With DJI closing in step by step, Insta360 decides to "change its line of business".
In the second half of 2025, a tech company that knows how to stir things up has emerged.
First, founder Liu Jingkang was heavily criticized by netizens for "throwing money from a high place," being labeled as "materialistic." Then, he secretly insinuated in his WeChat Moments that DJI was monopolizing the market. Insta360 always manages to make it onto the hot search and the front pages of major news platforms in various ways.
Just last week, Insta360 came up with something new.
On November 12th, Insta360 launched the "Imaging Master Package" for its Ace Pro 2 action camera, which includes three sets: the "Fun Shooting Package," the "Limited Edition of the Imaging Master Package," and the "All - in - One Edition of the Imaging Master Package."
To put it simply, it adds various types of imaging accessories such as optical lens sets, street - shooting handles, and replaceable filters to its Ace Pro 2 action camera, enhancing the product's playability.
However, the most talked - about one is the "Fun Shooting Package." In addition to the street - shooting handle, it also comes with a small printer that can immediately print photos. With the combination of these two accessories, the Ace Pro 2, originally an action camera, has transformed into a "Polaroid."
Naturally, the popularity of the product has also brought about controversy. A digital blogger with nearly 400,000 followers on Weibo directly criticized it as the "stupidest product of 2025."
Is the Insta360 Ace Pro 2 really that bad that it deserves the label of "the stupidest of 2025"? Is this product a great innovation worthy of praise or a bad idea that should be criticized?
Standing on the Shoulders of Giants
From past experience, it's not uncommon to turn a product into a "Polaroid" by adding accessories. However, it's the first time this has been done in the action camera field.
In the entire fun - shooting package, the mini portable printer is the soul.
Firstly, it makes the product's appearance more similar to a traditional Polaroid, naturally carrying emotional value. Secondly, it gives the Insta360 Ace Pro 2 the most core function of traditional instant - imaging products: the ability to immediately print a physical photo after taking a picture.
The value brought by instant printing cannot be provided by a simple action camera.
For example, digital photos often get buried in the phone's photo album, while physical photos can be treasured, displayed, and pasted in diaries or on the walls of rooms, meeting the young people's need to fight against "digital nihilism" and turning the images composed of 0s and 1s back into tangible and preservable physical memories.
In addition, the printed physical photos have a natural "film feel." The grain, grayscale, and slight color cast brought by paper development, these imperfections actually constitute a unique "flawed beauty," making the picture more textured and closer to the original charm of a Polaroid.
This irreversibility unique to instant imaging seals the current moment, bringing a stronger sense of psychological satisfaction.
However, Insta360's "transformation" is not limited to the Polaroid approach. It also wants to pursue a more literary and textured tone.
Insta360 has a collaboration with Leica. Naturally, the Ace Pro 2 inherits the Leica color and Leica watermark from the collaboration and can directly use Leica's color and style.
With the support of digital filters, the Insta360 Ace Pro 2, an action camera, can also take photos with a strong "German flavor": a "documentary texture" featuring high contrast, a sense of hierarchy, and warm - toned colors.
So, to some extent, the Insta360 Ace Pro 2 fun - shooting package is a great idea.
Its essence is a combination of the retro appearance of a Polaroid, the instant - printing experience, and filters with authoritative endorsement. These changes aim to transform the Ace Pro 2 from an "action camera" into an "emotional camera," precisely targeting the consumption needs of young women.
Why are young women worth Insta360's full efforts? The Polaroid market has already given the answer.
In recent years, the Polaroid and instant - printing industry has witnessed explosive growth due to the popularity among young women, forming a market scale of tens of billions and triggering a continuous consumption boom.
In the 2023 - 2024 fiscal year, the sales of Fujifilm's instax series of Polaroids reached 150 billion yen (nearly 7 billion RMB), a three - fold increase year - on - year. The original price of Fujifilm's mini photo paper, about 4 yuan per sheet, was hyped to 6 - 7 yuan per sheet in the secondary market, and it could only be purchased with peripheral products or under purchase restrictions.
How popular Polaroids are can be seen on Xiaohongshu. The topic #Polaroid on the platform has been viewed over 23 million times. Users spontaneously share shooting skills and ways to transform failed photos. Now, owning a Polaroid has become a status symbol for "fashionable young people."
Riding on this strong wave, the portable shooting package launched with Xiaomi Mix Flip was also a great success. The Xiaomi Pocket Photo Printer 1S priced at 499 yuan, along with the connected leather bag and ZINK photo paper, sold like hotcakes. More than 200,000 people made reservations as soon as it was launched, making it a phenomenal hit accessory.
In fact, although the other two packages launched by Insta360 this time, the Limited Edition and the All - in - One Edition of the Imaging Master Package, are not as popular as the fun - shooting package, the design ideas of the accessories, such as black - soft filters and replaceable optical lenses, show that Insta360, which focuses on "extreme sports" and "hardcore technology," is trying every means to attract more female consumers.
