Beyond the desk and fancy backdrop of the average TV studio broadcast, there are a set of giant cameras, each with a technician behind it, panning to follow movements on stage. In the era of everyone-as-a-broadcaster, OBSBot’s Tail Air offers a way to achieve a bit of that high production value without the high production crew price tag.
In contrast to professional studio settings, those of us doing small-scale streaming or filming have typically contented ourselves with a fixed webcam on our desk or a mirrorless camera on a tripod. No panning or zooming on the action, but — mercifully, on tiny budgets — no crew to hire.
OBSBot, in particular, burst onto the scene with a Kickstarter campaign back in 2019 with an intriguing pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) camera called the Tail. The Tail Air represents the most direct successor to their initial effort, after the company released a whole series of smaller PTZ and non-PTZ web cams. While the shinier Tail 2 we looked at earlier this year gets most of the attention these days, the Tail Air’s lower price keeps it accessible to the small-scale user.
A disclosure up front because of the unusual way I was able to spend time with this camera. The PR firm representing OBSBot reached out to Open for Business to give us prerelease access to the Tail Air, as is common industry practice, but the press agent subsequently went silent and never provided the promised access. Meanwhile, since my church and I had purchased a couple of OBSBot Tiny cameras years ago, the company’s “user liaison” offered my church an OBSBot Tail Air to use as part of developing a case study for their marketing efforts. My access to the Tail Air comes from working at the church on that camera. OBSBot was neither expecting nor aware of the possibility it could result in a review on these pages as part of that process, which was completed months ago. Like all OFB reviews, this one is part of our independent lab process.
PTZ cameras represent a happy compromise for small-scale content producers, “creators,” small businesses, small churches and others who can’t afford a staff of camera people running the equipment. The camera sits unmanned on a tripod without being static.
Traditionally, while PTZ cameras were far cheaper than studio equipment and an accompanying camera operator, they still had four-digit prices. If you’re a small-time streamer or church, that’s a hard reach. OBSBot’s line (on this point, ignoring the Tail 2, which passes $1,000 with add-ons) represents the first mainstream, genuinely affordable entries in the category.
The intriguing thing about the Tail Air is that much of the story I wrote about the more expensive and new Tail 2 can also be said of the Air, just for hundreds of dollars less. In fact, what I wrote in the the Tail 2 review serves as an apt introduction:
The “OBSBot Start” app interface is central to using the Tail 2. It looks a lot like other camera interfaces on a smartphone. It worked great for me on the iPhone and even better on the more spacious screen of an iPad.
OBSBot’s app was almost certainly inspired by another live streaming camera, the Mevo, and that company’s pioneering work on the “smartphone controlled streaming camera” genre they created a decade ago. If you’ve never used a Mevo, such as the Start we reviewed a few years back, just think “smartphone camera interface” and you get close enough. It’s straightforward.
The original Mevo was an attempt to break the price barrier for cheap streaming gear by simulating PTZ. Mevo did so by making a stationary camera that captured an ultra-wide-angle, high-resolution image, but streamed only a portion of the image at any given time and using that cropping to simulate “panning” about a space and “zooming.”
This is akin to zooming in on a photo you take and then moving around it — you are not actually moving, but the effect is a bit like you are. Apple’s “Center Stage” feature on recent Macs, iPads and the iPhone 17 is another implementation of this approach.
It works OK so long as the camera’s fixed line of sight isn’t blocked, though digitally “zooming” close to the maximum a sensor can accomplish will expose its weaknesses. And, enlarging an image is no replacement for an optical zoom when it comes to low light sensitivity.
Mevo itself seemed unsatisfied with the PTZ-without-PTZ approach and now promotes multiple cheaper Mevo Starts in a multi-cam setup instead. We reviewed the Start previously and it works well.
OBSBot’s interface may ape that of Mevo, but the Tail line — and their other cameras — are not Mevo clones. While the Start is an excellent, affordable live-streaming camera option, OBSBot’s true, motorized PTZ functionality is a huge addition to a camera that can be remotely controlled. It’s one thing to be able to put a camera in a live event and then back away from it for control. It is another to be able to make meaningful adjustments to what it sees from that same distance.
PTZ is incredibly useful once you start imagining the possibilities. For example, we use it to show the congregation during songs at church or turn to someone asking a question during Sunday school. Place a single camera in a spot, save several present positions of its moving head and it’s almost as if you have three or four cameras in one.
Multi-cam setups can accomplish a lot of the same things, if you can afford multiple cameras. But what about the inevitable moment none of them captures the angle needed for the energetic musician during a festival or the thoughtful question from the back during a seminar? The ideal small-scale setup is real PTZ mixed with multi-cam — that’s what we use at my church, and it overcomes the shortcomings of either alone — but if you can only do one, I’d opt for PTZ.
