I’m stubborn about turning on the heat. I grew up in a “heat is expensive so put on a hoodie” household and that has stuck with me into adulthood. Bedsure has a big batch of cold-weather gear on sale in its Amazon store, including electric throws, heated mattress pads, sherpa blankets, wearable blankets, and thick comforters. Warming the person on the couch usually costs less than warming every room in the house, and an electric throw uses a small fraction of the power a plug-in space heater pulls. Use the money you save to buy some soup, which was another “pretend it’s not cold” favorite from my childhood.
Top Bedsure heated blanket and cold-weather deals on Amazon
Before you give in and turn on the heat, try plugging in the Bedsure heated throw. Prime members can get the grey 50-by-60-inch version for $36.97, which is under the average price camelcamelcamel has tracked for it. Other colors and sizes cost more. It has six heat settings, timer options from one to 10 hours, and a preheat mode that runs hot for the first two hours before it drops to a lower setting. Bedsure rates it at 100 watts, and a typical space heater on high draws 1,500. Switched off, it works as a regular flannel throw with a sherpa back. Our guide to the best heated blankets covers more options.
If you would rather not run a cord across the living room, the Bedsure GentleSoft sherpa throw handles the job with no electricity at all. The linen color costs $19.99, about $5 under its average on camelcamelcamel. One side is flannel and the other is sherpa. At 50 by 60 inches, it fits one person on a couch, or two people who get along.
A throw stays on the couch when you get up for a snack, and the Bedsure wearable blanket hoodie goes with you. The grey version costs $35.99, about $6 under its camelcamelcamel average. It is an oversized, extra-long sherpa hoodie with a slit on the side so you can walk normally. It ships in a gift box, so it also works as an early holiday present. The dark purple version costs $44.99.
The Bedsure wearable heated blanket combines the two ideas above. It is a flannel-and-sherpa robe with heating wires, sleeves, a side pocket, and a closed pocket at the bottom for your feet. It uses the same six heat levels and six timer settings as the heated throw. The pink version costs $82.99, about $14 under its average on camelcamelcamel.
Best Bedsure heated blanket and mattress pad deals under $115
The grey heated throw and the wearable heated blanket are covered above. The ribbed heated throw in navy costs $49.97, and the full-size heated mattress pad costs $67.99. A mattress pad warms the bed from underneath before you get in, so the bedroom itself can stay cold.
The scams are getting a bit meta. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued a warning about a new scam currently making the rounds. But this time, the con artists aren’t impersonating a politician or celebrity to trick consumers.They’re claiming that they are the ones sounding the alarm at the FTC.
Real FTC officials explained the general scheme in an alert released on October 22. Scammers call a target to tell them that bad actors in another country have registered a separate phone using their name and number for nefarious purposes. The imposter may even “transfer” you to a fake police officer to file a report. Fake badge numbers and IDs are also offered to make it all sound legitimate, and skeptics may even be directed to verify everything by searching for the police department’s phone number online (also fake). Failure to comply allegedly results in the loss of your personal phone number.
Those who follow through with the instructions provide scammers with their state-issued ID and other personal info for the bogus police report, but it’s not over yet. Some time later, targets will receive another call informing them that they will soon be arrested for those nonexistent crimes committed using their phone number. The solution? Transfer money for a security deposit.
“None of this is true—it’s all a scam,” assured the FTC.
To prevent unnecessary headaches, the FTC listed a few ironclad rules. Actual FTC employees will never contact you about sending money, or transfer you to someone else requesting funds. The FTC will never threaten to disconnect your phone number, or ask you to keep your conversations secret from others. Finally, they will never text a photo of the supposed employee ID as a way to verify their identity to you.
Unfortunately, combatting scammers is a bit like playing a neverending game of Whack-a-Mole. While the FTC has a list of common ways to spot government imposters, they encourage everyone to report the latest con jobs to ReportFraud.ftc.gov.
When it comes to buying a home, many people pay a premium for privacy. But one new listing Carlton, Kansas, takes the cake. For a measly $1.6 million, someone can call a converted Cold War Atlas intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) silo home. Though the site sits on 18.2 acres of rural grassland, nearly the entire complex is hidden underground, save a single ominous steel door. The silo trenches down 182 feet, eventually leading to a two floor launch control center retrofitted to fit the modern world.
Surrounding the entire complex are 600 tons of steel rebar and six-foot-thick epoxy concrete walls meant to withstand nuclear blasts and 500 mph winds. The listing’s website calls it quite possibly “one of the most hardened structures ever built by man.” Once the staging ground for nuclear Armageddon, the indoor launch control center has been converted into a 2,200-square-foot, two bedroom, two bath, home outfitted with generic modern appliances. To top it all off, it is caked in a fresh coat of muted millennial gray and white paint.
