We analyzed how ChatGPT and DeepSeek recommend action camera brands

Three brands own the answer. A fourth barely exists

We tracked four brands. DJI was named in every single answer. GoPro in 98%. Insta360 in 95%. If you're one of those three, AI knows you exist and says so almost every time.

Who AI names when you ask which action camera to buy

DJI100%

GoPro98%

Insta36095%

AKAkaso8%

Who AI names when you ask which action camera to buy

Jeweller	Answers naming it	Share
DJI	118 of 118	100.0%
GoPro	116 of 118	98.3%
Insta360	112 of 118	94.9%
Akaso	9 of 118	7.6%

Akaso, the budget challenger, appeared in just 8% of answers. Its cameras are all over the marketplaces, but when a shopper asks AI for advice, it's almost never part of the conversation.

Count up every brand mention and the three leaders split them almost evenly: 33% for DJI, 33% for GoPro, 32% for Insta360. On the surface, a dead heat.

What this means for you. If AI already names you as often as the category leader, more awareness work won't move much. The question becomes where in the answer you appear, and what gets said about you.

Insta360 is always in the room and rarely named first

Here's what the dead heat hides. We looked at where each brand shows up inside the answer. DJI is almost always the first name out. GoPro comes second. Insta360 usually arrives third, after the reader has already met two alternatives.

The two models also see Insta360 differently. The OpenAI model actively recommended it in 97% of its answers. DeepSeek did in 70%. Same questions, same day, a 27-point gap. If your customers lean on one assistant more than another, that matters.

In straight head-to-head questions Insta360 does well: AI sided with it 85% of the time, close behind DJI at 91% and ahead of GoPro at 72%. The brand wins arguments. It just isn't the first one AI thinks of.

What this means for you. Being mentioned is not the prize. Being mentioned first is. Check your position in AI answers, and check it on more than one model, because they don't agree.

AI tells Insta360's old story well. It hasn't heard the new one

Next we asked AI a simpler question, 25 times: describe Insta360. Then one of our analysts read every answer and noted which ideas came up.

The good news: AI has absorbed the core pitch. “Capture everything, frame later” appeared in 20 of 25 descriptions. Smooth, action-ready footage, 20. Those impossible-looking third-person shots, 18. That's years of consistent marketing paying off.

Two things should worry the brand team. First, AI called Insta360 the category leader in 13 of 25 answers, a claim we couldn't find backed up in the brand's own public materials. Flattering, but risky to lean on. Second, the newest story Insta360 tells about itself, shooting flat video that's ready to share straight away, never came up. Not once.

It's the same picture in shopping answers. When AI recommends Insta360 it credits waterproofing in about a third of mentions and image quality in a quarter. Audio and wind reduction, which the brand has invested in, barely register at around 2% each.

What this means for you. AI learns your story slowly and forgets it slower. If you've moved on from the pitch you made two years ago, check whether AI has. The gap is where your next content should go.

One Leica partnership, two ways to say it

AI kept raising one worry about small action cameras: that a smaller lens means weaker image quality. Insta360 works with Leica, which is a natural answer to that worry. So we tested how to say it.

We had the models role-play a buyer, first a social media creator in Singapore, then a holiday traveller in Japan, and react in their own words to a message with and without the Leica line. Then we scored how interested each reaction sounded, out of five. These are small tests, five reactions per version, so read them as a steer.

The first version worked on both models: up +0.57 on DeepSeek and +0.15 on the OpenAI model. It names the benefit the buyer was worried about.

The second test was tougher. We swapped the detailed answer AI already gives a traveller for a single line: “New product with Leica certified lens and Leica designed filters.” Interest fell from 3.65 to 3.35. The reactions were warm, but every one asked for the same things: real sample shots, reviews, the price. A famous name on its own raised questions instead of answering them.

What this means for you. Lead with what the partnership does for the buyer, not with the partner's name. And test the wording before you brief the campaign. It took us an afternoon.

If I ran marketing at Insta360

AI already names you as often as GoPro. The work now is moving up the answer and updating the story. Three things I'd do.

1. Get the new story where AI can find it

   Your direct-to-share story never came up in 25 descriptions. Put it, in plain words, on the pages AI models read most: product pages, comparison pages, FAQs, and the reviews and explainers you can influence. Then ask again next quarter and see if it has landed.

2. Swap the leader claim for proof

   AI calls you the category leader more than half the time. That's a gift until someone asks for the source. Publish the numbers that back it up, or steer towards claims you can prove: the shots only your cameras can take.

3. Sell the Leica partnership by its outcome

   “Better image and video quality, built with Leica” moved buyers. “Leica certified” didn't. Pair the partnership with sample footage in low light, because that's what every role-played buyer asked to see next.