However, why did Insta360, which has always presented itself with hard technology and a "macho style," suddenly make a turn? Ultimately, it's all because of DJI.
Forced to Change Direction
Netizens who love gossip must have noticed that since Insta360 successfully went public in June this year, whether it's media reports or online discussions, wherever Insta360 appears, DJI and the performance comparison between the two companies are always mentioned.
Also starting from June this year, the two companies, which used to stay out of each other's way, began to have intersections in their product lines. Especially after DJI, a leading domestic tech company, announced its high - profile entry into the panoramic camera market, many people were worried about Insta360.
After all, DJI's strategy is to be both like Xiaomi and Apple:
It not only masters core technologies like Apple to create professional - grade products and builds a reliable, top - notch, and professional technical image in consumers' minds. It also, like Xiaomi, actively lowers the price and uses a cost - effective approach to quickly increase product sales.
Unsurprisingly, DJI won again.
According to data from Jiuqian Middle Platform, since DJI entered the panoramic camera market, Insta360's market share has been rapidly eroded. It dropped sharply from 85% - 92% in the second quarter to 49% in the third quarter. The Osmo 360 captured 43% of the global market share within just three months of its launch, showing terrifying customer - grabbing ability.
DJI came prepared. When the Osmo 360 was launched, it was priced at 2,999 yuan, 800 yuan cheaper than Insta360's flagship X5. After the national subsidy, it was as low as 2,197 yuan, directly delivering a dimensionality - reduction blow in terms of price.
In contrast, in the action camera market, the Insta360 Ace Pro 2, which was supposed to compete with DJI's Osmo Action 5, ended up in the dilemma of "winning in parameters but losing in the market."
Although both have a 1/1.3 - inch sensor, Insta360 has a 50 - megapixel main camera and supports a higher video recording specification of 8K/30fps. However, in the face of DJI's established mature ecosystem and industry status, it failed to make much of an impact.
Just last week, DJI also launched the new Osmo Action 6, using a variable aperture and a 1/1.11 - inch large - size sensor, raising the ceiling of this product category again.
Facing such an unfavorable situation, Insta360 is no match for DJI if it goes head - to - head. With no chance of winning in terms of hard power, Insta360 has to find another way.
Precisely because Insta360 needs to find a new path and open up a second growth curve, it created the Ace Pro 2 fun - shooting package with the same appearance as a Polaroid and an instant - printing function, targeting the female market with inherent emotional premium, social fission, and high repurchase rate.
But will things really go so smoothly?
A Do - or - Die Battle
As mentioned at the beginning, some digital bloggers look down on this product.
Such a strong reaction is understandable. After all, from the most core definition of an action camera, "sports," the fun - shooting package of the Ace Pro 2 is, to some extent, a "bad idea": it's not a product very suitable for static shooting.
Firstly, the Ace Pro 2 has only one camera, and it's a wide - angle lens with a 157° field of view. What does this mean? Most smartphones' ultra - wide - angle lenses don't exceed 130°, and the Ace Pro 2's lens is much wider.
Imagine what it's like to always take photos with a smartphone's ultra - wide - angle lens: distorted images, unnatural perspective, and crooked edges of the picture. Even if you can narrow the field of view by zooming in, it's essentially just digital cropping, and the image quality will also decline... The Ace Pro 2 is exactly the same.
In addition, to be able to focus at any time, action cameras use a "pan - focus" design. In actual shooting experience, this means it's difficult to blur the background when shooting portraits and impossible to highlight the subject when shooting close - ups of products or scenery. There's no distinction between the foreground and background, and no sense of hierarchy.
The above shortcomings make the final photos taken by many users far from the "textured photos" they see on Xiaohongshu.
What's even more fatal is that all operations, including composition, parameter adjustment, and mode switching, can only be done on the Ace Pro 2's 2.5 - inch flip - touch screen. It's really a torture to operate precisely on such a small screen.
Originally, when action cameras were designed, the need for users to frequently operate the touch screen was not considered, as videos are usually automatically recorded. Now, after being "forced" to be used as a static - shooting camera, the experience is naturally not good.
Finally, the high price makes the future of Insta360's "new attempt" even more uncertain.
The core reason for the success of the Xiaomi Mix Flip portable shooting set is that the whole set costs only 499 yuan. However, the Insta360 Ace Pro 2's single body costs just over 2,000 yuan at the lowest. Now, to buy a street - shooting handle + a portable printer, the price has to be increased to 4,099 yuan.
Although female consumers are generous, emotional, and sometimes a bit impulsive, it's a bit naive to expect them to pay an extra 2,000 yuan just for "emotional value."
Don't you see that the Fujifilm X - Half half - frame camera, which features a retro style and knows how to play on female emotions, has long failed.
The failure of that product shows that products with only sentiment but no practical value are difficult to succeed in this era.
Now, we're already looking forward to the sales data of the Ace Pro 2 fun - shooting package.
This article is from the WeChat official account "Blue Word Plan," author: Hayward. It is published by 36Kr with authorization.