The only clear sign of the bunker above ground is a single metal door. Image: North Star Missile Silo
From launch control to living room
This particular missile silo was part of the United States Air Force’s Atlas F Intercontinental Ballistic Missile Program. The Atlas program began toward the end of World War II, and produced the country’s first operational ICBM. At its peak, from late 1962 to mid-1964, 132 of these Atlas sites were built around the country.
According to the National Park Service, north-central Kansas’ Atlas F was “by far the best” of the Atlas variants ever deployed. The missile stood 82 feet tall and carried a 4.5 megaton warhead, roughly 300 times as powerful as the 15-kiloton bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Aside from the Kansas location, there were 72 Atlas missile sites stationed on bases in Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, and New York.
Though advanced for its time, the Atlas was soon eclipsed by the even stronger Titan and then Minuteman systems.The majority of the Atlas systems were decommissioned in 1979, when President Richard Nixon signed the SALT (The Strategic Arms Limitation Talks) treaties. That meant dozens of the massive structures were left dormant. Many of those relics have taken on new lives as luxury apocalypse bunkers or gimmicky rentals.
A 40 foot underground tunnel connects the retrofitted launch control to the missile silos. Image: North Star Missile Silo.
A buyer interested in viewing the North Star Missile Silo in Kansas would really have to know what they’re looking for. Getting there requires driving through a seemingly nondescript stretch of grassland before eventually coming up on a large gated fence with the iconic yellow “Fallout Shelter” signage on its side. Once inside, a surreal-looking steel door jutting out of the quiet countryside offers a clue to the shelter. It looks like a portal to some eerie, distant world, which, in some sense, it really is.
Once through the door, visitors descend a metal staircase that leads to a 40-foot tunnel. Photos show a narrow, claustrophobic walkway encased in a ring of white metal beams. At the end of the walkway stands a pair of imposing 7,000-pound blast doors. Home sweet home!
But the weirdest part about the retrofitted missile silo house is how remarkably normal much of it looks on the inside. The living quarters feature a floor plan with two bedrooms, two kitchens, and two bathrooms spread across two floors. Stainless steel appliances and a washer and dryer sit alongside standard wooden cabinets, none of which would look out of place in any hastily built rental unit across the country. The central area is laid out loft-style, showing off the control center’s massive support column. Visually, everything seems out of context. It evokes a slightly off not quite right AI-generated version of a house, or a modern millennial apartment that a visiting alien might describe to fellow interstellar travelers.
The loft style interior is built around the control’s center’s missive support column. Image: North Star Missile Silo.
It’s an undeniably weird place to live full time, but not a half-bad survival bunker. The listing notes that it features two separate sewage systems (one above ground and one underground) humidity control, a cellphone phone signal repeater and a solar power powered seven foot chain link gate. It also has ample room for solar or wind energy installation, though the buyer would have to install those. It’s also not necessarily limited just to survival or end time doomers. Realtor.com notes that the silo was previously used as a rental, though he also said there was interest in using it as an off-the grid conference site or even a wedding venue.
A new era of fancy bunkers
Many Cold War relics have taken on new lives as quirky rental and luxury condominiums. Airbnb shows a number of silos available for short term stays in New Mexico, Kansas, and southern Texas. Some of these explicitly court “prepper” audiences with fat wallets. Possibly the best known of those is Survival Condo, located about 200 miles outside of Kansas City, That sprawling Atlas Missile Silo was converted into a 15 floor luxury condominium outfitted with a pet park, climbing walls, swimming pool (with a slide) library and a movie theater. The starting asking price for one of the units? Around $1 million in 2020 dollars.
And while Cold War bunkers are relics of the past, new interpretations of the structures are still being built. In the U.S. and abroad (New Zealand attracts a particular amount of attention) a subset of the world’s wealthiest elites are reportedly constructing their own apocalyptic lairs. Some of the best known examples of those billionaire bunker builders are in the tech industry with some racing to build advanced AI models that are increasingly putting them at odds with public opinion. Aside from escaping the pitchforks, the Kansas listing also notes one more potentially enticing incentive.
“Underground structures not taxable by [the] County.”
Rattlesnake venom is a complex blend of necrotic toxins designed to quickly disrupt blood coagulation and destroy tissue cells. This effective biological weapon comes at a major premium, however. Snakes must regularly replenish their venom reserves, which means they need to dole out just the right amount with each bite. Injecting too little venom into prey may allow their next meal to escape, while delivering too much can leave a rattlesnake defenseless against its own predators.
