2. Shooting Video

Drones make it possible for amateur filmmakers to get aerial shots sans helicopter. This is enabling things that the general population was never able to experience, at the same time cutting costs off of aerial photography in a huge way. Call it Zen and the Art of Helicopter Maintenance.

All you have to do is take a look at YouTube and see all the incredible videos being taken by amateur videographers — like this 4K drone video in Hawaii:

3. Law Enforcement and War

As you can imagine the impact of low cost drones on law enforcement is simply revolutionary. If you’d like to see in depth how drones are being used by law enforcement today check out this great infographic put together by Dronefly with 6 ways drones are being used by law enforcement. There are some really interesting use cases for drones in law enforcement. In a nutshell, law enforcement is currently only approved for peaceful use of drones, meaning no use of force.

Then there’s war… the dark side of drones. We won’t go too far into how drones are being used to stalk and murder people in the military because quite honestly that’s been well covered in the media and pretty depressing. Let’s just say there are things flying in the that can kill you where you are at almost any moment — like the up to 804 innocent civilians that were killed during the 8 years of Obama’s presidency (not a political statement — just the facts of how the times are changing).

4. Drone Racing

Drone racing using first person cameras and a set of VR goggles is the good clean fun way of modifying drones. You can get a really good first person view (FPV) racing drone on Amazon for a just a few hundred dollars. Why can’t I be a kid growing up now??

5. Surveillance Drones

In combat and in regular life drones are used to monitor things, people and places. FAA regulation limits the true range of drone usage in business surveillance. State surveillance of citizens does not rely as heavily on drones. Some have use in specific situations such as during protests or other large events. One of the most extreme publicly acknowledged surveillance drones we’ve seen is the British Black Hornet Nano UAV:

6. Agriculture

Agriculture is the drone application that I’m most optimistic about.. A birds eye view of land using an array of cameras can offer farmers ways to track and monitor conditions. 3D mapping can increase effective use of resources like water and fertilizers. And most recently there’s this completely earth shattering DJI MG-1S fertilizer drone being used by Zhu Hualiang:

7. Hunting hurricanes with drones

NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and Northrop Grumman hope to track storms as they evolve using drones. The Global Hawk will be able to fly for 30 hours straight, covering as much as 11,000 miles in that time. Swarm technology is also used in climate science. A team from the University of Florida is using drones only six inches long to form a swarm which move within the storm. The complex data collected as they go and helps to model complex flows.


Not long ago we witnessed the impact of what drones can do during a hurricane disaster with Hurricane Harvey. The relief and data collection that drones can provide during a natural disaster is unprecedented. When roads are blocked even to boats there’s no option but to approach by air — and hurricane winds are incredibly dangerous to helicopter crew.

Even critical infrastructure like telecommunications were revived by drones during Hurricane Harvey. What we’re seeing is bird-like mobility with the precision and quality video footage of a movie studio all at the cost of an operator — and who knows how long we’ll need those.

While cost isn’t really a concern during when so many lives are at stake, it is great to know that for the $24,475 cost of one single hour in a military helicopter, we could have Predator drones in the air at $3,679 per hour. But that’s insane, natural disasters don’t need Predators, wars do. The reality of it is we can now send out a swarm of practically unlimited high-end consumer drones for just the cost of a pilot — if they aren’t volunteering their time during such a disaster.

Do you have a novel use for drones to add to this list? Send us a message with your suggestions!