from the Action 5 Pro but is something GoPro has already had for a few generations: the Hero11, Hero12, and Hero13 Black all use 8:7 aspect-ratio sensors.

(Credit: Jim Fisher)

Aside from the change in aspect ratio, the Action 6's sensor delivers very similar image quality when compared with the Action 5 Pro. There is a difference in low light, however. The Action 6 is the first action cam to use a variable aperture lens, an F2-4 design. At F2, it captures twice as much light as the Action 5 Pro's F2.8, so video recorded in dim light is brighter and shows better detail. Even so, the Action 6 isn't a killer camera for dark interiors. The 4K video from my aging iPhone 13 shows less noise and is better exposed, but the Action 6 handles early morning and evening twilight well. We'll have to wait and see if GoPro's forthcoming Mission 1 Pro finally breaks through and goes toe-to-toe with smartphones for darker interiors.

(Credit: Jim Fisher)

On the other end of the spectrum, the Action 6 stops down to F4 to cut out incoming light, which is handy for scenes with very bright light. It's not enough to record footage with cinematic motion blur under the sun—you'll still want a strong neutral density filter for that look—but I won't knock DJI for including the option.