GoPro Mission 1 Pro Review

Design and Build Quality

• 207g, waterproof to 20m without a case
• Point-and-Shoot Grip accessory: £89.99 (£44.99 for GoPro subscribers)
• Three mounting options included: fingers, tripod thread, magnetic latch

Given the size of its sensor, the Mission 1 Pro isn’t nearly as large as I’d expected it to be. That said, it is noticeably bigger and heavier than a GoPro Hero13 Black, a DJI Osmo Action 6 or an Insta360 Ace Pro 2, and its lens protrudes out a fair way compared with any of those rivals. 

Still, it’s small and light enough to mount in pretty much all the usual spots you’d stick an action camera. The one place I probably wouldn’t want to put it is on my head. Unless it’s bolted to a proper helmet, the Mission 1 Pro feels a bit too heavy to wear comfortably.

It’s reassuringly tough, of course. It’s waterproof to 20m without needing a housing, which is double what the Hero13 Black can manage, comfortably ahead of the Ace Pro 2’s 12m, and a match for the Osmo Action 6. GoPro has built a small drain into the side of the camera specifically to help water escape after a dunking.

The buttons are a highlight, too. They’re chunky, well-sized and easy to find by feel alone, even with wet or gloved hands.

Versatility is one area the Mission 1 Pro really earns its keep. During my week of testing I mounted it on the roof, body and windscreen of my car (using suction cups from SmallRig), put it on my bike’s handlebars and screwed it onto a selfie stick for vlogging, and it handled all of them without complaint. It’s a GoPro, after all, and between the mounting fingers, standard tripod thread and magnetic latch mount it has on board, there’s very little you can’t attach it to.

Then there’s the Point-and-Shoot Grip optional accessory, which feels pretty much essential if you’re planning to use the Mission 1 Pro for still photography.

It does add bulk, but in return you get extra protection, a proper handle to wrap your fingers around (complete with a tripod mount), and a cold shoe on top for microphones, LEDs and similar accessories. It comes with a wrist strap, though at £90 I’d have expected a neck strap in the box too, especially given the loops for one are already built in.

My one gripe is the shutter button itself, which is too limp to come close to replicating the snap of a proper point-and-shoot camera. 

Performance

• Touchscreen-based UI and Quik mobile app compatibility
• Around 90 minutes of 8K/30fps recording on a full charge
• Recorded continuously for 85 minutes before overheating

The touchscreen UI is slick and easy to get to grips with, particularly if you’ve spent time with other recent GoPros. I also put the Quik app’s remote control features through their paces, triggering recording from inside my car while the camera itself was mounted outside, which worked a treat.

That being said, the app keeps a lot of its more useful features behind a subscription paywall and doesn’t stop nudging you to buy in, which grates given the Mission 1 Pro’s already premium price tag. It’s a decent app rather than a great one, overall: for example, footage shot in GP-Log2 can’t be graded within the app at all, so you’re reliant on desktop software regardless.

Battery life is respectable rather than outstanding. The 2150mAh Enduro 2 cell (also compatible with the Hero13 Black, handily) delivered around 90 minutes of continuous 8K/30fps recording in 4:3 format, or 100 minutes at 4K/60fps, in my real-world testing. It’s worth noting that’s with the camera’s built-in GPS switched off; leave it on and I’d expect that runtime to drop noticeably.

Thermal performance is impressive, too. GoPros have a bit of a reputation for overheating during sustained high-resolution recording, but even in warm summer weather, with the camera left stationary and shooting continuously, I managed to burn through almost an entire battery’s worth of 8K footage, only for the camera to eventually shut down with 5% left on the clock. GoPro says it shouldn’t overheat at all in normal conditions with decent airflow, and on this evidence, I believe that claim.

There’s no built-in storage here, which is a standard GoPro trait. You’ll have to use a microSD card instead.

Image Quality

• 8K Open Gate (4:3) capture using entire sensor surface
• Slo-mo up to 960fps at 1080p via Burst Slo-Mo
• 50MP RAW stills, but only at 14mm-equivalent field of view

This is where the Mission 1 Pro goes a long way towards justifying its retail price. The ability to record using the whole sensor, in 4:3 format at 8K, will appeal to creators who’d rather shoot once and crop selectively afterwards, whether that’s down to 16:9 for YouTube or 9:16 for Reels and TikTok. And truly, it does provide enormous room to reframe in post. Just be aware that the 8K files are massive, if you’re tight on storage you might need to invest in a fast external SSD or similar.

I shot 8K and 4K video footage in GP-Log2 at a high bit rate throughout, then used GoPro’s own LUTs in DaVinci Resolve to grade and correct. Even with my fairly modest editing skills, I was able to pull some genuinely gorgeous, cinematic-looking footage out of it – footage that wouldn’t look out of place from cameras costing considerably more.

Traditionally, low light has been GoPro’s Achilles’ heel, but not here. This is the first GoPro I’ve tested that I’d be happy reaching for after dark, although it still pays to be careful with your settings and execution if you want the cleanest results. In my view it beats both the Ace Pro 2 and the Osmo Action 6 after the sun goes down, which is a big win for GoPro given how far behind it’s previously been in this area.

Slo-mo is similarly impressive, with a wide range of speeds on offer, including a super-fast burst mode capable of 960fps (albeit capped at 1080p). And image stabilisation remains a huge strength, as you’d expect. GoPro probably makes the best in the business, and it shows here: wander around with this on a selfie stick and the resulting footage looks like it’s come off a gimbal-mounted camera.

The Mission 1 Pro is not without flaws, though, and the biggest one is the minimum focus distance of 60cm on the stock lens – a consequence of that larger sensor. Sharp close-ups simply aren’t possible here, and even handheld self-shooting with a stick or handle becomes tricky if you’re not blessed with long arms. There’s currently no official macro or vlog lens mod to fix this either, so anyone considering the Mission 1 Pro for vlogging or similar close-range work needs to go in with eyes open.

And as a stills camera, it still has some growing up to do. Yes, you can shoot 50MP RAW files, but only at the ultra-wide setting; switch to any other field of view and you’re limited to JPEG. The lens also isn’t as sharp as I’d like, which really undercuts one of the camera’s headline attractions: the ability to crop deep into those big 50MP photos.

Should you buy it?