I've heard enough comments from totally unrelated UA-camrs, from firearms channels, to bushcraft channels, to guys who catch snakes for a living, casually mentioning they lost some footage cause their GoPro overheated to know one of the big reasons without knowing anything else about GoPro.
When I worked at Best Buy in the camera department back in 2017 they sent me for camera training in Arizona. GoPro had a presenter who was super kind and awesome. Turns out it was the CEO and I had no idea until after. He didn’t say who he was and just talked about the love for cameras. Really cool dude
@@MrJeremybowling Miserable indeed! Imagine paying good money for something that works half the time. When I use want to use the GoPro, its not for every day mundane tasks that can be captured tomorrow. Its for things that you do maybe once in your life and to have the camera die on you is not fun. Should have bought a cheaper imitation camera. Imagine that, an imitation that probably does a better job!
The subscription/cloud model really kneecapped them as well. Lots of companies are guilty of trying to capture additional consumer dollars by moving features behind a paywall. This generation of MBA types are on a mission to screw over consumers without any thought toward those consumers ignoring them with future purchases.
@@honor9lite1337the unlimited cloud subscription is what keeps me with GoPro, I can record everything I want and just have it upload and stored for free at night when I sleep. Other wise I would have switched to DJI by now.
@@minch5537so even though the product that they sold is just complete crap, actually was of limited to no value economically, and otherwise. But as long as it made money. Does anyone else see what's wrong with running a society like this?
Felt like everyone that wanted to own them bought them, then... turns out most people have little use for one, let alone buy another in the future. Infinite growth was an even harder sell here than everywhere else.
And, they overheat like crazy. They’re not meant for use as a regular video camera. They need airflow and short recording times. Cheap competitors came out with cameras that can record for longer than 10 minutes, all while GoPro gaslit us about it.
Exactly. They're like anything, you buy one when they first come out and other companies jump in to make a better one, so even if you need another, there are DJI and Sony and Samsungs that make better ones.
I bought the Hero 2 in 2011 for around $200, came with everything, housings, mounts, brackets, clamps, suction caps, etc. Brought the Hero 5 a few years later for almost $600 and got 2 mounts, that's it... I've never bought one since. They went down the Apple business model of charging more for less and selling accessories that were once included. That was the death of them.
I owned a 2 for a long time. It finally bit the dust after years of great service. They were up to the 11 or 12 but they were to expensive. I was able to buy a new 3 with a giant pack of accessories for $99.
I’ve wanted one for years but really couldn’t justify the price tag. At this point GoPro is almost irrelevant. Decent drones cost less with more technology so still can’t justify the money
I used to work for GoPro over a decade ago at their HQ as an intern, the company grew way too fast and Nick Woodman has been a narcissist with posting videos in his press releases to employees! He’s mostly responsible for GoPro’s decline, since he lacked focus in new products that would make them relevant in the smartphone era.
Should have been a GoPro📱in a waterproof case with video editing apps as bloat ware, 5 gigs of free ☁️ storage..........even 10 years ago for $499.99 unlocked with dual SIM slots, 64 gigs on board expandable to 512gb, I think it would have sold
@@mankind8088hmmm I think they should’ve tried to make action cameras for the film industry/ and going deeper in the camera/ film Industry in general. Phones would’ve only lasted so long before IPhone etc out did them
@@mankind8088tough to say if people would buy that phone in the masses should of made phone covers and separate cloud services link to phone that would of made a big impact.
@@mankind8088 they were already too late to compete in smartphones, but they should’ve made camera accessories for smartphones like lens adapters. There was too much competition in smartphones at that point.
True. I respect the guy's perserverance, but it is pretty funny to hear "this guy failed spectacularly in a business venture... and went on a 5 month surfing trip to cope with it"
I have owned one GoPro and sold it after a few months because the video kept freezing. Apparently that's still a very common problem because I know quite a few people that use them and they have the same issues. So it wasn't like I bought a bad one. They have poor quality control.
It is a common issue. Not a lemon unit but across the whole range in general. It has only gotten better with the most recent releases which is more than a decade since the first model.
Great video! I studied GoPro Inc. for my MBA course in 2018. An add-on worth mentioning for that last factor of a niché (narrow) market is that, in my research, this was the biggest headwind, and it was self-imposed! Nick Woodman consciously wanted the brand "GoPro" to be associated with an "active lifestyle" brand. Therefore, they halted marketing opportunities to expand on GoPro from an action sports camera to an "everyday" video camera. At the time, there were museums filming tours to be placed online as a "virtual tour" (a concept thrust into public awareness two years later). There were also surgeries being filmed with GoPros with intentions to be shown to medical students. This was huge because it was a visual how-to guide at a nominal expenses, where article were comparing the cost of a GoPro with the expense of hiring a camera crew to capture it previously. My takeaway was that GoPro was the antithesis of Nintendo Wii, where (instead of losing the video game competition among gamers) they expanded the market beyond gamers to outsell the competition. GoPro opted to stick to the inner competition instead of expanding its market.
Kinda had the same thoughts, gopro did not expand their market, unlike insta360 where almost a majority of the outdoor vloggers use. Insta’s marketing is that you don’t need to be an extreme athlete or a hardcore adventurer to use their cams. Ista captured the bigger market which is the majority or cam-users, non-athletes.
One of the big missteps was around 2016/17. I was a dealer - and a professional sports photographer on the side. My product rep gave me a full kit. I think it might've been a Hero 4 or 6. The problem was that GoPro required you to create a gopro account to access all the controls of the camera. Sorry, I'm not logging in to allow GoPro to track any of my usage. For many users that just want to configure a camera, use all of its features, then access the created content, that was a ridiculous overreach. I've used 25 years of professional and pro-sumer Canon DSLRs and mirrorless camers, and I've never had to log in to configure anything. I never created that GoPro account. I did continue to trot out an older GoPro I had acquired a few years prior, but at some point - as you point out - smart phones basically cannibalized much of the everyday use cases.
I also read some reviews of the top reviewer on German Amazon at that time and they literally threw out third-party batteries with a firmware update (AFAIK it was the Hero 5), because he had a bunch of these, it rendered them useless. When they had done that with the introduction of a new model (but then they should rather change the battery body completely to make it physically incompatible) it's still a little douchbaggery, but not as much as they did throwing it out overnight.
@@bigload6 I'm not sure what one thing has to do with the other. I'm a professional photographer. I don't "log in" to configure or access features of my Canon, Nikon, or Sony cameras. It's a self-own by GoPro. Apparently they've since addressed the issue in the intervening decade.
as a tv professional. gopro were the ideal camera for risky or weird mounting footage....ext cars, airplane wings etc. BUT. tv companies know that gopro are not professional grade kit. prone to locking up, loosing files and just not working. these issues with software, have never been totally solved. great idea but flawed.
Using a GoPro is also an excruciating experience compared to a regular camera. Yeah they're super durable and all that, but trying to pull files off of the thing is just stupid. Their cloud system sucks, a lot of the hardware is proprietary. There's a lot of reasons GoPro is going down the drain. Not to mention the fact that they are WAY too expensive at this point. You can get little cameras that do all the same stuff, without all the bullshit, for cheaper. So people buy those
Another example of a company thinking they can extract more money from a cornered market only to find they've actually pushed themselves out of said market. You can only get away with the whole overpriced proprietary cables, batteries, software, mounts, accessories, etc racket for so long until your whole customer base gives up on you en masse.
DJI went from being a cheap option if you wanted a spare camera to go with your GoPro equipment to being a better choice in most cases just based on UI. They might not have quite the image quality, but they're a lot easier to use.
Yep a $50 action📷 that has a 64gb card recording at 720 that only records with no🐂💩or software required..........is 10x easier to use than any $299 progo
Yeah DJI just fucking dominated gopro's Market. Funny because they hold a near Monopoly in consumer drone market so much so that the US is looking to ban them out right through lobbying by skydio reps
As a mountain biker, I've had and used a few gopros over the years. They were great when they worked, and a nightmare otherwise. Crashes, corruption of files, crappy services, and overheating are big problems; but I think the thing which really killed them was that other companies came in and did it better. DJI and Insta360 both offer better products for cheaper, and with significant innovations over the latest gopros (the magnetic mount from DJI is a game-changer, for example) I think gopro still has a chance to get back in the game; but they need to put out something better than their competition, and with more reliable hardware.
I have a GoPro 9 and a GoPro 10... both are Black editions that I have used for recording aviation videos and flights I do. I have been in a constant battle with them since I first started to use them. From overheating, to random recording glitches and stops, to not being able to use a battery pack because of a software glitch that HAS NOT BEEN PATCHED FOR YEARS. It's absolutely unbelievable. I will never buy another GoPro product.
Their tech and support was awful for me. I bought one before a vacation in 2018. I am pretty tech savvy tested it, went on my vacation and the camera had failed on me. I was able to rescue 4 thumbnails. After researching, their "recommend card" had known compatibility issues, but this wasn't mentioned on their site only at 3rd party forums. Their support was less than stellar and my GoPro, with little less than an hour of use time, was the most expensive item I've thrown away. Such a waste. But like you said, bloat and inefficiency is obvious on this one.
I have plenty of my own issues with GoPro, but I will say, their support was pretty good for me. Basically, the battery cover can come off if it isn’t closed, and due to my own fault, I ended up losing it. They only sold replacement covers for newer models, but I contacted support asking if I could still buy one, and they just sent me a new one for free since I had had the GoPro less than a year. I’m not sure how many companies do this since I usually only contact them if it was their fault something broke, but I really appreciate it.
I’m surprised how many other people in these comments have been having reliability problems with their cameras. My first GoPro was a Hero 3 Black Edition and it never gave me issues. Switched to a Hero 10 a few years back and it constantly freezes, outright fails to power on sometimes, and has syncing issues all the time. I use it primarily when riding my motorcycle and it doesn’t give you the most peace of mind when you never know if it’ll turn on when you need to use it. Not to mention the hilariously bad battery life. They need better quality control, especially at the price
I have a Hero 5 I use on my motorcycle but I added USB ports to my bike so the camera is powered by the bike so battery life is irrelevant in my case. I don't have many issues with the 5, I think one of the main issues is sometimes pressing the highlight button to add a tag in the video causes the camera to shut down instead.
