DJIs latest power station is proof that good things come in mini packages

As an avid vanlifer, I have to carefully curate everything I carry in order to eke out every square inch of storage I can to support life off the grid for weeks at a time. That’s why I jumped at the chance to review DJI’s latest power station.

The DJI Power 1000 Mini is almost half the size of the original DJI Power 1000 released two years ago with the same 1kWh battery capacity. And from my calculations, it’s also the smallest 1kWh power station from the major brands that money can currently buy.

DJI’s little power station also has a few tricks up its sleeve, including a built-in retractable USB-C cable, a light that can be controlled remotely, an integrated MPPT controller that turns it into a solar generator, and the option to fast-charge off my van’s alternator when wired up to the starter battery. Hoozah!

I found myself using the little DJI power station far more than expected in my two months of testing, despite traveling with a giant 8kWh battery system. The Power 1000 Mini is so small that I don’t hesitate to grab it whenever I need to power a projector for an outdoor movie night, keep my Starlink Mini internet running in a field, or power an air compressor to inflate my tires after leaving a sandy beach.

The €579 / £449 Power 1000 Mini’s diminutive size does come with a few tradeoffs — dongles, ugh! — but I think DJI has struck an excellent balance between portability, versatility, and power.

Right now, it’s unclear if it’ll get approved for sale in the US because “the application for authorization is still pending,” according to DJI spokesperson Daisy Kong.

Most people still think of DJI as a drone company, but the Chinese tech giant has branched out into several product categories, where it’s introduced real innovation. For example, the incredibly small and powerful Avinox e-bike drive system it developed has radically transformed what mountain bikers expect in terms of performance.

Similarly, the DJI Power 1000 Mini resets expectations about how large a 1kWh power station should be. Just look at how it stacks up to the competition.

Despite shrinking the footprint, DJI couldn’t do much with the weight, but most of that can be attributed to the industry settling on long-lasting LFP batteries.

Some of DJI’s space savings are the result of using a less powerful inverter. On paper, DJI says the Power 1000 Mini can produce a continuous 800W of AC output (with a 1000W peak). That’s enough to power appliances like a small microwave or Instant Pot, but not a hair dryer set to max or power tools at a job site. For comparison, EcoFlow’s 1kWh Delta 2 and Anker’s Solix C1000 both offer 1800W of continuous output.

In my testing, the Power 1000 Mini could power my 800W water boiler and, surprisingly, even my Nespresso coffee machine, which can briefly pull as much as 1200W. But it can’t power them simultaneously unless the power station is plugged into an AC wall jack. Then its bypass mode kicks in to deliver as much as 2200W of output to my 240V European model, which drops to 1440W for 120V US models.

Whenever I exceeded its maximums, the Power 1000 Mini shut down gracefully with an “overload” message on the display, and a more detailed error report in the DJI Home app. It cleared with a simple on/off toggle of the power station.

DJI’s power station also saves space by relying upon an SDC (Smart DC) connector to add I/O to the unit. By plugging in a variety of dongles, the SDC port can transform into a 12V barrel jack output or an MC4 connector for up to 400W of solar panel input.

Uniquely, DJI also sells an SDC Power Car Battery Charging Cable that you can snake up to your car’s starter battery to charge the Power 1000 Mini at up to 400W while driving. That’s over three times faster than charging off your car’s 12V cigarette lighter socket, meaning you can take the Power 1000 Mini from empty to full in just over two hours of driving. I did not have an opportunity to test this.

Naturally, this DJI battery also offers several proprietary SDC adapters that will charge DJI’s drones faster than any other power station on the market. If you’re already big into DJI gear then getting one of their power stations is pretty much a no-brainer.

One of the best features of the Power 1000 Mini is the integrated 100W USB-C cable that retracts with a tug and magnetically folds into place. I like that it’s long enough to reach a table top when the power station is on the ground. I dislike that it, and the unit’s integrated USB-C jack, don’t support 140W like DJI’s original Power 1000. Fortunately, both USB-C jacks are bidirectional, so they can also be used to charge the mini DJI battery.

Power stations have had lights integrated since forever, and can be very useful at the end of an all-day shoot when you’re trying to pack up. I like that I can remotely trigger it from the app while I’m still in bed. That way I can illuminate the van just enough for a little late-night spelunking while my wife is asleep.

I gotta say, I wasn’t expecting a 1kWh battery to be so useful while traveling around southern Europe over the last several weeks. I’ve used many similarly specced power stations before, but their size never made it a grab-and-go device, causing me to carry a few smaller, but very capable, power banks instead. DJI’s Power 1000 Mini changes the equation for me, and anyone else that values portability and adaptability over raw power.

Photography by Thomas Ricker / The Verge