But that doesn’t mean rattlesnakes adhere to a one-bite-fits-all policy. According to researchers at California’s Loma Linda University, the amount of venom routinely varies by individual reptile. Their recent findings published in Frontiers in Ethology indicate these dosage ranges aren’t randomly distributed, and that snakes and their venom are much more complicated than many people realize.
“This study gives us a better understanding that reptiles, such as rattlesnakes, are behaviorally complex and have personalities like humans do,” explained Loma Linda University biologist and study co-author Chelsea Martin.
Martin and her colleague, William Hayes, focused on the preferences of the Pacific rattlesnake (Crotalus oreganus helleri). On three occasions over a four-week window, the team offered 48 snakes the chance to sink their fangs into a membrane-covered beaker. Previous experiments mainly focused on the frequency of bites, but Martin and Hayes also measured the amount of injected venom in each instance. They then compared the data across snakes.
“The results were striking in their consistency,” the study’s authors wrote in an accompanying Phys.org rundown.
The team also reported measured behaviors like aggressiveness, bite willingness, and the amount of venom amount were statistically significant and repeatable across many of the snakes. Additionally, their study further debunks the lingering myth that larger snakes actually produce less venom.
“Larger snakes expended more venom than smaller snakes, as expected given their greater capacity for venom storage,” explained the biologists, while noting that actual delivered levels still occasionally varied regardless of size.
The study’s authors emphasize that their findings shouldn’t be held against the rattlesnakes themselves. While often feared, the snakes generally do everything they can to avoid confrontations with larger animals like humans. Bites are almost always the result of an unintentional encounter in the wild rather than an overly aggressive serpent. If anything, it’s people who aren’t paying attention to their surroundings, and not the other way around.
“One practical lesson remains unchanged: No rattlesnake should be approached or handled on the assumption that it will behave predictably,” the authors said. “Consistent individual differences do not make any particular snake safe.”
Our fingerprints, patterns on whale flukes, and fur patterns on cheetahs are examples of the natural ways we can tell one individual animal from another. For an Amazonian treefrog called the egg-eating spiny-backed frog (Osteocephalus oophagus), we need to look into their eyeballs. Fine black radial lines cross their golden irises, and form a pattern similar to our fingerprints. A study recently published in the journal Herpetozoa details the discovery.
The project began with study co-author Mélissa Peignier, a behavioral ecologist at the University of Bern in Switzerland, admiring frog eyes.
“At the time, I was doing my PhD, studying Allobates femoralis in the field in French Guiana,” Peignier said in a statement. “My first reaction was simply something along the lines of, ‘Wow, what beautiful eyes!’ That initial curiosity gradually turned into a genuine interest in the species, and I realised how little we actually know about them.”
Osteocephalus oophagus in situ. Photographed in French Guiana (4°02’N, 52°41’W; ) between March and May 2021. Image: Mélissa Peignier et al., 2026.
There was also an ethical component. One of the standard ways to tell amphibians apart from one another is toe-clipping, where a section or all of a single toe is removed. This procedure can affect their survival, physiology, and behavior.
“Other studies have used toe-clipping, which involves removing some of the digits. Personally, I was uncomfortable with this approach, especially given that these are arboreal frogs that rely on their limbs to climb trees.”
Osteocephalus oophagus in situ. Photographed in French Guiana (4°02’N, 52°41’W; ) between March and May 2021. Image: Mélissa Peignier et al., 2026.
Looking for other markings could offer a more humane solution and a way to observe the animals natural behavior unimpeded.
For this study, fieldwork took place over three rainy seasons (2021 to 2023) on a river island in the Nouragues Nature Reserve in French Guiana. They identified 103 individual frogs over the course of the study.
Example of the diversity of iris patterns from eight Osteocephalus oophagus individuals photographed in French Guiana (4°02’N, 52°41’W; Bongers et al. 2001) between March and May 2021, 2022, and 2023. Image: Mélissa Peignier et al., 2026.
During their later encounters, the team took pictures of each animal’s eyes without touching it and then compared the images with a reference library. This way, the recognised frogs were left undisturbed and their eyes appeared in their more natural state. The identifications were then independently verified using Wild-ID, a software package that analyzes photographic markings in animals.
They found highly distinctive iris patterns. Within one season, between 56 and 80 percent of the frogs were recaptured and reliably re-identified. According to the team, this indicates that the patterns on their eyes remain stable enough to monitor the frog in the short-term. Photographs could even be taken of frogs while in their mating embrace (called amplexus) without disrupting them. The team hopes that this method will spread.