One of the best and stable GoPro's was Hero3. It had the audio issues sorted out Vs the Hero2. I've had heated arguments with tech UA-camrs giving glowing reviews over the necessary upgrades to GoPros as they progressed up to the current model. The lack of backwards compatibility and subscription cloud really spoke volumes to me that GoPro always wanted you to pay up more at each new model. I learned to be very careful what SD card I used and to keep the later GoPros out of the heat. But the exact same happens to a iPhone when shooting video on a warm day. When GoPros were a simple robust action camera without trying to be a DSLR thats when it worked. GoPro need to get back to raw basics but sadly the damage has been done. RIP GoPro
I am the unfortunate owner of a Gopro and I have said that if a suitable replacement shows up at the door I'd destroy my gopro in any way the sender wants. It's buggy it overheats the external microphone adapters are buggy and often never work it's buggy and over heats and it crashes allot and did I mention it's buggy and overheats. The newer players on the market have focused on reliability over spending on marketing. The main reason for Gopro declining is very simple they are not reliable.
For the intended use of getting video of a sport, you really need the video camera to be dead reliable. You don't get to do another take. And GoPro's just aren't reliable. I had too many races where at the end I checked the GoPro and nope. I just lost all the footage of my race because the dumb thing randomly stopped working again. You. Had. One. Job. Mr. Camera.
Started my channel with GoPros and they seemed to get better and somehow worse with every new iteration, after suffering so many issues resulting in lost or compromised footage I switched to DJI and have never looked back. I wish I could support them but when you need to count on them to make a living you can’t gable with them actually working
Interesting to see you here... Otherwise it is a common story for basically anyone doing anything outside on youtube. Start with a gopro and go to DJI or Insta or an actual camera because of Gopro's being garbage. Ironically I remember you saying your 7 Silver(I think) was complete garbage and you threw it into a hole, and your 7 Black actually worked. I have the exact opposite issue. My 7 works great, my 7 Black constantly overheats and has issues.
Also dont forget the efect of insta360. Their recent cameras really eat into the same market with much beter cameras for most people with more features. Especially their tiny camera is used a lot where a gopro would have been traditionally used.
i think it’s the 360 camera that gave insta 360 its success. even with the gopro name, 9/10 times people would rather get the insta360. if gopro tried harder, they wouldn’t have to compete against the likes of insta360 (or dji)
@@scoot5642 Go pro effectively abandoned the fusion 360 camera, over priced the omni and also killed the Kolor AutoPano software and the offline Go Pro VR player in favor of pushing cloud bs.
@@Warp2090 In terms of what? Because their products are positioned really well compared to gopro. People who want action cams want something light weight and durable and to not be overwhelmed with the tech and they want it to work in the more extreme elements. They want it easy to use given the circumstances of action. GoPro has some issues in UI, although the other companies have been able to innovate only because of gopros early work, the UI is slightly improved on DJI and insta for certain things. Both insta360 and DJI looked at what GoPro wasn't doing and innovated on some of those things, and frankly they nailed it with hardware magnetic connections and insta with 360 footage and now their smaller camea that pops out of the player and also has wireless video.
We primarily use ours for water sports where the touch screen interface is terrible and basically on par with a cell phone in a waterproof enclosure. Would love more physical (customizable) buttons to get it ready to reliably work in the water.
I know someone who's used a GoPro to shoot videos on his dirtbike. I suspect it's an older one, less prone to overheating and easier to dump video from. Myself, I've had no need for one; my phone or my regular digital camera have been enough. I was not very aware of the issues newer GoPros have had, until I started reading comments here. Nor do I remember their issues in trying to branch out. But yah, I suspected competition in a limited market was part of their problem. Good video as ever!
Yeah, they were incredibly cheap cameras sourced from a no-name factory in China, stuck in waterproof housings. Lots of other companies came out with similar things and did it better/cheaper.
I'm so glad you're still uploading videos weekly. I've been using them since 2018 to get an understanding of a business and how it runs before I buy their stock. Thank you, Mike, keep it up!
I think overall competition should be #3. Yes you have phones, but they sat on their laurels and let other prominent cameras overtake them. I personally like insta360 cameras.
The Hero4 is definitely where it started going downhill. They cut every corner possible. It’s the last one I bought, because it was constantly crashing, missing sound at random, overheating, and the face plate crumbled the first time I put it in the case. That’s around the time where they started diluting their own market. They didn’t follow the Steve Jobs 4 square model, and just made whatever sounded neat.
DJI and Insta360 offer better products for better prices, not to mention your phone having a great water/dust rating and being able to handle some extreme conditions, it allows people to use their phone and not an action camera. Let's not forget the million cheap GoPro knock offs that work pretty well with decent quality too.
I think you might have missed the part where a number of the later models had a bunch of issues, from overheating, to leaking, to corrupting media, and weird issues where they stop recording for seemingly no reason and so on.
Yah. It’s true that the GoPro business model was broken, but the actual product was more work than it was worth because of tech issues. If they made a superior product, it wouldn’t matter how wacky the CEO is. This video seems like a shallow assessment in that it’s only looking at the business model, which fits in with the channel. To be fair, that fits with capitalism in general, where we are expected to enjoy the product that they provide and to pay for it. The product is secondary. The profit is *everything*.
I own a GoPro Hero 9 and have used it to create a multitude of simple outdoor 4K 60fps videos that I publish on UA-cam. I had never experienced overheating problems, but in the early Hero 9's firmware and software updates I had a helluva time with the touch screen controls being unresponsive. This problem has in recent years been completely resolved. For the most part, I am happy with the GoPro's performance though I could never capture good low-light recordings no matter what I tried. For me, it has served its purpose, though I might consider upgrading to a different brand of camera in the future.
They did eventually respond to try to work with phones, but in an awful way. They killed off their desktop app, so if you want to pull off files in a more polished way than windows explorer, or if you want to edit the videos, you have to do it ON YOUR PHONE. Yes, the main way to backup and edit videos from a device that is meant to take tens or hundreds of gigabytes of videos, is the device that usually only has a few hundred gigabytes, and also just isn’t the best device for editing. Not to mention many of the editing features are paywalled. Before posting this, I just googled it, and it sounds like they brought back the app to macOS and will do windows later this year, but the fact they killed their computer app for years is a massive blunder in my eyes.
Oh and gopros have constantly struggled from batteries not lasting as long as you need them (and while they are swappable, replacements are expensive) and they overheat easily if it is somewhat hot out (like 80-90°f) and recording video. Fixing those two things would make them much more worth it to me, but they spend their time making other features instead.
Sure fire way to alienate more tech savvy users which I imagine if you know extreme sports or get a go pro to record something cool you’re doing you’re probably at least some what tech savvy.
You hit the nail on the head. No point recording awesome footage if you can't do anything interesting with it. I bought a high end phone so I could edit GoPro vids but it was never as good as the PC application
Yup, fully agree. I got my first Gopro last year and was also surprised that the app doesn't support Windows. I use it as a travel blog camera and have footage from different devices, so that a Windows app makes a lot of sense. As for the IOS support, it's awful. I've had the camera connected both to iPad and iPhone and auto upload is pretty much DoA. Even manually uploading to the cloud is a pain in the a**. So what's the point of the subscription?
I got a gopro to shoot UA-cam videos for my other channels because I didn't want to put my smartphone around things like Dust and water. I have had it a couple years now and have been really happy with it, no issues whatsoever. It was a much cheaper alternative than buying a professional camera, this is important for someone who is starting out.
Bought a Hero 4. It was defective out of the box. If you had Wi-Fi turned on the audio would be a course buzzing sound. I returned it for a replacement and the replacement did the same thing. I called the company and they basically said they know about the issue but had no intention of fixing it and if I did not like it, return the camera. So I did. Never done business with them since. I did buy a DJI OSMO 1st gen. Still use it all the time. Great product.
I’ve used GoPro since gopro 8 and I can tell you, insta360 will be (if not already) on top. I have recently experienced my most frustrating time when transferring 1 hour of footage for the 12 and almost made me set my GoPro on fire. I will be switching to insta360 as I am just starting my motovlogging vids. This is just like apple vs android. Apple takes 5 years to add one feature that Android has already implemented
I have a GoPro Hero Session that I absolutely love and has worked flawlessly for seven years. I've taken it and used it scuba diving in Hawaii, use it daily on my motorcycle helmet...I'd buy another one gladly but they don't make them anymore and don't seem to make one like it.
I'm a CI Engineer and I use GoPro's to record time lapses of building an area, product, etc, and put them inside machines to analyze machine movement for point of cause to identify issues using higher frame rates to breakdown movements. They definitely have a broad use-case list, but the problem is this idea of "infinite growth" that wall street has. GoPro filled a niche that didn't exist at the time, and now there are $40 copies that get the job done. Still the best for the size, but expensive and plenty of alternatives that perform good enough at lower budgets. They had their time, but now its a saturated market (and the drone was really their last shot at a comeback).
@@Warp2090 Uhh no they arent. Most people have moved on to DJI or Insta360 cams. The full coverage and actual smart system is much easier to use. I have an Olympus/OM Tough camera, which has a standard point and shoot camera style, while still being able to go 15 meters underwater; vs Hero 9 that has no external controls aside from a play button and can only go 10 meters down.
Great vid! I've never owned a GoPro since 7. And that too was a disaster when it kept hanging at the best moments. Poor support plus unreliable product sold at premium Price, people switched to Dji and Insta360 products instead
I thought you were going to mention the design flaws introduced on the hero 6 or 7 that made them add this statement to their warranty "this product is not warranted against water housing leakage or any resulting damage". Almost everyone I know that bought a GoPro in the past 6 years has run into this issue, thankfully I have not, but I noticed how this product became something that everyone I know had to something everyone I know warns about.
That's actually a standard on a most waterproof cameras, not just action cameras. Which is a shame, because average joe buys these things on the fact that they can be advertised to go underwater but then get burned when it fails on them during vacation, and know they wonder why they can't get warranty support.
I've always heard that becoming a synonymous name is a bad thing because inferior products become attributed to the company. Say someone buys a shit action-camera. People around think of it as a GoPro. Now, they think GoPros are shit.
@@ElleBrOw yeah, and maybe he doesn't. f off with that classist nonsense. at your //real// job, does your boss feel you up too? all jobs are real jobs you diphead.
Owning a GoPro, it took me all of 15 minutes to hate this thing the first time it overheated. They refuse to fix the issue and keep releasing new models while saying there is nothing they can do. Meanwhile, DJI has had the problem be non-existent for a long time now. Why buy something you can't use when other companies have made a competent and not just comparable but superior product for the same or sometimes cheaper price?
Heres the BIG problem with GoPro. Before, I will say this. I have a newer Hero9Black and a Hero3. Ive had the 3 for over 10 years now and it was used as a dash cam. It would run no matter the heat, especially inside the car on a hot summer day. The new one will shut down in 60 degree weather after about 10 minutes. Im told, I should record 4k. Then dont advertise it as a 4k camera capable of recording hours of footage. It got so bad, that I gave up on using it and now record in my office using a Insta360 bcause it doesn't overheat. I am so furious with GoPro, because they just forgot about battery overheating issues. Everything else, would have been fine, so long as it didnt ge the three beeps of death, as you recorded someting you couldnt catch anymore.