Like Apple’s aforementioned “Center Stage,” OBSBot’s cameras offer AI subject tracking. This allows the cameras not only to track subjects without someone physically turning the camera, but without anyone telling the camera what to do at all. The cameras recognize a subject and follow it. Unlike Center Stage or tracking a subject using the older Mevos, though, OBSBot’s cameras’ ability to move allow them to do so to a much greater degree.
I initially experienced those benefits from buying a couple of the OBSBot Tiny 4Ks during Amazon’s Prime Day in 2021. These are even smaller than the Tail Air and are standard USB web cams except for one added bit of shtick: PTZ functionality. I’ve used one as my primary videoconferencing webcam for four years now and it’s great. If you have a workspace you move around while doing video conferencing, the Tiny can help keep you centered on the video screen — no more “hey, you realize your head is halfway out of the picture?” remarks.
The Tiny wasn’t marketed for live venue filming, unlike larger PTZ cameras, but it does that competently in a smaller venue, too. When my church started meeting in-person, I mounted the second Tiny as far from the live-streaming computer as I could manage with a long USB-C cable and — presto! — we had an inexpensive PTZ camera to complement our wireless, NDI-powered Mevo Start cameras.
To again tap my Tail 2 review, I should mention that whether it is either Tail or the Tiny, I put more stock in the PTZ functionality than I do the AI tracking:
I can say from experience with multiple other OBSBot cameras in more spry times that the company’s systems do what they promise. That said, I hesitate using tracking in most situations for aesthetic reasons. I don’t always like the framing it chooses — it isn’t wrong, but it often isn’t quite what I envision either. See control freak, above.
How does it perform visually? I find the Air quite good, even against its much larger sibling in the Tail 2. While the little OBSBot Tiny performed admirably, our setup’s Mevo Starts benefitted from their larger sensors when faced with extremes of dark and light while capturing stage lighting. But even it could produce a good image. The Tail series cameras do an even better job.
They do exactly what I wished for: the freedom of wireless placement offered by Logitech’s Mevo line and the PTZ movement of the Tiny. OBSBot can make the Tiny fulfill that wish with the company’s $299 USB to NDI adapter, but that raises the price of the Tiny to nearly that of the Air, at which point, the Air is a more compact, more robust option. I’d only go with the adapter if you already own the camera to be adapted.
While I used the Tiny alongside Mevos to good effect, the Tail Air feels like a true PTZ peer to Logitech’s offering, fulfilling what the early Mevos always wanted to be: flexible and affordable. Like a Mevo, it can operate wirelessly, stream directly from its paired phone app and transmit its video wirelessly via NDI to more robust live-streaming software such as OBS (an unrelated, very popular open source project that most streamers use for live-streaming).
Because the Air uses the same software as the Tail 2, it also has the appeal of buying into an ecosystem that can be expanded. The two cameras can be mixed and matched as budget and circumstance requires without learning different control interfaces.
The Tail Air always pleasantly surprises me with its excellent handling of settings requiring high dynamic range because of combinations of light and dark. While it doesn’t offer all the bells and whistles of its more expensive sibling, it’s good enough for a lot of purposes. It bests the quite good Mevo Start with great, accurate color saturation, even in low light settings. Significantly smaller than the Tail 2 and essentially occupying the same amount of space as the Start, it’s an impressive, diminutive camera.
And, despite being cheaper, the Air has one exclusive over its sibling: a built-in microphone for when you want everything to be in a single package without building custom rigging to hold it together. While the best videography will involve separate, discrete microphones, sometimes having a unified option is incredibly helpful.
The Tail Air supports Wi-Fi, making it capable of entirely wireless operation thanks to its built-in battery. If going unplugged makes you jittery as it does me, you probably shouldn’t be. I’ve found its Wi-Fi performance to be consistently good enough to depend on, even though I take comfort in the safety blanket of a wired connection.
When wired, the Tail Air can be powered beyond its rechargeable battery using either using USB or, via the OBSBot ethernet adapter, Power over Ethernet (POE), which combines data and power into a single cable. That’s been my preferred approach and it has worked flawlessly at the church except for when one of the ports on my Ethernet switch went on the fritz. (That’s the switch’s fault, not the Tail Air’s.)