Osteocephalus oophagus in situ. Photographed in French Guiana (4°02’N, 52°41’W; ) between March and May 2021. These frogs are in amplexus, or their mating embrace. Image: Mélissa Peignier et al., 2026.
“In a world where biodiversity is declining at an alarming rate, it is essential that we minimise our impact on the animals we study,” added Peignier. “If we can reliably identify individuals using naturally occurring features, we may be able to reduce the need for more invasive marking techniques while still collecting the data needed to answer important scientific questions.”
While the reliability of the eye markings will vary between species, and should be done case by case, the team sees considerable promise for amphibians with complex irises. And working with them offers its own benefits.
“Honestly, the frogs themselves are incredibly beautiful and surprisingly chill, which makes working with them a real pleasure,” Peignier said.
The best camera under $1,000 for most people is the Canon EOS R50 ($849.99 with an 18-45mm lens at Canon as of October 2026), because it pairs a 24.2-megapixel sensor and uncropped 4K video with Canon’s current lens mount and an assisted auto mode built for backlit and night scenes. If you’re mostly filming yourself, the Insta360 Luna Ultra ($769.99) puts a 1-inch sensor, a 3x telephoto, and a mechanical gimbal in your pocket. Plenty has changed since our last update: price increases, many tied to US tariffs, have pushed favorites like Sony’s a6400 past $1,000 for the body alone, Canon has discontinued the EOS RP in Japan, GoPro’s new flagship is the Mission 1 Pro rather than a Hero 14, and DJI’s newest pocket gimbal hasn’t officially reached the US. Here are your options if you’re looking to get started under a grand.
I have been a professional photographer and camera journalist for nearly two decades. During my time at our sibling publication, Popular Photography, I shot with almost every major camera released in the past decade. For this guide, I looked for cameras with clear strengths that fit specific kinds of shooting, and weighed durability, performance, and less tangible things like access to a deep catalog of lenses and accessories.
For this update, we started from our previous picks and the cameras released since, then checked every finalist against its maker’s spec page and a live US retailer listing on October 20, 2026. That price pass cut more cameras than any spec comparison did: Sony’s a6400 now costs $1,098 for the body at Adorama and the Fujifilm X-E5 is $1,699.95 for the body. We also checked each maker’s product lifecycle and business news, which is why the Canon RP section says “while stock lasts” and the GoPro section mentions the company’s sale process.
The best cameras under $1,000: Recommendations
The picks below run from about $620 to $1,000. Five are interchangeable-lens cameras; the other three have built-in lenses, for people who want one device that does everything. Camera prices have moved a lot this year in both directions, so check before you buy. While we always make specific picks for specific needs, there’s plenty of overlap, so read the whole list before you set your heart on one.
24.2MP APS-C sensor and uncropped 4K/30, oversampled from 6K (Canon’s spec)
Up to 15 fps with the electronic shutter, 12 fps with electronic first curtain
Vari-angle touchscreen plus a 2.36-million-dot OLED viewfinder
Advanced A+ Assist mode helps with backlit and night scenes
Cons
No in-body stabilization, per Canon’s spec page
Small grip gets cramped with larger lenses
$849.99 is a sale price; it was $799 in early October, per CPriceWatch
Specs
Lens mount:
Canon RF (RF-S lenses for APS-C)
Sensor size:
APS-C
Megapixels:
24.2
Maximum video resolution:
4K at 30 fps, uncropped (Canon’s spec)
Price:
$849.99 with RF-S 18-45mm at Canon as of October 20, 2026
Canon’s EOS R50 is still the camera we’d hand to someone trading up from a phone. The kit with the RF-S 18-45mm IS STM lens costs $849.99 at Canon as of October 20, 2026 (a sale price against a $899.99 regular price), which leaves room in a $1,000 budget for a memory card and a bag. If that’s still too much, Canon’s refurbished store had this same kit for $529 with a one-year Canon USA warranty in late September (per CPriceWatch), though restocks sell out fast. Y.M.Cinema Magazine reported in late August that it was still the best-selling mirrorless camera on Amazon, more than three years after launch.
The video spec has aged better than the price tag suggests. Canon rates the R50 for 4K at 30 fps using the full width of its 24.2-megapixel APS-C sensor, oversampled from 6K, so you don’t lose your wide angle when you switch from stills to video. Subject-detection autofocus locks onto people and animals and follows them across the frame without any fiddling, and there’s a mic jack for when the built-in microphone stops cutting it.