I also use a Hero 3 silver as a dash cam. I only have overheating issues if Ieave it in the sun all day and then go to use it. I can't blame it for that. But I don't see much reason to upgrade, much less every single year. I miy but another 3 or 4 but I don't see a reason to buy a newer one.
Thanks for your post. The only GoPro I’ve owned and used was also a Hero 3, and I’ve been baffled as to why everyone keeps talking about problems. Didn’t realize I owned the one semi-reliable model. 😅
@@davidmcleod5133 I still have it, and it still works. I did finally have to get a battery for it, but one in 10 years now! One issue it gets, is the button to turn it off or on wont work. The screen will be on, but wont respond. But its easy to take the battery out and force reboot it and its fine, and doesnt affect the recorded stuff. Image isnt the bst (its a bit low contrast, and night recordings are meh) but for a dashcam it shows license plates. So yeah, I thought that would be the same experience with the newer ones. I still use the new one too, but not as much. My last episode I had to stop midway and throw the camera in the freezer for about 10 minutes. It melted my peas LOL. I can rant forever on this. I got all the extensions, the external case so I can plug a different mic (the Rode wireless one), and for 400, I expected better. Batteries for it dont last, and they do that bloating thing where they wont go in or out of the camera itself. Sorry, really writing a novel here. But hold onto the 3. Those truly were the good ones at their peak!
I have a GoPro HD Hero2 that I bought in February 2012 for $280. For more than a decade I used this camera extensively for personal "video notebook" purposes, to document my juggling pattern research ideas for future reference and cataloging, with some curated highlights posted on UA-cam, Facebook, or Instagram. This GoPro still works great and is sitting here on my desk ready for action, although I haven't really used it much in about a year, preferring my phone instead most of the time now. When I purchased it, it was definitely the most convenient way to accomplish what I needed to do - super quick and easy to capture a casual clip. I have probably recorded at least 25,000 videos with it over the years. The durability has been outstanding with the only longevity issue being that I had to replace the original battery 5 years ago since it was failing to hold a charge. Occasionally I thought about upgrading to a newer model, but never had any real motivation to do that. So based on my experience I think it makes a lot of sense that this company has been recently struggling to remain a viable business.
Not at all surprised by this. Once smartphones became the norm it was pretty rare to hear much about GoPro. Usually if I heard about GoPro it was from someone who had purchased one for a specific use case, and even then it was not uncommon to hear of the device not working properly or outright failing. I personally have never owned one and for probably the last 10-15 years have had little to no interest in owning one.
The subscription model is what killed them. Plus their software turned to shit. I still do use GoPro but have their legacy software which works really well. I have a program that unscrambles their crazy filename structure of videos. They never should have done things like that. GoPro screwed GoPro.
I remember when GoPro was big in 2014 and 2015 I think it was the official sponsor of the X Games at one point an other competitions. Now there are other companies that make visor cams now. Wouldn't surprise me if GoPro eventaully folds.
I never had one but I've watched a few UA-camrs complain about it, especially it over heating. It's a shame a company that's been around this long and they never got their shit together.
He lost his investors money - but - he managed to have enough money for surfing and enough "savings" from the savings gods, together with lots of moolah from the bank of mom and dad. Sorry investors, money gone (into my "savings") carry on...
I bought a used GoPro Hero 7 Black off someone and it functioned exactly as I wanted it to, until I tried doing some skateboard rides with it. Even with 20-25 mph wind, it kept wanting to overheat on me. I thought it was a byproduct of the fact I bought it used, but it turns out, GoPros overheating are a major problem with it. The compact format and the resolution is great, but it seems to be generating a lot of waste heat and cannot dissipate it efficiently enough. Not to mention the sheer amount of proprietary nonsense means that whenever this camera decides to kick the bucket, I'm more than likely gonna go with another company
Funny I heard a UA-camr saying the 7 was the best one, I have the 12 and havnt had a problem yet, I'm happy so far, just not with the price, I had to finance it as I don't have $500, so I'm paying like $50 a month for 10 months or something, I am also disappointed with the battery life, I keep the battery cover off when I'm not in the rain and keep it plugged into my XTAR pbs2l with 2 5000mAh 21700 batteries, that gives me an extra hour or 2
I had a GoPro 7 Hero black. I bought it with the idea of using it as a camera, but with 4-5 exceptions that didn't happen. It worked great as a hand warmer, as an emotional endurance test but not as a camera. Of all my attempts to connect it to a phone, the only ones that worked were when I didn't need it to happen, but it was a test to see that it was actually possible. Their android app was a complete failure, the camera crashed constantly and had several redundant options that were unusable without an external battery. So were the GPS, voice commands and the hotkey. Just with these options on, the battery was dying before I could even connect to the phone.
I’ve been using a GoPro 5 (dirt bike riding) for years. Cons: battery dies quickly, horrible wind noise Pros: totally reliable, excellent quality in all lighting, only one corrupted file and that was after a crash that had the camera hit the ground pretty hard. I found a simple fix for the wind noise and it’s been a great camera!
I like to video water sports like rafting and snorkeling. GoPro's were always too expensive. I found the Olympus TG brand of camera's work fine. Sometimes you do get some clicking noise from them on video, but for the price they are very rugged, waterproof, and easy to use. Uploading files is easy.
Another problem with GoPro is the fact that they launch new models without reducing their older model inventory. To clear that inventory, they sell their previous models at a loss to bring in the newer models. Before bringing a new model on the market, they should wait for the older model to clear the shelves, or reduce their production.
I actually work for a television studio, direct some, DOP for others or simply a camera technician. The GoPro is a work horse for all those extra shots I need. -The GoPro 5 is mostly unreliable but I can put it in situations which I fear not for the camera. -The GoPro 7 tends to overheat but has a better stabilizer, tends to empty the batteries quickly. However, great as a back-up action cam. -The GoPro10 is the cream of the crop, the stabilization, wide angle, sound and battery life is impressive and is often my main shot in certain conditions (with external mics). I have difficulty finding faults with it unless put under extreme duress. Having several is epic in any shoot, because they give you so much variety, options and ease of use. I have even used the sound of a GoPro10 as back-up for faulty mics. Should GoPro step up their game? Absolutely! But I don't see them dying any time soon.
You seriously should try the Hero 12 if you're using it for broadcast. There are a couple of things that are complete game changers for broadcast: 1) 10 bit color.. being able to get so much more out of the color's dynamic range is huge because small sensors like he GoPro have terrible dynamic range. The 10 bit makes a huge difference. 2) log... again, more dynamic range. 3) Full sensor recording. 8:7 mode basically records the entire sensor, allowing you to decide the crop later without losing resolution. Plus, you can pan up and down in post without affecting the resolution if you didn't frame the shot perfectly.
I was an early GoPro user. I knew about the film GoPros when they came out, and bought one every time they came out, but they began screwing over customers. Every time a new version came out they changed the battery, so now you had to buy a whole sst of new batteries to go with the camera, and the most notable differences after awhile boiled down to just slight changes in saturation and white balance. Between the terrible app, the overheating batteries, and price gouging on batteries, I got fed up and switched to the DJI Osmo Action 4. It is an awesome camera that made me forget about GoPro. I still use my 360 Max, but I have no need for GoPro anymore.
The GoPro Max is a surprisingly interesting camera, though its a shame that you can't monitor the camera on a smartphone whilst shooting 360 footage. I guess it hasn't sufficient processing power perhaps? I now have an Insta360 X4 with which I am very pleased, but I'm not sure that when (if) GoPro's new 360 camera is released, whether it could touch the X4. GoPro's subscription service would in addition be the 'No, I'm not going there ever again' decision.
I’m a full time videographer and though I love the use of my GoPro, I do only use it for limited stuff. It’s the perfect answer for underwater shots, action shots, unique perspectives where I can just hide it in a corner, but 90% of the time my work doesn’t need it. When I’m out adventuring in some way, I take it every time! It’s small, it’s convenient, it’s great. But outside of any type of adventure stuff I do, I typically don’t use it
I owned a gopro when I was younger, and then I was thinking about upgrading a couple years ago. But then I saw cheap ones on amazon for like $80, 4k 30fps, waterproof. Basically gopros, but cheaper. Decided to take a chance and buy one, since I knew I could return it if it wasn't good. I still have, and its honestly better than a gopro.
I own multiple GoPros and have learned that, like everything, there's a learning curve. You can't just pick one up and immediately start shooting. In that situation, it will overheat. You need to go and adjust your settings to prevent this. Primarily, set a manual shutter speed! It will automatically set a high shutter speed which makes your videos jittery, takes um much more storage space, kills the battery faster, and overheats the camera.
Bought GoPro 12 to replace my dslr to shoot my short films. The quality is really superior for the price point. The camera stabilization is next level. Has add ons for lights, mics and a lens hood. Shot 2 projects and so far and very pleased with the footage. Light weight too.
gopros are really great and have been hitting the limits of what's pssible across all cameras. I want them to stay relevent and compete on a few areas against DJI and insta. GoPro certainly can and people do prefer GoPro for some things. Problem of a lot of it has been people's demand for more and more video processing, resolution and also demanding lighter weight, and better temp mgmt. All these things are very hard problems and Sony also struggles with them. But DJI has also competed with gopro just on having simple magnetic hook connections, solving what 3rd parties were doing for GoPro and in some cases not even as good. Quick swaps of locations is very important as these cameras can be used for lifestyle recording. A good UI and swappable locations is important there. from chest to selfie stick to tripod to pack strap to dock etc.
The downside of the 12 is that they removed the GPS module in a cheap effort to hide the overheating issue. It may be ok for static videos, but not having GPS killed their usefulness for sports use, especially motorsports.
Being a band kid in high school, the biggest thing I think about when I think of GoPro is using them as a headcam to record your POV while performing a marching band show. Those are very cool, and far and away was the biggest reason why I wanted one in high school even when smart phone cameras were getting really good.
DJI makes incredible cameras, but to be fair, the "not overheating" is partially because the Action4 only shoots less than half the resolution of a Hero11 / Hero12
@@b.griffin317 5312 x 4648 - an 8:7 aspect ratio with 24,690,176 pixels. Osmo Action 4 is 3840 x 2880, a 4:3 aspect ratio with only 11,059,200 pixels. Obviously sheer pixel count isn't everything, but that's a pretty significant difference
@@BayAreaMotorcycleCommutingNot really, 4k will use 8.3mp no matter the camera resolution and the dji action has a bigger sensor so it should overheat even faster
While I've never actually used a GoPro, every comment I've ever heard about them over the past few years seems to point to one major culprit: Focusing on features over quality. It's so common in the tech sphere these days, where they're so desperate to have bullet-points that they completely abandon the user experience, and people move away from them because they're just so miserable to use.