I will say it seems OBSBot’s POE adapter has a somewhat weak USB-C connector on the end of the cable going into the OBSBot. After a few months of use, it started to bend, which is worrisome since it is a fixed cable: if it breaks, the whole $100 adapter goes up in smoke with it. If you plan to go with Wi-Fi, that’s not worrisome, but for those of us who prefer the security of a wired network, I’d love to see an improvement on that connector — or better yet — making the cable removable from the adapter so a failure on it doesn’t ruin the whole adapter. But, a year after I first noticed the bend, it continues to function.
Speaking of adapters, the Tail Air has a standard tripod mount and I bought a cheap tripod thread to mic stand adapter to allow an even more compact setup, using a weighted microphone stand in lieu of a larger tripod to hold the camera. Given the Tail Air’s compact size this works great and makes it easy to move the Tail Air around, even during an event.
This is an arrangement I’d feel far more comfortable with on the Air than the Tail 2. The bigger camera benefits from a heftier, more stable stand.
So far you’ve likely noticed I’ve spent little time on specs and that is by design. For most of us who are using cameras like the Start or either Tail, we aren’t likely pushing resolution limits and the like. Streaming in 4K sounds great until one realizes it overtaxes one’s internet connection, computer or storage of the video archive. (At least the first and third concern are real in my own use case.)
That said, both Tails do offer the ability to stream at 4K, which is a decided advantage over the Mevo Start if you actually want to do a 4K stream or you plan to record and do post-production work involving cropping. The original Mevos actually did have 4K sensors to support virtual PTZ, but that’s another story.
The Tail 2 gains 120fps 1080p and 60fps 4K shooting, one notch up from the limit on both resolutions of the Air. Neither of these is necessary for most average streams and, to my eyes — and many others accustomed to movies’ 24fps and TV’s 30fps — the slower rate actually feels more pleasing and natural. But if you are streaming live sports or other fast paced events, where even milliseconds can make a difference, the faster shooting modes can be of genuine benefit.
One spec should be mentioned that even average streamers may genuinely benefit from — it isn’t just for bragging rights — and that is the optical zoom. While those shooting at 720p or 1080p can make use of the Tail Air’s 4x digital zoom without consequence, the Tail 2 has a decided advantage with a 5x optical zoom, meaning there is no quality cost to zooming in even while shooting in 4K. Knowing your output plans and what kind of settings you plan to film in will help determine if the optical zoom is “nice to have” or “must have.”
Not to endlessly repeat for anyone who has read my Tail 2 review, but as I mentioned in the former review, having used Mevo’s app for most of its existence, OBSBot’s app feels immediately familiar in good ways. Even the layout of UI elements in the app is similar. It’s a good layout and I can’t fault OBSBot for not just competing with, but learning from the UI of the pioneer. I go into more detail on that app in the Tail 2 review.
Using the app is fine for basic streaming and in the ministries I’ve led; we used such a basic setup all the way into the beginning of the heavily live stream-dependent COVID era. However, the NDI functionality I referenced above adds so much more power that once I made the jump, it’s hard to go back. To me, this is the feature that makes the Tail Air attractive and I’d plan for the $100 NDI license upfront, because it unlocks the best of the camera.
It also makes it at least possible to mix and match ecosystems, as I’ve mentioned we do with Mevos, OBSBot and Avkans cameras all working in unison in one place. Sophisticated on-screen graphics also become possible, giving streams a more professional feel. We incorporate all of those elements into the church’s weekly worship services. The OBSBot Tail Air fits into such a workflow with aplomb.
Speaking of using the camera with OBS Studio, the phone app becomes much less appealing when one is working on a computer. Thankfully, OBSBot’s well-designed, proprietary control software available for Mac and Windows, the same tool that controls the Tiny, can also control the more sophisticated wireless OBSBot cameras.
Even better, if, like my church, you want to mix and match other, non-OBSBot PTZ cameras, the Tail Air also supports standard control systems for its namesake pan/tilt/zoom movement. A handy PTZ controller plugin for OBS can control both the Tail Air and other brands of PTZ cameras from one place.
(My only regret is that OBS-PTZ cannot control the USB-based Tiny, which would make for a truly unified setup.)
But if it outputs to a third-party program and can be controlled with third-party software, what is the specific point of any brand’s product? Why pick the Tail Air over another option?
Notably, when the company released the Tail Air, OBSBot joined Mevo as one of the few sub-$1,000 NDI enabled camera makers. They are perhaps the only two makers in that range with a clear, well-established track record.
There are deals to be found occasionally from those “scrambled letter” generic brands that now overtake almost every page of Amazon — I’m actually quite impressed with Avkans — but even the best of those options lack the polished ecosystem of either OBSBot or Mevo.