For beginners, the Advanced A+ Assist mode is the feature that matters. It works like a full auto mode that reads the scene, so backlit portraits and night shots come out better than they would on plain auto, and you can graduate to aperture priority when you’re ready. Canon’s spec page lists no in-body stabilization, so stick with stabilized lenses for low-light handheld shooting, or budget for Canon’s inexpensive RF 50mm f/1.8 STM, which gathers far more light than the kit zoom. If you mostly shoot video, the R50 V below is the same camera reworked for creators, without the viewfinder.
Detachable 2-inch OLED screen doubles as a remote up to 20 meters away
47GB of built-in storage plus a microSD slot
Cons
About 233 grams, heavier than DJI’s Osmo Pocket 4, per T3
T3’s reviewer found controls lag slightly with the screen detached
No focus peaking at launch, per T3
Specs
Lens mount:
Fixed dual lens (Leica Summicron)
Sensor size:
1-inch main, 1/1.3-inch telephoto
Megapixels:
Not published (photos up to 37MP in UltraPhoto mode, per Insta360)
Maximum video resolution:
8K at 30 fps (Insta360’s spec)
Price:
$769.99 at Insta360 as of October 20, 2026
A phone on a gimbal gets you steady video. A pocket gimbal camera gets you steady video from a much bigger sensor, with the screen facing you and the stabilizer built in. The Insta360 Luna Ultra is the one we’d buy in that category, at $769.99 for the standard bundle at Insta360’s store. Its main camera puts a 1-inch sensor behind a Leica Summicron lens, and a second camera with a 1/1.3-inch sensor handles 3x telephoto. Insta360 rates the pair for 6x lossless zoom and 12x total.
That second lens is why we’d pick it over a single-lens pocket camera. You can frame yourself at the wide end, then punch in on a street performer across the plaza without walking over. Insta360 rates it for 8K at 30 fps, 4K at up to 120 fps, Dolby Vision HDR, and 10-bit I-Log, and the gimbal is a mechanical 3-axis unit, so most of the steadying happens physically instead of by cropping the frame. I have been using this for the past few months to shoot everything from personal videos to footage for work and I’ve been impressed with everything from battery life to image quality.
The 2-inch OLED screen pops off and works as a wireless monitor and remote from up to 20 meters, per Insta360, which is handy when the camera is on a tripod and you’re in the shot. It’s not the quickest to zoom or focus, but you’re trading a bit of performance for convenience. The bigger story for US buyers is the competition: DJI’s Osmo Pocket 4 launched in April with its FCC authorization still pending, per DroneXL, and Amateur Photographer reported in June that DJI’s products remained off the US market. The $969.99 Creator Bundle adds a wireless mic transmitter, a battery handle, and a wide-angle lens; start with the standard bundle unless you already know you need the mic.
Full-width 4K/30 oversampled from 6K, per DPReview
Headphone and mic jacks, a front tally lamp, and a side tripod thread for vertical video
Optional RF-S 14-30mm power zoom is wide enough to hold at arm’s length
370 grams for the body, per DPReview
Cons
No viewfinder and no built-in flash
No in-body stabilization
4K/60 uses a 1.56x crop, and electronic stabilization crops further
About 70 minutes of 4K/30 per charge, per Canon’s manual (via DPReview)
Specs
Lens mount:
Canon RF (RF-S lenses for APS-C)
Sensor size:
APS-C
Megapixels:
24.2
Maximum video resolution:
4K at 30 fps uncropped; 4K at 60 fps with a 1.56x crop (per DPReview)
Price:
$619.99 body, $799.99 with RF-S 14-30mm, at Canon as of October 12, 2026 (per CPriceWatch)
The Canon EOS R50 V takes the R50’s 24.2-megapixel sensor and rebuilds the body around video. The viewfinder and flash are gone. In their place you get a headphone jack next to the mic jack, a red tally lamp on the front so you know you’re recording, and a second tripod thread on the side for shooting vertical video without an L-bracket.
It’s the camera for the creator who wants interchangeable lenses on a desk or a tripod rather than a gimbal in a pocket. DPReview lists full-width 4K at 30 fps oversampled from 6K, the same clean 4K as the R50, and 4K at 60 fps with a 1.56x crop. Get the 14-30mm kit if you film yourself: on APS-C, that’s roughly a 22-48mm equivalent by our arithmetic, wide enough to hold at arm’s length.
There’s no in-body stabilization, so walking shots depend on a stabilized lens, a gimbal, or Canon’s electronic stabilization, which crops further. Battery life is the other limit. Plan for about 70 minutes of 4K/30 per charge, so grab a spare battery or USB power for long sessions. If you’d rather have a viewfinder for stills, the regular R50 kit above costs $50 more than the R50 V kit and does both jobs.