I have one of GoPro's main competitors: DJI Osmo Action 3. Heard some bad review on GoPros (newer models have overheat problems) and went with the Osmo instead. Couldn't have made a better decision.
I had one. As other have said, mine would overheat and stop recording and I wouldn't know until much later. I had been experimenting with the time lapse feature and captured some great footage of some road trips and building lego kits with my son. I liked the Quik software which produced some great footage of those lego builds which took several days. They really made it easy. Pick your clips, pick some music and *poof* you have a video memory. I still use it occasionally to grab short videos. The overheating issue soured me on action cameras and reviews of subsequent models I looked into show that this is still a problem. You can't sell a 5K video camera and tell people to use lower resolutions and turn off stabilization so it doesn't overheat.
I found I can remove the battery and run my GP11 from a pocket lithium battery via USB-C cable and it solved the overheating problem more than once. Think I was shooting 60p 4K Hope this helps The GoPro is mounted on a Volta 1 stick but I leave the lead to dangle because my copy of the Volta 1 barely holds any charge and the controls are meh. Disclaimer: I am a 70 year-old codger
This might be the right place to ask. I have the newest GoPro, 1st time ever buying. I use it to record videos but also have the app to use it as a webcam. However, the app won’t even open anymore. I’ve read there are many problems with the app just not openly. I’ve done several trouble shooting steps but no idea where to go from here. And I don’t think I even care to try to use it anymore. Is anyone able to suggest help for me?
GoPro really missed out not making a competitive drone. And even then, I feel like the market has stagnated. What they should’ve done is gotten into surveillance (home and commercial) and police body cams.
Yeah, it seems like they really squandered their brief moment of dominating their market, and couldn’t pivot before the competition improved and surpassed them. It’s easy to be critical in hindsight, of course.
Some years ago I was planning a microbudget movie, and thought about using a GoPro for the primary camera since it would be small and could fit anywhere, had anti-shake technology and would be able to do some planned underwater shots. But the reviews I read indicated that it would create a fisheye distortion, which you needed to take extra steps to undo. So I began to look for something else with better image quality.
GoPro now has competition from DJI, Insta360 and smartphones. GoPro is not Kleenex, most people just call them 'action cams" or "action cameras". I have 6 different Hero cams and an Insta360 X3. I do like the 360 camera and GoPro needs an update to their Max 360 camera since it was released almost 5 years ago.
I don't know how many people here have gopros themselves, but I've clocked over 500 hours on my Hero 9 and Hero 11 without overheating, loosing or corrupted files. So personally I like these cameras, they're awesome for what they are. 350$ for a proper tanky action cam is totally worth it.
Hearing you say things like "it ended up being an embarassing waste of time and money" in that trademark company man tone is hilarious to me. Also, I love seeing companies get what they deserve for being greedy.
As a freestyle drone guy, you cant beat a used $30 gopro hero4. The 1080 and 2.7k options look surprisingly good even today and you don't have to worry about losing an expensive camera. Little known fact about the hero 3&4 is that It also has analog pass-through so you can use the gopro as your fpv cam if you didn't want to run 2 separate cameras on your quad.
I've heard from many sources that the gopro is crap. The software sucks and the camera itself is a lemon. Overheating, shutting off randomly, not uploading right, not charging and the list goes on. the other issue is buying one because you think you're gonna use it but then don't which is something a lot of us do. I never owned one due to the horror stories I heard about them. Not that I had any use for one to begin with.
Yup them releasing model after model with issue after issue just slowly killed my interest in owning one. Used to dream of upgrading from my knock off to a real GoPro but at this point no thanks.
@@NiSE_Rafter The confusing array of models certainly didn't help with marketing them to a wider market, I looked at buying one a while back and found researching which one I wanted tedious. It took so long that, combined with reports of quality issues with some models, I simply talked myself out of it.
I bought a GoPro in 2016 or 2017. I’m really into skiing so I wanted to use it for ski strips to record what I did. I don’t remember the model, but I remember it was overtly complex to use. They had an app, but you couldn’t use that app without cell service, you can see how that would become an issue. So you just had to manually try and get it to record, and when it’s pouring snow and freezing out that becomes hard. I had it attached to my helmet and I could never get it to actually work except a couple times. I immediately sold that thing. Back then you used to see tons of people on the slopes with those things attached to their helmets or on a stick. Now you never see them, people have gone back to using a cameraman, but now the camera man uses the competing brands usually.
I touched one once, and was so confused. As a 20 year old who’s grown up with almost every new age technology, there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to work a basic camera meant for athletes. Especially when I’m a videographer! It genuinely felt like they were tryna make me not use it. They’d be doing very well if they actually made the product intuitively rather than focus simply on durability and accessories.
I have a GoPro Hero 9 and one of my favorite parts about it is honestly just being able to take pictures and videos in a way that doesn't fill up my phone storage or use it's battery. It's a fairly insignificant use I recognize, if I don't think a video is worth using my phone storage for, is it worth having that video? But I enjoy the option and the pictures and videos I do want to share, I can put on my phone later.
I used to use my Hero9 for shooting train videos, but it had issues with overheating, shutting off spontaneously, corrupted files, and buttons that had to be pushed hard and held. I had planned to keep it as a backup after purchasing my EOS camera, but three months later, the GoPro memory chip completely freaked out on me, and hasn't worked at all ever since, even with a new chip. Also, the file sizes are huge, and relatively difficult to work with.
I agree with all the comments here. My experience is I got one several years ago (2 actually) for motorcycle vlogging, but suffered from overheating, crashing, and a workflow that wasn't easy to manage. I also felt no need to upgrade, and with annual releases, it felt like I was trapped, so I sold what I had and moved on to cheaper, more stable options that offered more. And that last point is why it's tough with GoPro these days, too narrow of a market, and too much good competition.
*You want to know why we stopped using them? Because they OVERHEAT in under 10 minutes in a temperature controlled environment without direct sunlight. Absolutely ridiculous.*
I have always use my GoPro for skiing, hiking, fishing. Now my kids are old enough, I tie it to dugouts and live stream our baseball games for families outside of the area to watch. Thanks to their feedback, we have fine tuned it to the point we make pretty good quality videos shared around the world for free. We get grandparents, relatives, even deployed soldiers who can watch these kiddos play ball!
I've heard enough comments from totally unrelated UA-camrs, from firearms channels, to bushcraft channels, to guys who catch snakes for a living, casually mentioning they lost some footage cause their GoPro overheated to know one of the big reasons without knowing anything else about GoPro.
They aren't very easy to use. I got frustrated and just put them away.
Yoink
100% you get ONE shot to get the shot and these stupid cameras overheat and die constantly. Absolute trash.
Loss of footage and overheating is also the biggest issues I heard about them.
Wonder what on earth they were doing? I recorded a lot in Rio de Janeiro, in the middle of summer with no issue.
When I worked at Best Buy in the camera department back in 2017 they sent me for camera training in Arizona. GoPro had a presenter who was super kind and awesome. Turns out it was the CEO and I had no idea until after. He didn’t say who he was and just talked about the love for cameras. Really cool dude
He does seem like a pretty genuine dude.
Technology eats their young for breakfast.
So? GoPros are utter garbage and expensive garbage at that.
@@johncrow5552 Imagine being so miserable that you leave a comment like this.
@@MrJeremybowling Miserable indeed! Imagine paying good money for something that works half the time. When I use want to use the GoPro, its not for every day mundane tasks that can be captured tomorrow. Its for things that you do maybe once in your life and to have the camera die on you is not fun. Should have bought a cheaper imitation camera. Imagine that, an imitation that probably does a better job!
The subscription/cloud model really kneecapped them as well. Lots of companies are guilty of trying to capture additional consumer dollars by moving features behind a paywall. This generation of MBA types are on a mission to screw over consumers without any thought toward those consumers ignoring them with future purchases.
😊😊
@@honor9lite1337the unlimited cloud subscription is what keeps me with GoPro, I can record everything I want and just have it upload and stored for free at night when I sleep. Other wise I would have switched to DJI by now.
Yeah, because it’s more profitable lol. This is capitalism in action
I read a lot of the comments and I think you summed it up best.
@@minch5537so even though the product that they sold is just complete crap, actually was of limited to no value economically, and otherwise. But as long as it made money.
Does anyone else see what's wrong with running a society like this?
Overheating, corrupted files, randomly shutting off, auto splicing videos, and their cloud/subscription thing. The end.
You just described my Hero 9.
@@LetsGoChaseThatTrain The 9 was maybe the worst GoPro yet.
I don’t use the cloud service. My phone has a dumb amount of storage so I just download clips or keep them on the card
@@MJWCBW Yeah I never used the cloud thing. I have two external hard drives.
@@stevenm6301 Lucky me. 😆
Felt like everyone that wanted to own them bought them, then... turns out most people have little use for one, let alone buy another in the future. Infinite growth was an even harder sell here than everywhere else.
Also seems like camera quality has plateaued. The past few models has been pretty similar as far as features and camera resolution go
And, they overheat like crazy. They’re not meant for use as a regular video camera. They need airflow and short recording times. Cheap competitors came out with cameras that can record for longer than 10 minutes, all while GoPro gaslit us about it.
Can confirm. I bought one and had little use for it.
I have 2. Never found an interesting use for them. They have problems that make them difficult to use. They just sit now
Exactly. They're like anything, you buy one when they first come out and other companies jump in to make a better one, so even if you need another, there are DJI and Sony and Samsungs that make better ones.
I bought the Hero 2 in 2011 for around $200, came with everything, housings, mounts, brackets, clamps, suction caps, etc. Brought the Hero 5 a few years later for almost $600 and got 2 mounts, that's it... I've never bought one since. They went down the Apple business model of charging more for less and selling accessories that were once included. That was the death of them.
I owned a 2 for a long time. It finally bit the dust after years of great service. They were up to the 11 or 12 but they were to expensive. I was able to buy a new 3 with a giant pack of accessories for $99.
I’ve wanted one for years but really couldn’t justify the price tag. At this point GoPro is almost irrelevant. Decent drones cost less with more technology so still can’t justify the money
I used to work for GoPro over a decade ago at their HQ as an intern, the company grew way too fast and Nick Woodman has been a narcissist with posting videos in his press releases to employees! He’s mostly responsible for GoPro’s decline, since he lacked focus in new products that would make them relevant in the smartphone era.
