It’s been a bit of a troubled path for DJI’s iOS MSDK development team of late, but now the drone maker has clarified it will no longer support the development of third-party apps for Apple devices. Instead, DJI is urging businesses to switch to Google’s Android platform for app development.
The DJI MSDK is a software development kit that gives developers ready access to the inherent capabilities of the tech giant’s drones. It simplifies the application development process by taking care of lower-level functionalities such as flight stabilization, battery management, signal transmission, and communication. This way, third-party developers, such as Litchi and Maven, can straightaway focus on the application the drone is being integrated into, without worrying about the nitty-gritty of robotics and embedded systems.
DJI has stopped adding new drones to the iOS MSDK for a while now. The Mini 3 and Mini 3 Pro drones, for instance, received only Android MSDK support. So, it wasn’t a complete surprise when the company announced it was moving away from iOS. But what was surprising was that DJI made a post-dated announcement of the event. Also, in addition to the iOS SDK, DJI explained it was no longer supporting Windows SDK and Onboard SDK either.
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Here’s the notice that DJI put out on Nov. 29:
In order to continue providing you with a better development experience and technical support services, DJI will now stop updating certain SDKs. After the update is stopped, the corresponding SDKs will no longer release new versions and will no longer accept new MFi applications. Technical support services will not be affected. At the same time, we recommend that you use the alternative solutions we recommend for development.
| SDK type | Last date for updates | Alternative solution |
| iOS SDK | November 24, 2023 | We recommend developing mobile applications based on the Android SDK |
| Windows SDK | November 24, 2023 | No alternative solution available. You can choose to develop using the mobile SDK or cloud API based on your application scenario |
| Onboard SDK | November 24, 2023 | We recommend developing onboard applications based on the Payload SDK. The functionality of the Onboard SDK has been integrated into the Payload SDK |
DJI will continue to provide you with higher-quality products and better services. Thank you again for your concern and support. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact our developer technical support.
To be clear, this development only affects third-party flight planning and drone management apps such as DroneDeploy and Drone Harmony. DJI’s in-house flight app for iOS devices, DJI Fly, continues to be available on the Apple App Store.
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