26.1MP X-Trans CMOS 4 sensor and X-Processor 5 (Fujifilm’s spec)
Top-plate film simulation dial with three slots for saved recipes
Built-in electronic viewfinder
6.2K/30 open gate and full-width 4K/30 video, per DPReview
Cons
No in-body stabilization
$999.95 is body only; the 13-33mm kit is $1,149.95
Body-only stock was thin at the retailers we checked
CIPA-rated for 315 shots per charge (425 in Economy mode)
Specs
Lens mount:
Fujifilm X
Sensor size:
APS-C
Megapixels:
26.1
Maximum video resolution:
6.2K at 30 fps open gate; 4K at 60 fps with a 1.18x crop (per DPReview)
Price:
$999.95 body only at Hot Rod Cameras as of October 20, 2026
The T30 III runs the same X-Processor 5 as the X-E5. It trades the X-E5’s 40-megapixel sensor for a 26.1-megapixel X-Trans CMOS 4 chip, which is plenty for prints and cropping, and it still has a built-in viewfinder, which Fujifilm’s cheaper X-M5 doesn’t.
The new top-plate dial is the reason to want this camera. It switches between 20 film simulations, and three of its positions store custom recipes, so you can build a Classic Chrome look with your own grain and white balance settings and call it back with a thumb. Fujifilm’s straight-out-of-camera color is why many people choose the system in the first place, and the dial moves it from the menus to the top of the camera. Video is better than an enthusiast stills camera needs: DPReview lists 6.2K at 30 fps in open gate and 4K at 30 fps from the full sensor width, with 10-bit 4:2:2 internal recording.
It’s still an entry-level body. There’s no in-body stabilization, so handheld low-light shots depend on a stabilized lens or a steady grip, and the battery offers roughly 315 shots per charge under good conditions. Stock is the other catch. On October 20, Glazer’s Camera showed the body sold out in all three colors and Hot Rod Cameras listed it as a preorder. The kit with the XC 13-33mm lens, at $1,149.95, breaks this guide’s budget, so pair the body with one of Fujifilm’s compact primes instead.
Dedicated shutter speed, ISO, and exposure compensation dials
Uncropped 4K at 30 fps, per Nikon
Fully articulating 3-inch touchscreen
Body price has dropped below $760
Cons
No in-body stabilization
Five years old, with an older processor than Nikon’s Z50 II
Our price is body only
Specs
Lens mount:
Nikon Z (DX)
Sensor size:
APS-C
Megapixels:
20.9
Maximum video resolution:
4K at 30 fps, uncropped (Nikon’s spec)
Price:
$756.95 body only at Adorama as of October 20, 2026
The Nikon FM2 is one of the great film SLRs, and the Z fc copies its top plate closely enough to fool people at a distance. Shutter speed, ISO, and exposure compensation each get their own engraved aluminum dial, so you can read every exposure setting with the camera switched off. I love setting exposure with real dials, and so do many of the working photographers I know. The price has come down too: Adorama had the body at $756.95 on October 20, 2026, against a $1,056.95 list price, and Nikon’s own store listed it starting at $759.95.
Inside, it’s a 20.9-megapixel DX sensor. Nikon rates it for 4K at 30 fps with full-pixel readout and no crop, plus bursts up to 11 fps, and the 3-inch touchscreen flips fully around for selfies and flips in to hide, which keeps the retro look intact. The contoured front makes it easier to hold than its flat sides suggest, and the 2.36-million-dot OLED viewfinder is big and bright for a camera this size.
It’s from 2021, and you can tell in places. There’s no in-body stabilization, and the Z50 II that Nikon launched at $909.95 in late 2024 has a newer processor and better subject detection inside a plainer body. The Z fc is the one to buy if you’ll enjoy using it more, and that’s a real consideration. The short Z-mount flange also makes it a good host for adapted vintage lenses, and Nikon’s FTZ II adapter covers decades of F-mount glass.
Maximum video resolution:
4K at 60 fps (1.4x crop); 4K at 30 fps full width
Price:
$849 at Canon as of October 20, 2026
Canon couldn’t keep up with orders for the PowerShot V1 after it launched in 2025. It’s easier to find now, and cheaper: Canon’s store had it for $849 on October 20, 2026, down from a $1,029 regular price. It replaces the Sony ZV-1 II we used to recommend here, because the Insta360 above covers that camera’s vlogging job better and the V1 is the stronger camera for everything else.