Should have been a GoPro📱in a waterproof case with video editing apps as bloat ware, 5 gigs of free ☁️ storage..........even 10 years ago for $499.99 unlocked with dual SIM slots, 64 gigs on board expandable to 512gb, I think it would have sold
@@mankind8088hmmm I think they should’ve tried to make action cameras for the film industry/ and going deeper in the camera/ film Industry in general. Phones would’ve only lasted so long before IPhone etc out did them
@@mankind8088tough to say if people would buy that phone in the masses should of made phone covers and separate cloud services link to phone that would of made a big impact.
@@mankind8088 they were already too late to compete in smartphones, but they should’ve made camera accessories for smartphones like lens adapters. There was too much competition in smartphones at that point.
@@vincentkingsdale8334mostly Canon, Sony, Nikon, and lots of Chinese companies that make action video cameras.
Damn imagine having so much money you can fail try business ventures and then go on a 5 month abroad trip
Joys of coming from a rich family.
I had to scroll this far down.
True. I respect the guy's perserverance, but it is pretty funny to hear "this guy failed spectacularly in a business venture... and went on a 5 month surfing trip to cope with it"
I have owned one GoPro and sold it after a few months because the video kept freezing. Apparently that's still a very common problem because I know quite a few people that use them and they have the same issues. So it wasn't like I bought a bad one. They have poor quality control.
My GoPro kept on overheating and I wasn’t overusing it in any way. Sometimes it would start overheating seconds after turning it on.
Get a DJI Osmo Action. Solves all the problems with GoPros and is smaller, more compact, cheaper and water proof down to a lower depth.
That’s the sign of a bad SD card.
It is a common issue. Not a lemon unit but across the whole range in general. It has only gotten better with the most recent releases which is more than a decade since the first model.
@@gigihanmandarin I have a 7 and 11 and neither lock up ever although they can overheat after a period of time.
Great video! I studied GoPro Inc. for my MBA course in 2018. An add-on worth mentioning for that last factor of a niché (narrow) market is that, in my research, this was the biggest headwind, and it was self-imposed!
Nick Woodman consciously wanted the brand "GoPro" to be associated with an "active lifestyle" brand. Therefore, they halted marketing opportunities to expand on GoPro from an action sports camera to an "everyday" video camera. At the time, there were museums filming tours to be placed online as a "virtual tour" (a concept thrust into public awareness two years later). There were also surgeries being filmed with GoPros with intentions to be shown to medical students. This was huge because it was a visual how-to guide at a nominal expenses, where article were comparing the cost of a GoPro with the expense of hiring a camera crew to capture it previously.
My takeaway was that GoPro was the antithesis of Nintendo Wii, where (instead of losing the video game competition among gamers) they expanded the market beyond gamers to outsell the competition. GoPro opted to stick to the inner competition instead of expanding its market.
Kinda had the same thoughts, gopro did not expand their market, unlike insta360 where almost a majority of the outdoor vloggers use. Insta’s marketing is that you don’t need to be an extreme athlete or a hardcore adventurer to use their cams. Ista captured the bigger market which is the majority or cam-users, non-athletes.
Sounds reasonable. It is a study on how nuanced business can (must) be. Thank you for your comment.
One of the big missteps was around 2016/17. I was a dealer - and a professional sports photographer on the side. My product rep gave me a full kit. I think it might've been a Hero 4 or 6. The problem was that GoPro required you to create a gopro account to access all the controls of the camera. Sorry, I'm not logging in to allow GoPro to track any of my usage. For many users that just want to configure a camera, use all of its features, then access the created content, that was a ridiculous overreach. I've used 25 years of professional and pro-sumer Canon DSLRs and mirrorless camers, and I've never had to log in to configure anything. I never created that GoPro account. I did continue to trot out an older GoPro I had acquired a few years prior, but at some point - as you point out - smart phones basically cannibalized much of the everyday use cases.
I also read some reviews of the top reviewer on German Amazon at that time and they literally threw out third-party batteries with a firmware update (AFAIK it was the Hero 5), because he had a bunch of these, it rendered them useless.
When they had done that with the introduction of a new model (but then they should rather change the battery body completely to make it physically incompatible) it's still a little douchbaggery, but not as much as they did throwing it out overnight.
You realise you can use the GoPro quick app as guest?
So you got given free GoPros but didn't want to log into an account to use it. 😂 My lord 😂
@@bigload6 What an ignorant comment.
@@bigload6 I'm not sure what one thing has to do with the other. I'm a professional photographer. I don't "log in" to configure or access features of my Canon, Nikon, or Sony cameras. It's a self-own by GoPro. Apparently they've since addressed the issue in the intervening decade.
as a tv professional. gopro were the ideal camera for risky or weird mounting footage....ext cars, airplane wings etc. BUT. tv companies know that gopro are not professional grade kit. prone to locking up, loosing files and just not working. these issues with software, have never been totally solved. great idea but flawed.
Using a GoPro is also an excruciating experience compared to a regular camera. Yeah they're super durable and all that, but trying to pull files off of the thing is just stupid. Their cloud system sucks, a lot of the hardware is proprietary. There's a lot of reasons GoPro is going down the drain. Not to mention the fact that they are WAY too expensive at this point. You can get little cameras that do all the same stuff, without all the bullshit, for cheaper. So people buy those
Another example of a company thinking they can extract more money from a cornered market only to find they've actually pushed themselves out of said market. You can only get away with the whole overpriced proprietary cables, batteries, software, mounts, accessories, etc racket for so long until your whole customer base gives up on you en masse.
DJI went from being a cheap option if you wanted a spare camera to go with your GoPro equipment to being a better choice in most cases just based on UI. They might not have quite the image quality, but they're a lot easier to use.
Yep a $50 action📷 that has a 64gb card recording at 720 that only records with no🐂💩or software required..........is 10x easier to use than any $299 progo
Yeah DJI just fucking dominated gopro's Market.
Funny because they hold a near Monopoly in consumer drone market so much so that the US is looking to ban them out right through lobbying by skydio reps
@@Molly-ey6lqunless your apple
As a mountain biker, I've had and used a few gopros over the years. They were great when they worked, and a nightmare otherwise. Crashes, corruption of files, crappy services, and overheating are big problems; but I think the thing which really killed them was that other companies came in and did it better. DJI and Insta360 both offer better products for cheaper, and with significant innovations over the latest gopros (the magnetic mount from DJI is a game-changer, for example)
I think gopro still has a chance to get back in the game; but they need to put out something better than their competition, and with more reliable hardware.
The mount alone makes it a game-changer...
they can't get back in. I would never buy another one. Its expensive rubbish.
You know they fell off when 360 cameras have a smaller form factor with a bigger battery life.
sony f3000 action camera is what go pro wish it couldve been
Typical company losing focus on their core business.
Gopro makes a 360 camera already. Been out there for a while.
@@SpeedDemonExpressbut it’s big and bulky as compare to insta360 x4. Plus their software not as easy to use as insta360
@sookainian I've heard good things, but never seen anyone use it at the motocross track.
I have a GoPro 9 and a GoPro 10... both are Black editions that I have used for recording aviation videos and flights I do. I have been in a constant battle with them since I first started to use them. From overheating, to random recording glitches and stops, to not being able to use a battery pack because of a software glitch that HAS NOT BEEN PATCHED FOR YEARS. It's absolutely unbelievable. I will never buy another GoPro product.
me too. never ever again!
Their tech and support was awful for me. I bought one before a vacation in 2018. I am pretty tech savvy tested it, went on my vacation and the camera had failed on me. I was able to rescue 4 thumbnails. After researching, their "recommend card" had known compatibility issues, but this wasn't mentioned on their site only at 3rd party forums. Their support was less than stellar and my GoPro, with little less than an hour of use time, was the most expensive item I've thrown away. Such a waste. But like you said, bloat and inefficiency is obvious on this one.
I have plenty of my own issues with GoPro, but I will say, their support was pretty good for me.
Basically, the battery cover can come off if it isn’t closed, and due to my own fault, I ended up losing it. They only sold replacement covers for newer models, but I contacted support asking if I could still buy one, and they just sent me a new one for free since I had had the GoPro less than a year. I’m not sure how many companies do this since I usually only contact them if it was their fault something broke, but I really appreciate it.
irony in blaming the customer and not the company for making a non functioning product
I’m surprised how many other people in these comments have been having reliability problems with their cameras. My first GoPro was a Hero 3 Black Edition and it never gave me issues. Switched to a Hero 10 a few years back and it constantly freezes, outright fails to power on sometimes, and has syncing issues all the time. I use it primarily when riding my motorcycle and it doesn’t give you the most peace of mind when you never know if it’ll turn on when you need to use it. Not to mention the hilariously bad battery life. They need better quality control, especially at the price
I have a Hero 5 I use on my motorcycle but I added USB ports to my bike so the camera is powered by the bike so battery life is irrelevant in my case. I don't have many issues with the 5, I think one of the main issues is sometimes pressing the highlight button to add a tag in the video causes the camera to shut down instead.
They essentially stagnated and didn’t diversify their products categories after a whole decade. Not a good strategy.
Well, they TRIED to diversify, but sadly failed in spectacular manner (drones, a media division, etc)
@@BayAreaMotorcycleCommutingit’s unfortunate there drones sucked
Should have just focused on making the best AND reliable camera
@@BitcoinTo100K in theory, it should've been a layup for them, but I guess it was just bad execution
One of the best and stable GoPro's was Hero3. It had the audio issues sorted out Vs the Hero2. I've had heated arguments with tech UA-camrs giving glowing reviews over the necessary upgrades to GoPros as they progressed up to the current model. The lack of backwards compatibility and subscription cloud really spoke volumes to me that GoPro always wanted you to pay up more at each new model. I learned to be very careful what SD card I used and to keep the later GoPros out of the heat. But the exact same happens to a iPhone when shooting video on a warm day. When GoPros were a simple robust action camera without trying to be a DSLR thats when it worked. GoPro need to get back to raw basics but sadly the damage has been done. RIP GoPro
I am the unfortunate owner of a Gopro and I have said that if a suitable replacement shows up at the door I'd destroy my gopro in any way the sender wants. It's buggy it overheats the external microphone adapters are buggy and often never work it's buggy and over heats and it crashes allot and did I mention it's buggy and overheats. The newer players on the market have focused on reliability over spending on marketing.
The main reason for Gopro declining is very simple they are not reliable.
DJI Osmo Action doesn't have all the problems of a GoPro and many advantages over it.