I like the Avkanz offerings a lot and with included NDI licenses on many of those products, the true cost of an Avkanz PTZ is notably cheaper than the Tail Air. But the company is clearly rebadging generic “ODM” products, and so the software controls are rougher and less consistent from model to model. I also cannot speak to their long-term track record. If you want sure long-term support and software updates, prices jump substantially.
In that limited “well-established budget player” arena, we applauded the quality of the Mevo Start, but its significant limitation has already been discussed. It doesn’t pan, tilt or zoom, even in the simulated way of older Mevo devices. The Tail Air is the game in town for affordable, sub-$1,000 PTZ over NDI.
And a good game it is.
It is worth reiterating just how impressively the OBSBot handles a contemporary worship service, where the room can often be a contrast of darkness and bright, stage-lit areas, the HDR mode of the Tail Air produces very vivid footage. The output doesn’t feel “budget.” Dropping it into the mix, entering the NDI license key and turning on HDR mode was all we needed to get rolling. It’s good.
The Air does lack certain professional-grade specs of the Tail 2, most notably HDMI and SDI out along with PTZR — the “R” is for rotation — support, which lets the more expensive camera be its own fully functional 3-axis gimbal to level out a scene. That said, it does features enough for most purposes and it packs its features into a substantially smaller, lighter package than the Tail 2.
If there were one feature I wish the Tail Air had that seems common on even many of the cheapest alternatives, it’d be a built-in Ethernet port. The Tail 2 has one and I’ve noted above the weakness of the Air’s own, $100 Ethernet adapter. Unlike Mevo, OBSBot does not support third-party Ethernet adapters, so its own significantly more expensive than average — and yet delicate — adapter is the only way to go.
If you can live without wired connectivity, do it. But if you want the wired option and also the incredibly useful NDI license, the camera’s price balloons to $699. That’s about double an NDI-capable (and Ethernet-equipped) Avkans option. You’ll need to weigh how much a more well established brand, a built-in battery and a more svelte design are worth. Each is of value, it just depends on the use case if they are worth enough.
Still, $699 is not bad for a competent live streaming PTZ camera and it is $400 less than a Tail 2 with an NDI license. When I first heard about the Tail 2, I assumed it would be the natural successor to the Air, replacing the older camera entirely. As its feature set pushed it just that much higher, though, the Air was left with its own segment to serve. The “Air” branding fits, paralleling Apple’s use of that adjective for a nice, middle-of-the-road option to the more pro option’s northward price.
After months of using both, I have reasons I prefer each over the other, depending on the circumstance. The Tail 2 does offer better video quality, but I wouldn’t say it offers massively better quality in my day-to-day use. The Tail 2 sports all of those extra connectivity options, but when used wirelessly, functions identically to the cheaper model. The Tail 2 seems more ready for action with its rotation capability bringing out gimbal functionality, but the Tail Air is more portable both in size and with the built-in microphone.
And, while the Tail 2 is very nice, but also situated well above the no-name “alphabet company” alternatives in pricing, the Tail Air is still low enough in the pricing spectrum to offer a chance to move to a well-established company’s product line without breaking the bank.
On the other hand the Tail Air, in my experience, is decidedly more finicky than the Tail 2. At times, I find it takes starting it a couple of times before it shows up in OBS Studio, especially if the battery drained. Occasionally it will keep shutting down until I login to the iPhone app — that typically gets everything back in line, without any further fuss once logged in. Clearly another generation of design improvements benefits the Tail 2. Combine that, a physically more robust design and the better reliability of a built-in Ethernet connection instead of a flimsy USB Ethernet adapter and the Tail 2 is, no doubt, the more professional option.
Not every task needs the more professional option, though. Sometimes the smaller, lighter option is preferable. The more I use the Tail Air wirelessly where I want to achieve a good shot as inconspicuously as possible, the more I appreciate it. Even if they were priced the same, I’d favor it in plenty of situations where bulkiness is just getting in the way. (Both Tails are smaller than the aforementioned Avkans PTZs, but the Tail Air is unquestionably the best PTZ option I’ve seen if you need tiny and inconspicuous.)
No, with an NDI license and ethernet adapter, it isn’t cheap. But despite all the competitors we’ve considered above, the Tail Air is a remarkably competent, compact camera with pricing in the sweet spot between generic cheap models and lofty professional options.
Sometimes the Goldilocks “just right” spot really is the ideal and, I must say, the longer I use and push the Tail Air, the more I think it might just be such a Goldilocks camera (OBSBot; $499 plus $99 for NDI license and $99 for the Ethernet adapter). 
Timothy R. Butler is Editor-in-Chief of Open for Business. He also serves as a pastor at Little Hills Church and FaithTree Christian Fellowship.
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