Its sensor is the reason. Canon calls it a 1.4-inch type, and at 22.3 megapixels it has roughly the area of a Micro Four Thirds sensor, per PetaPixel, which by our arithmetic is about twice the area of the 1-inch sensors in most premium compacts. More area means cleaner low-light shots and easier background blur from a camera that fits in a jacket pocket. The zoom covers 16-50mm equivalent at f/2.8-4.5 (17-52mm in video mode), wide enough to hold at arm’s length and long enough for a head-and-shoulders portrait.
The V1 is also a better video camera than most compacts because it has a fan. PetaPixel’s launch report says Canon rates it for more than two hours of 4K/60 in typical conditions with the right settings, and the fan settings lift the time limits on 4K/30 and Full HD. 4K/60 crops the frame by 1.4x, though, so use 4K/30 when you need the full width, and expect the lens to get slow at the telephoto end indoors. Canon lists optical image stabilization in the lens plus digital Movie IS, and Galaxus’s hands-on review notes a built-in ND filter, which helps keep motion natural in bright daylight. The same review called the lack of a viewfinder the camera’s biggest weakness, and the screen is dim in direct sun, so this is a camera you’ll frame at arm’s length.
Discontinued in Japan in June 2026; US stock won’t last forever
4K tops out at 23.98 fps with about a 1.76x crop, per Digital Camera World
About 5 fps bursts, per Canon
Specs
Lens mount:
Canon RF
Sensor size:
Full-frame
Megapixels:
26.2
Maximum video resolution:
4K at 23.98 fps (Canon’s spec)
Price:
$899 body only at Canon as of October 20, 2026
Canon listed the EOS RP as discontinued in Japan in June. In the US, Canon’s store still sells it, at $899 for the body as of October 20, 2026, which is $250 off a $1,149 regular price through November 1, per Canon. It was $799 at Canon and B&H in early October, per CPriceWatch, so a holiday sale could bring that back. Canon U.S.A. told PetaPixel in June that the RP remained on sale in the United States, with no end date announced, so treat this as a while-supplies-last pick.
I’ve shot with the RP as a backup body, and it’s a capable camera for what it is: a small, light way into full-frame for people who mostly shoot stills. The reason to buy it is the sensor. A full-frame sensor is the size of a frame of 35mm film, so lenses behave the way their focal lengths suggest: a 50mm lens looks like a 50mm lens, wide angles stay wide, and it’s easier to get a sharp subject against a soft background. The RP’s 26.2-megapixel sensor also handles dim rooms better than the APS-C cameras above, and anything you buy for it works on Canon’s newest full-frame bodies when you upgrade.
It’s a stills camera first. Canon’s spec page lists bursts of about 5 fps and 4K at 23.98 fps, and Digital Camera World’s review measured about a 1.76x crop in 4K, with Canon’s Dual Pixel autofocus unavailable in that mode, so the R50 is the better Canon for video. The kit with the RF 24-105mm f/4-7.1 lens runs $1,199 at Canon, past our budget; buy the body and add the RF 50mm f/1.8 STM for portraits.
1-inch 50MP sensor, 8K at 60 fps, and 4K at 240 fps (GoPro’s spec)
Waterproof to 66 feet (20 meters) without a housing
Front and rear screens, HyperSmooth stabilization, and Horizon Lock
Built-in mounting fingers fit standard GoPro mounts
Cons
$699.99 list, well above the Hero 13 Black
3.5mm mic input requires the optional Media Mod
GoPro is looking for a buyer, per RedShark News
Specs
Lens mount:
Fixed, 159-degree native field of view (GoPro’s spec)
Sensor size:
1-inch
Megapixels:
50
Maximum video resolution:
8K at 60 fps (GoPro’s spec)
Price:
$699.99 at Adorama as of October 20, 2026
GoPro hasn’t released a Hero 14 Black. GoPro’s 2026 flagship is the Mission 1 Pro, a camera the company pitches at filmmakers, but it keeps everything that makes a GoPro useful for action: it’s waterproof to 66 feet without a housing, it has mounting fingers built into the body, and it has screens front and back. The difference is the sensor. It uses a 1-inch, 50-megapixel chip, much larger than the 1/1.9-inch sensor in the Hero 13 Black, which should mean cleaner footage at dusk and indoors.
GoPro rates it for 8K at 60 fps, 4K at 240 fps for slow motion, and 1080p at 960 fps in 10-second bursts, with 10-bit GP-Log2 and HLG HDR. Its native field of view is 159 degrees, per GoPro, and four microphones record 32-bit float audio, which makes a sudden shout much harder to clip.