Lol just glancing at the comments section and I see a lot of ex gopro users talk about DJI OSMO. I guess that's your best bet lol
For the intended use of getting video of a sport, you really need the video camera to be dead reliable. You don't get to do another take. And GoPro's just aren't reliable. I had too many races where at the end I checked the GoPro and nope. I just lost all the footage of my race because the dumb thing randomly stopped working again. You. Had. One. Job. Mr. Camera.
dji and insta have been doing better for years now
I destroyed mine with a sledgehammer
Started my channel with GoPros and they seemed to get better and somehow worse with every new iteration, after suffering so many issues resulting in lost or compromised footage I switched to DJI and have never looked back. I wish I could support them but when you need to count on them to make a living you can’t gable with them actually working
Your channel rocks Matt! You could record with an 80s VHS camcorder and still be the best on UA-cam
@@mikeb8893 😂 thanks!!
Interesting to see you here...
Otherwise it is a common story for basically anyone doing anything outside on youtube. Start with a gopro and go to DJI or Insta or an actual camera because of Gopro's being garbage.
Ironically I remember you saying your 7 Silver(I think) was complete garbage and you threw it into a hole, and your 7 Black actually worked. I have the exact opposite issue. My 7 works great, my 7 Black constantly overheats and has issues.
Also dont forget the efect of insta360. Their recent cameras really eat into the same market with much beter cameras for most people with more features.
Especially their tiny camera is used a lot where a gopro would have been traditionally used.
i think it’s the 360 camera that gave insta 360 its success. even with the gopro name, 9/10 times people would rather get the insta360. if gopro tried harder, they wouldn’t have to compete against the likes of insta360 (or dji)
@@scoot5642 Go pro effectively abandoned the fusion 360 camera, over priced the omni and also killed the Kolor AutoPano software and the offline Go Pro VR player in favor of pushing cloud bs.
@@scoot5642 Insta360 is worse than gopro though
@@Warp2090 well i did say 9/10
@@Warp2090 In terms of what? Because their products are positioned really well compared to gopro. People who want action cams want something light weight and durable and to not be overwhelmed with the tech and they want it to work in the more extreme elements. They want it easy to use given the circumstances of action. GoPro has some issues in UI, although the other companies have been able to innovate only because of gopros early work, the UI is slightly improved on DJI and insta for certain things. Both insta360 and DJI looked at what GoPro wasn't doing and innovated on some of those things, and frankly they nailed it with hardware magnetic connections and insta with 360 footage and now their smaller camea that pops out of the player and also has wireless video.
We primarily use ours for water sports where the touch screen interface is terrible and basically on par with a cell phone in a waterproof enclosure. Would love more physical (customizable) buttons to get it ready to reliably work in the water.
Wanted a gopro... got a gopro... don't use the gopro...
I know someone who's used a GoPro to shoot videos on his dirtbike. I suspect it's an older one, less prone to overheating and easier to dump video from. Myself, I've had no need for one; my phone or my regular digital camera have been enough.
I was not very aware of the issues newer GoPros have had, until I started reading comments here. Nor do I remember their issues in trying to branch out. But yah, I suspected competition in a limited market was part of their problem.
Good video as ever!
I thought the decline was from lower sales caused by quality problems.
Yeah, they were incredibly cheap cameras sourced from a no-name factory in China, stuck in waterproof housings. Lots of other companies came out with similar things and did it better/cheaper.
@@nitehawk865:55 not produced by foxconn? they owned 8.88% of gopro.
I'm so glad you're still uploading videos weekly. I've been using them since 2018 to get an understanding of a business and how it runs before I buy their stock. Thank you, Mike, keep it up!
I think overall competition should be #3. Yes you have phones, but they sat on their laurels and let other prominent cameras overtake them. I personally like insta360 cameras.
I was actually quite surprised to see he barely mentioned the competition from both DJI and Insta360.
You can buy similar looking action cameras with identical fittings for a small fraction of the price. This must be one of the top 3 reasons.
I will buy imsta360 flow pro with my iP15 pro max
The Hero4 is definitely where it started going downhill. They cut every corner possible. It’s the last one I bought, because it was constantly crashing, missing sound at random, overheating, and the face plate crumbled the first time I put it in the case. That’s around the time where they started diluting their own market. They didn’t follow the Steve Jobs 4 square model, and just made whatever sounded neat.
DJI and Insta360 offer better products for better prices, not to mention your phone having a great water/dust rating and being able to handle some extreme conditions, it allows people to use their phone and not an action camera. Let's not forget the million cheap GoPro knock offs that work pretty well with decent quality too.
Yes Dji is great from my experience
The writing and narration on this channel is SOOO good. You deserve (and have earned) the success of Company Man.
That's so kind. Appreciate it.
I think you might have missed the part where a number of the later models had a bunch of issues, from overheating, to leaking, to corrupting media, and weird issues where they stop recording for seemingly no reason and so on.
Yup
Yah. It’s true that the GoPro business model was broken, but the actual product was more work than it was worth because of tech issues. If they made a superior product, it wouldn’t matter how wacky the CEO is. This video seems like a shallow assessment in that it’s only looking at the business model, which fits in with the channel. To be fair, that fits with capitalism in general, where we are expected to enjoy the product that they provide and to pay for it. The product is secondary. The profit is *everything*.
I mean they’re also expensive. I looked at them not long ago and couldn’t believe how much they cost. Not interested
My Hero 9 had all of those issues.
We just got a new GoPro for work and it overheated while the one guy was using it and is bricked. We also got the Karma Drone and it never worked.
I own a GoPro Hero 9 and have used it to create a multitude of simple outdoor 4K 60fps videos that I publish on UA-cam. I had never experienced overheating problems, but in the early Hero 9's firmware and software updates I had a helluva time with the touch screen controls being unresponsive. This problem has in recent years been completely resolved. For the most part, I am happy with the GoPro's performance though I could never capture good low-light recordings no matter what I tried. For me, it has served its purpose, though I might consider upgrading to a different brand of camera in the future.
They did eventually respond to try to work with phones, but in an awful way.
They killed off their desktop app, so if you want to pull off files in a more polished way than windows explorer, or if you want to edit the videos, you have to do it ON YOUR PHONE. Yes, the main way to backup and edit videos from a device that is meant to take tens or hundreds of gigabytes of videos, is the device that usually only has a few hundred gigabytes, and also just isn’t the best device for editing. Not to mention many of the editing features are paywalled.
Before posting this, I just googled it, and it sounds like they brought back the app to macOS and will do windows later this year, but the fact they killed their computer app for years is a massive blunder in my eyes.
Oh and gopros have constantly struggled from batteries not lasting as long as you need them (and while they are swappable, replacements are expensive) and they overheat easily if it is somewhat hot out (like 80-90°f) and recording video.
Fixing those two things would make them much more worth it to me, but they spend their time making other features instead.
Sure fire way to alienate more tech savvy users which I imagine if you know extreme sports or get a go pro to record something cool you’re doing you’re probably at least some what tech savvy.
You hit the nail on the head. No point recording awesome footage if you can't do anything interesting with it.
I bought a high end phone so I could edit GoPro vids but it was never as good as the PC application
Yup, fully agree. I got my first Gopro last year and was also surprised that the app doesn't support Windows. I use it as a travel blog camera and have footage from different devices, so that a Windows app makes a lot of sense.
As for the IOS support, it's awful. I've had the camera connected both to iPad and iPhone and auto upload is pretty much DoA. Even manually uploading to the cloud is a pain in the a**. So what's the point of the subscription?
I have edited all my GoPro footage on my MacBook Pro for years?
I got a gopro to shoot UA-cam videos for my other channels because I didn't want to put my smartphone around things like Dust and water. I have had it a couple years now and have been really happy with it, no issues whatsoever. It was a much cheaper alternative than buying a professional camera, this is important for someone who is starting out.
Bought a Hero 4. It was defective out of the box. If you had Wi-Fi turned on the audio would be a course buzzing sound. I returned it for a replacement and the replacement did the same thing. I called the company and they basically said they know about the issue but had no intention of fixing it and if I did not like it, return the camera. So I did. Never done business with them since. I did buy a DJI OSMO 1st gen. Still use it all the time. Great product.
I’ve used GoPro since gopro 8 and I can tell you, insta360 will be (if not already) on top. I have recently experienced my most frustrating time when transferring 1 hour of footage for the 12 and almost made me set my GoPro on fire. I will be switching to insta360 as I am just starting my motovlogging vids. This is just like apple vs android. Apple takes 5 years to add one feature that Android has already implemented
Wow, I remember when they were getting popular. I never used one but that's odd to hear they are struggling.
I have a GoPro Hero Session that I absolutely love and has worked flawlessly for seven years. I've taken it and used it scuba diving in Hawaii, use it daily on my motorcycle helmet...I'd buy another one gladly but they don't make them anymore and don't seem to make one like it.
I'm a CI Engineer and I use GoPro's to record time lapses of building an area, product, etc, and put them inside machines to analyze machine movement for point of cause to identify issues using higher frame rates to breakdown movements. They definitely have a broad use-case list, but the problem is this idea of "infinite growth" that wall street has. GoPro filled a niche that didn't exist at the time, and now there are $40 copies that get the job done. Still the best for the size, but expensive and plenty of alternatives that perform good enough at lower budgets. They had their time, but now its a saturated market (and the drone was really their last shot at a comeback).
oh,i remember that shit drone.
When has capitalism not been mutually exclusive with infinite growth?
@@BleedForTheWorldplenty of people run businesses with consistent profits and have no intention of increasing their businesses size.
@@TheMysteryDriver plenty of people do the opposite because they're greedy as hell and that's not illegal. In fact, it's rewarded.
@@BleedForTheWorld ok? That doesn’t help your point
The rise and fall of GoPro is indeed an extraordinary case study. There are business lessons to be learnt from its case.
Never expected to see a GoPro episode.
Same, I always thought they were doing good but maybe I was wrong? 🤔
@@alexsynthesis They are doing good.
Go Pro, endorsed by Trevor Jacob . . . . .. ( Along with Ridge Wallets )
@@Warp2090 Uhh no they arent. Most people have moved on to DJI or Insta360 cams. The full coverage and actual smart system is much easier to use. I have an Olympus/OM Tough camera, which has a standard point and shoot camera style, while still being able to go 15 meters underwater; vs Hero 9 that has no external controls aside from a play button and can only go 10 meters down.
@@Warp2090😂🤣
If they were doing good, this video wouldn’t have come out. GoPro is within two years of bankruptcy in my opinion.
Great vid! I've never owned a GoPro since 7. And that too was a disaster when it kept hanging at the best moments. Poor support plus unreliable product sold at premium Price, people switched to Dji and Insta360 products instead
I thought you were going to mention the design flaws introduced on the hero 6 or 7 that made them add this statement to their warranty "this product is not warranted against water housing leakage or any resulting damage". Almost everyone I know that bought a GoPro in the past 6 years has run into this issue, thankfully I have not, but I noticed how this product became something that everyone I know had to something everyone I know warns about.
