On November 3, DJI Enterprise named the four Excellence winners in its 2026 World Heritage 3D Conservation Initiative. The announcement came ten weeks after DroneXL covered the competition’s debut and the obstacle posed by national parks. Among the winning models are China’s Longmen Grottoes and Madrid’s Las Ventas Bullring, with the Spanish National Police contributing to the latter.
The full roster on DJI’s awards page has reached 12 winners, including eight People’s Choice Award recipients. Social media engagement determines that award, which DJI had scheduled for October 15. Yet a fresh reading of the contest rules page this morning still shows only four recipients.
Spain’s National Police Among Recipients Of Four Excellence Awards
Two models received the Excellence in Cultural Heritage Award: @无人机王老师’s Longmen Grottoes and Las Ventas Bullring in Madrid, attributed to MCR Infoelectronic S.L. and the Spanish National Police. For natural heritage, the winning sites were Wulingyuan in Zhangjiajie, China, and the volcanic rock formations of Cappadocia in Türkiye.
No winning entry other than Las Ventas credits a law enforcement agency. In assessing the Neo-Mudéjar arena, DJI’s eight-judge panel said the model “truly and delicately restores the red brick texture and glazed patterns” and attributed that detail to the drone’s automatic 3D exploration. The aircraft used by the winners are not identified on either the awards page or the winner graphics.
Enes Ertan Kulaksız earned the Cappadocia award by mapping its fairy chimneys and the dwellings cut into them. According to the panel, the model retains the spatial relationships linking the rock layers, living spaces and surrounding landscape.
Eight People’s Choice Awards, But Prize Tables Allow For Four
Eight People’s Choice recipients appear on DJI’s awards page, without any prizes specified. Both the contest rules and the DJI Enterprise blog post set out four recipients, with an Osmo 360 Standard Combo for each. Whether all eight will receive that prize remains unstated by DJI.
Confusion over the prize count dates to the launch. DroneXL’s August reading of DJI’s blog post put the People’s Choice total at eight, compared with four in the rules. However, the earliest archived version of the blog, dated October 10, lists four, in line with the rules.
The eight winning entries depict China’s Dazu Rock Carvings and Jingshan Temple complex; Colombia’s Castillo San Felipe de Barajas; Indonesia’s Candi Plaosan temples; architecture at Shenzhen Bay; Ecuador’s Ingapirca archaeological complex; Spain’s Heroes of Puente Sampayo monument; and the Longwo Temple Grottoes on the Taihang cliffs.
Of the 12 sites honored, six are in China, two are in Spain and none is in the United States. That distribution cannot establish how many Americans participated, because DJI does not publish submissions by country. American pilots had numerous eligible places to choose from, including urban landmarks, industrial sites, state parks and Bureau of Land Management land. National parks were off limits under the National Park Service’s drone ban, in place since 2014. A promotional video for the Mavic 4 Pro in October 2025 ran into that restriction. DJI subsequently said the video was the work of an independent creator and had not been commissioned by DJI.
An X post announcing DJI’s Excellence results carried #DJIReality, referring to the free viewer required for rendering every entry. DJI Reality debuted in April alongside Terra 5.2, a launch DroneXL covered.
DroneXL’s Take
My August question was what would happen to these models after November 3. DJI’s awards page offers an answer, but not the one I wanted: its final section directs people to look up #DJIMapYourHeritage on Facebook, Instagram, X, YouTube and LinkedIn. That leads to a social feed. Neither the rules page, the blog nor the awards page identifies an archive for the underlying models. Records such as the Longmen and Cappadocia models would appeal to a heritage body, while Spain’s national police force contributed to documenting a landmark in its own capital. If DJI could accommodate eight People’s Choice winners despite rules specifying four, it should be able to accommodate an archive as well. I would like the 12 winning models entrusted to an institution such as the World Monuments Fund, whose senior vice president for global preservation strategy served on DJI’s judging panel.
Sources: DJI Enterprise awards page, DJI Enterprise contest rules, DJI Enterprise Insights blog, DJI Enterprise (X), Internet Archive
DroneXL uses automated tools to support research and source retrieval. All reporting and editorial perspectives are by Haye Kesteloo. Read our editorial standards.