That's actually a standard on a most waterproof cameras, not just action cameras. Which is a shame, because average joe buys these things on the fact that they can be advertised to go underwater but then get burned when it fails on them during vacation, and know they wonder why they can't get warranty support.
I've always heard that becoming a synonymous name is a bad thing because inferior products become attributed to the company. Say someone buys a shit action-camera. People around think of it as a GoPro. Now, they think GoPros are shit.
Uploaded 16min before my 30min break. Company Man is a life saver
have a good rest of your work day. happy 4th
If you have a 𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒍 job you’re off Friday too
@@ElleBrOw yeah, and maybe he doesn't. f off with that classist nonsense. at your //real// job, does your boss feel you up too?
all jobs are real jobs you diphead.
Owning a GoPro, it took me all of 15 minutes to hate this thing the first time it overheated. They refuse to fix the issue and keep releasing new models while saying there is nothing they can do. Meanwhile, DJI has had the problem be non-existent for a long time now. Why buy something you can't use when other companies have made a competent and not just comparable but superior product for the same or sometimes cheaper price?
Heres the BIG problem with GoPro. Before, I will say this. I have a newer Hero9Black and a Hero3. Ive had the 3 for over 10 years now and it was used as a dash cam. It would run no matter the heat, especially inside the car on a hot summer day.
The new one will shut down in 60 degree weather after about 10 minutes. Im told, I should record 4k. Then dont advertise it as a 4k camera capable of recording hours of footage. It got so bad, that I gave up on using it and now record in my office using a Insta360 bcause it doesn't overheat.
I am so furious with GoPro, because they just forgot about battery overheating issues.
Everything else, would have been fine, so long as it didnt ge the three beeps of death, as you recorded someting you couldnt catch anymore.
I also use a Hero 3 silver as a dash cam. I only have overheating issues if Ieave it in the sun all day and then go to use it. I can't blame it for that.
But I don't see much reason to upgrade, much less every single year. I miy but another 3 or 4 but I don't see a reason to buy a newer one.
Thanks for your post. The only GoPro I’ve owned and used was also a Hero 3, and I’ve been baffled as to why everyone keeps talking about problems. Didn’t realize I owned the one semi-reliable model. 😅
@@davidmcleod5133 I still have it, and it still works. I did finally have to get a battery for it, but one in 10 years now!
One issue it gets, is the button to turn it off or on wont work. The screen will be on, but wont respond. But its easy to take the battery out and force reboot it and its fine, and doesnt affect the recorded stuff.
Image isnt the bst (its a bit low contrast, and night recordings are meh) but for a dashcam it shows license plates. So yeah, I thought that would be the same experience with the newer ones.
I still use the new one too, but not as much. My last episode I had to stop midway and throw the camera in the freezer for about 10 minutes. It melted my peas LOL.
I can rant forever on this. I got all the extensions, the external case so I can plug a different mic (the Rode wireless one), and for 400, I expected better. Batteries for it dont last, and they do that bloating thing where they wont go in or out of the camera itself.
Sorry, really writing a novel here. But hold onto the 3. Those truly were the good ones at their peak!
@@davidmcleod5133ya my hero2 worked great
They are stupid hard to use.
I have a GoPro HD Hero2 that I bought in February 2012 for $280. For more than a decade I used this camera extensively for personal "video notebook" purposes, to document my juggling pattern research ideas for future reference and cataloging, with some curated highlights posted on UA-cam, Facebook, or Instagram. This GoPro still works great and is sitting here on my desk ready for action, although I haven't really used it much in about a year, preferring my phone instead most of the time now. When I purchased it, it was definitely the most convenient way to accomplish what I needed to do - super quick and easy to capture a casual clip. I have probably recorded at least 25,000 videos with it over the years. The durability has been outstanding with the only longevity issue being that I had to replace the original battery 5 years ago since it was failing to hold a charge. Occasionally I thought about upgrading to a newer model, but never had any real motivation to do that. So based on my experience I think it makes a lot of sense that this company has been recently struggling to remain a viable business.
A video about GoPro without mentioning all of the technical problems with their cameras just seems incomplete.
I have a Gopro Hero Black 12, 4k. I use it for filming scenic routes, while I ride on my motorcycle in Romania.
Not at all surprised by this. Once smartphones became the norm it was pretty rare to hear much about GoPro. Usually if I heard about GoPro it was from someone who had purchased one for a specific use case, and even then it was not uncommon to hear of the device not working properly or outright failing. I personally have never owned one and for probably the last 10-15 years have had little to no interest in owning one.
The subscription model is what killed them. Plus their software turned to shit. I still do use GoPro but have their legacy software which works really well. I have a program that unscrambles their crazy filename structure of videos. They never should have done things like that. GoPro screwed GoPro.
I remember when GoPro was big in 2014 and 2015 I think it was the official sponsor of the X Games at one point an other competitions. Now there are other companies that make visor cams now. Wouldn't surprise me if GoPro eventaully folds.
DJI and Insta360 are offering great competing products on the high end, and decent budget action cam options include AKASO and SJCAM.
I never had one but I've watched a few UA-camrs complain about it, especially it over heating. It's a shame a company that's been around this long and they never got their shit together.
And Osmo Action cams became available...☺
He lost his investors money - but - he managed to have enough money for surfing and enough "savings" from the savings gods, together with lots of moolah from the bank of mom and dad. Sorry investors, money gone (into my "savings") carry on...
I bought a used GoPro Hero 7 Black off someone and it functioned exactly as I wanted it to, until I tried doing some skateboard rides with it. Even with 20-25 mph wind, it kept wanting to overheat on me. I thought it was a byproduct of the fact I bought it used, but it turns out, GoPros overheating are a major problem with it. The compact format and the resolution is great, but it seems to be generating a lot of waste heat and cannot dissipate it efficiently enough. Not to mention the sheer amount of proprietary nonsense means that whenever this camera decides to kick the bucket, I'm more than likely gonna go with another company
Funny I heard a UA-camr saying the 7 was the best one, I have the 12 and havnt had a problem yet, I'm happy so far, just not with the price, I had to finance it as I don't have $500, so I'm paying like $50 a month for 10 months or something, I am also disappointed with the battery life, I keep the battery cover off when I'm not in the rain and keep it plugged into my XTAR pbs2l with 2 5000mAh 21700 batteries, that gives me an extra hour or 2
@@digginggopher I have a 7 Silver that is great. The 7 Black constantly overheats.
I had a GoPro 7 Hero black. I bought it with the idea of using it as a camera, but with 4-5 exceptions that didn't happen. It worked great as a hand warmer, as an emotional endurance test but not as a camera. Of all my attempts to connect it to a phone, the only ones that worked were when I didn't need it to happen, but it was a test to see that it was actually possible. Their android app was a complete failure, the camera crashed constantly and had several redundant options that were unusable without an external battery. So were the GPS, voice commands and the hotkey. Just with these options on, the battery was dying before I could even connect to the phone.
I just got a HERO 12. It seems great and I haven’t had any issues. Looking forward to getting some videos on the bike with it!
its excellent
@@michaelbuddy I like mine.
I’ve been using a GoPro 5 (dirt bike riding) for years.
Cons: battery dies quickly, horrible wind noise
Pros: totally reliable, excellent quality in all lighting, only one corrupted file and that was after a crash that had the camera hit the ground pretty hard.
I found a simple fix for the wind noise and it’s been a great camera!
I like to video water sports like rafting and snorkeling. GoPro's were always too expensive.
I found the Olympus TG brand of camera's work fine. Sometimes you do get some clicking noise from them on video, but for the price they are very rugged, waterproof, and easy to use. Uploading files is easy.
Another problem with GoPro is the fact that they launch new models without reducing their older model inventory. To clear that inventory, they sell their previous models at a loss to bring in the newer models. Before bringing a new model on the market, they should wait for the older model to clear the shelves, or reduce their production.
I actually work for a television studio, direct some, DOP for others or simply a camera technician.
The GoPro is a work horse for all those extra shots I need.
-The GoPro 5 is mostly unreliable but I can put it in situations which I fear not for the camera.
-The GoPro 7 tends to overheat but has a better stabilizer, tends to empty the batteries quickly. However, great as a back-up action cam.
-The GoPro10 is the cream of the crop, the stabilization, wide angle, sound and battery life is impressive and is often my main shot in certain conditions (with external mics). I have difficulty finding faults with it unless put under extreme duress.
Having several is epic in any shoot, because they give you so much variety, options and ease of use. I have even used the sound of a GoPro10 as back-up for faulty mics.
Should GoPro step up their game? Absolutely! But I don't see them dying any time soon.
Yo thanks for this review! Real use case
You seriously should try the Hero 12 if you're using it for broadcast. There are a couple of things that are complete game changers for broadcast: 1) 10 bit color.. being able to get so much more out of the color's dynamic range is huge because small sensors like he GoPro have terrible dynamic range. The 10 bit makes a huge difference. 2) log... again, more dynamic range. 3) Full sensor recording. 8:7 mode basically records the entire sensor, allowing you to decide the crop later without losing resolution. Plus, you can pan up and down in post without affecting the resolution if you didn't frame the shot perfectly.
I was an early GoPro user. I knew about the film GoPros when they came out, and bought one every time they came out, but they began screwing over customers. Every time a new version came out they changed the battery, so now you had to buy a whole sst of new batteries to go with the camera, and the most notable differences after awhile boiled down to just slight changes in saturation and white balance. Between the terrible app, the overheating batteries, and price gouging on batteries, I got fed up and switched to the DJI Osmo Action 4. It is an awesome camera that made me forget about GoPro. I still use my 360 Max, but I have no need for GoPro anymore.
The GoPro Max is a surprisingly interesting camera, though its a shame that you can't monitor the camera on a smartphone whilst shooting 360 footage. I guess it hasn't sufficient processing power perhaps? I now have an Insta360 X4 with which I am very pleased, but I'm not sure that when (if) GoPro's new 360 camera is released, whether it could touch the X4. GoPro's subscription service would in addition be the 'No, I'm not going there ever again' decision.
GoPro eats video files.
I’m a full time videographer and though I love the use of my GoPro, I do only use it for limited stuff. It’s the perfect answer for underwater shots, action shots, unique perspectives where I can just hide it in a corner, but 90% of the time my work doesn’t need it. When I’m out adventuring in some way, I take it every time! It’s small, it’s convenient, it’s great. But outside of any type of adventure stuff I do, I typically don’t use it
I owned a gopro when I was younger, and then I was thinking about upgrading a couple years ago. But then I saw cheap ones on amazon for like $80, 4k 30fps, waterproof. Basically gopros, but cheaper. Decided to take a chance and buy one, since I knew I could return it if it wasn't good. I still have, and its honestly better than a gopro.
drop a link homie
@@skully_8500they're all over and cheaper now
I own multiple GoPros and have learned that, like everything, there's a learning curve.
You can't just pick one up and immediately start shooting. In that situation, it will overheat.
You need to go and adjust your settings to prevent this. Primarily, set a manual shutter speed!
It will automatically set a high shutter speed which makes your videos jittery, takes um much more storage space, kills the battery faster, and overheats the camera.
Bought GoPro 12 to replace my dslr to shoot my short films. The quality is really superior for the price point. The camera stabilization is next level. Has add ons for lights, mics and a lens hood. Shot 2 projects and so far and very pleased with the footage. Light weight too.
gopros are really great and have been hitting the limits of what's pssible across all cameras. I want them to stay relevent and compete on a few areas against DJI and insta. GoPro certainly can and people do prefer GoPro for some things. Problem of a lot of it has been people's demand for more and more video processing, resolution and also demanding lighter weight, and better temp mgmt. All these things are very hard problems and Sony also struggles with them. But DJI has also competed with gopro just on having simple magnetic hook connections, solving what 3rd parties were doing for GoPro and in some cases not even as good. Quick swaps of locations is very important as these cameras can be used for lifestyle recording. A good UI and swappable locations is important there. from chest to selfie stick to tripod to pack strap to dock etc.
The downside of the 12 is that they removed the GPS module in a cheap effort to hide the overheating issue. It may be ok for static videos, but not having GPS killed their usefulness for sports use, especially motorsports.
@@jamessloanofficial How? I never use the GPS on mine and they still overheat.
Being a band kid in high school, the biggest thing I think about when I think of GoPro is using them as a headcam to record your POV while performing a marching band show. Those are very cool, and far and away was the biggest reason why I wanted one in high school even when smart phone cameras were getting really good.
There are much better options now, I use a DJI osmos 4 and it doesn’t have the overheating issues that GoPros have
DJI makes incredible cameras, but to be fair, the "not overheating" is partially because the Action4 only shoots less than half the resolution of a Hero11 / Hero12
@@BayAreaMotorcycleCommuting What is the max resolution of a Hero 11/12?
@@b.griffin317 5312 x 4648 - an 8:7 aspect ratio with 24,690,176 pixels. Osmo Action 4 is 3840 x 2880, a 4:3 aspect ratio with only 11,059,200 pixels. Obviously sheer pixel count isn't everything, but that's a pretty significant difference
Why would you buy from a chinese company? They're probably sending all your data back to China.
@@BayAreaMotorcycleCommutingNot really, 4k will use 8.3mp no matter the camera resolution and the dji action has a bigger sensor so it should overheat even faster
While I've never actually used a GoPro, every comment I've ever heard about them over the past few years seems to point to one major culprit: Focusing on features over quality. It's so common in the tech sphere these days, where they're so desperate to have bullet-points that they completely abandon the user experience, and people move away from them because they're just so miserable to use.
I have one of GoPro's main competitors: DJI Osmo Action 3. Heard some bad review on GoPros (newer models have overheat problems) and went with the Osmo instead. Couldn't have made a better decision.
I had one. As other have said, mine would overheat and stop recording and I wouldn't know until much later. I had been experimenting with the time lapse feature and captured some great footage of some road trips and building lego kits with my son. I liked the Quik software which produced some great footage of those lego builds which took several days. They really made it easy. Pick your clips, pick some music and *poof* you have a video memory. I still use it occasionally to grab short videos.
The overheating issue soured me on action cameras and reviews of subsequent models I looked into show that this is still a problem. You can't sell a 5K video camera and tell people to use lower resolutions and turn off stabilization so it doesn't overheat.
You can spend a fraction of the price on something that works just as well
There's TONS of choices out there now...
I use it for almost all videos and some pics!!! Vacations, action family events. I have had no problems with overheating with the Hero 12.
If they could make a camera that didn't overheat they would do a lot better
I found I can remove the battery and run my GP11 from a pocket lithium battery via USB-C cable and it solved the overheating problem more than once. Think I was shooting 60p 4K
Hope this helps
The GoPro is mounted on a Volta 1 stick but I leave the lead to dangle because my copy of the Volta 1 barely holds any charge and the controls are meh.
Disclaimer: I am a 70 year-old codger
This might be the right place to ask. I have the newest GoPro, 1st time ever buying. I use it to record videos but also have the app to use it as a webcam. However, the app won’t even open anymore. I’ve read there are many problems with the app just not openly. I’ve done several trouble shooting steps but no idea where to go from here. And I don’t think I even care to try to use it anymore. Is anyone able to suggest help for me?
GoPro really missed out not making a competitive drone. And even then, I feel like the market has stagnated. What they should’ve done is gotten into surveillance (home and commercial) and police body cams.
Yeah, it seems like they really squandered their brief moment of dominating their market, and couldn’t pivot before the competition improved and surpassed them. It’s easy to be critical in hindsight, of course.
Some years ago I was planning a microbudget movie, and thought about using a GoPro for the primary camera since it would be small and could fit anywhere, had anti-shake technology and would be able to do some planned underwater shots. But the reviews I read indicated that it would create a fisheye distortion, which you needed to take extra steps to undo. So I began to look for something else with better image quality.
GoPro now has competition from DJI, Insta360 and smartphones. GoPro is not Kleenex, most people just call them 'action cams" or "action cameras". I have 6 different Hero cams and an Insta360 X3. I do like the 360 camera and GoPro needs an update to their Max 360 camera since it was released almost 5 years ago.
A gopro and anything similar is just a waste of money. Smartphone cameras are super good now,
@@Warp2090I'm not using a smartphone mountain biking, surfing or paddleboarding.
@@netposerx you can get waterproof cases that will protect your phone and make it waterproof, and you can get hand things to hold it
@@Warp2090if video quality was the only thing people were considering, nobody would have ever bought a GoPro in the first place
@@Warp2090i think you miss the point of what this camera is used for.
I don't know how many people here have gopros themselves, but I've clocked over 500 hours on my Hero 9 and Hero 11 without overheating, loosing or corrupted files.
So personally I like these cameras, they're awesome for what they are. 350$ for a proper tanky action cam is totally worth it.
Hearing you say things like "it ended up being an embarassing waste of time and money" in that trademark company man tone is hilarious to me.
Also, I love seeing companies get what they deserve for being greedy.
As a freestyle drone guy, you cant beat a used $30 gopro hero4. The 1080 and 2.7k options look surprisingly good even today and you don't have to worry about losing an expensive camera. Little known fact about the hero 3&4 is that It also has analog pass-through so you can use the gopro as your fpv cam if you didn't want to run 2 separate cameras on your quad.
I've heard from many sources that the gopro is crap. The software sucks and the camera itself is a lemon. Overheating, shutting off randomly, not uploading right, not charging and the list goes on. the other issue is buying one because you think you're gonna use it but then don't which is something a lot of us do. I never owned one due to the horror stories I heard about them. Not that I had any use for one to begin with.
Yup them releasing model after model with issue after issue just slowly killed my interest in owning one. Used to dream of upgrading from my knock off to a real GoPro but at this point no thanks.
@@NiSE_Rafter The confusing array of models certainly didn't help with marketing them to a wider market, I looked at buying one a while back and found researching which one I wanted tedious. It took so long that, combined with reports of quality issues with some models, I simply talked myself out of it.
I bought a GoPro in 2016 or 2017. I’m really into skiing so I wanted to use it for ski strips to record what I did. I don’t remember the model, but I remember it was overtly complex to use. They had an app, but you couldn’t use that app without cell service, you can see how that would become an issue. So you just had to manually try and get it to record, and when it’s pouring snow and freezing out that becomes hard. I had it attached to my helmet and I could never get it to actually work except a couple times. I immediately sold that thing.
Back then you used to see tons of people on the slopes with those things attached to their helmets or on a stick. Now you never see them, people have gone back to using a cameraman, but now the camera man uses the competing brands usually.
I touched one once, and was so confused. As a 20 year old who’s grown up with almost every new age technology, there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to work a basic camera meant for athletes. Especially when I’m a videographer! It genuinely felt like they were tryna make me not use it. They’d be doing very well if they actually made the product intuitively rather than focus simply on durability and accessories.
I have a GoPro Hero 9 and one of my favorite parts about it is honestly just being able to take pictures and videos in a way that doesn't fill up my phone storage or use it's battery. It's a fairly insignificant use I recognize, if I don't think a video is worth using my phone storage for, is it worth having that video? But I enjoy the option and the pictures and videos I do want to share, I can put on my phone later.
Damn. I wondered if the fad would last.
People are still buying action cameras just not gopro
Good analysis.... also competition, as you touched on DJI for example .
I feel like the drone industry kill GoPro
I used to use my Hero9 for shooting train videos, but it had issues with overheating, shutting off spontaneously, corrupted files, and buttons that had to be pushed hard and held. I had planned to keep it as a backup after purchasing my EOS camera, but three months later, the GoPro memory chip completely freaked out on me, and hasn't worked at all ever since, even with a new chip. Also, the file sizes are huge, and relatively difficult to work with.
Always look forward to your work from Canberra AU.
Yep, so many alternatives now - I have a Goo-Pro lol.
Why are we up so late/early 😂
I agree with all the comments here. My experience is I got one several years ago (2 actually) for motorcycle vlogging, but suffered from overheating, crashing, and a workflow that wasn't easy to manage. I also felt no need to upgrade, and with annual releases, it felt like I was trapped, so I sold what I had and moved on to cheaper, more stable options that offered more. And that last point is why it's tough with GoPro these days, too narrow of a market, and too much good competition.
What I find annoying about GoPro footage is the barrel distortion.
*You want to know why we stopped using them? Because they OVERHEAT in under 10 minutes in a temperature controlled environment without direct sunlight. Absolutely ridiculous.*
They overheat in a snowbank in January in -20. Then they say the battery is too cold.
It seems every visionary, self-made, techbro always starts off with a loan of a few million dollars from their parents.
? The gopro ceo got outside investments. It's stated in the video itself.
@@lpnp9477 4:52
I have always use my GoPro for skiing, hiking, fishing. Now my kids are old enough, I tie it to dugouts and live stream our baseball games for families outside of the area to watch. Thanks to their feedback, we have fine tuned it to the point we make pretty good quality videos shared around the world for free. We get grandparents, relatives, even deployed soldiers who can watch these kiddos play ball!