If you just want a camera to stick on a helmet and forget, GoPro still sells the Hero 13 Black for less. If you want a waterproof camera that shoots photos first, with an optical zoom, look at OM System’s Tough TG-7 instead. Both are rugged and totally waterproof without a case, which also makes either one a good underwater camera.
Cameras that just missed the $1,000 cut
Several cameras that show up in nearly every budget camera roundup didn’t make this list because their current prices are over $1,000. If one goes on sale below that line during the holidays, it’s worth a look.
Nikon Z50 II: about $1,007 for the body at Focus Camera in mid-October, with a newer processor than our Z fc pick. It’s about $7 over the line, so a holiday sale could easily push it under.
Sony a6400: $1,098 for the body at Adorama as of October 20, 2026, for a camera that launched at $899.99 for the body in 2019.
Sony ZV-E10 II: $1,198 at Adorama as of October 20, 2026.
Canon EOS R10: $1,249 with the 18-45mm lens at Canon and B&H as of October 12, 2026. Canon’s refurbished store sold the same kit for $649 in May, per CPriceWatch.
Ricoh GR IIIx: about $1,247 at US retailers in late August, per Digital Camera World, and Ricoh is ending production in Japan this month.
Fujifilm X-E5: $1,699.95 for the body at Fujifilm’s US store in mid-October.
What to consider when buying a camera under $1,000
The right camera depends less on the spec sheet than on what you’ll actually shoot and how you’ll carry it. Here’s what to look at before you buy.
Sensor size matters more than megapixels
Most cameras here land between 20 and 26 megapixels, which is plenty for prints and cropping. Sensor size makes a bigger difference. A full-frame sensor matches a 35mm film frame. APS-C sensors, like the ones in the Canon R50, Fujifilm X-T30 III, and Nikon Z fc, have roughly 40 percent of that area, and the 1-inch and 1.4-inch-type sensors in the compacts and gimbal cameras are smaller still, though larger than most phones’ main sensors. Bigger sensors generally mean cleaner low-light shots and easier background blur. APS-C makes telephoto lenses smaller and cheaper, which is why it’s a good fit for most beginners.
Interchangeable lenses or a fixed lens
Compact cameras, gimbal cameras, and action cameras have built-in lenses, which keeps everything in one tidy package. Interchangeable-lens cameras let you add a fast prime for portraits or a long zoom for sports later, but you’re buying into a lens mount. Canon RF, Nikon Z, and Fujifilm X all have current lens lines from the camera makers plus third-party options, so any of the mirrorless picks here will have new glass to grow into.
Gimbal cameras are their own category
A pocket gimbal camera like the Insta360 Luna Ultra mounts its lens on a motorized 3-axis stabilizer, so walking shots stay smooth without the cropping that electronic stabilization uses. The trade is that the lens is fixed and the camera is built around video. If you mostly film yourself, buy one. If you mostly shoot photos, a mirrorless camera will serve you better.
Video specs to check
4K is standard across this list, but how a camera makes it varies. Some read the full width of the sensor; others crop in, which narrows your field of view and makes wide shots harder. Frame rate matters too: 30 fps is standard, 24 fps looks more like film, and 60 fps or higher lets you slow footage down. Check the recording format and bit depth as well. Log profiles and 10-bit recording give you more room to edit color, but they also mean more time grading.
Manual controls and build
When you’re starting out, manual mode can seem intimidating. That won’t last, and you want a camera you can grow into, which is why dial-heavy bodies like the Nikon Z fc and Fujifilm X-T30 III are worth a look even for beginners. Most cameras under $1,000 also aren’t built for harsh conditions. If you plan to get your camera wet or dirty, buy one made for it, like the GoPro, rather than worrying about a mirrorless body every time it rains.
FAQs
Q: What’s the best camera for beginners under $1,000?
The Canon EOS R50. It costs $849.99 with an 18-45mm lens at Canon as of October 2026, shoots uncropped 4K video, and has an Advanced A+ Assist mode that handles backlit and night scenes while you learn.
Q: Is the Canon EOS R50 still worth buying in 2026?
Yes. Canon hasn’t announced a successor as of October 2026, and the R50 still offers a 24.2-megapixel APS-C sensor, uncropped 4K at 30 fps, and Canon’s current RF lens mount. Y.M.Cinema Magazine reported in August 2026 that it was still the best-selling mirrorless camera on Amazon. If you mostly shoot video, consider the R50 V instead.
Q: When do cameras go on sale?
Around big retail events. Canon’s prices dropped during the early-October sales, then rose on October 12: the R50 kit went from $799 to $849 and the EOS RP body from $799 to $899, per CPriceWatch. The holiday shopping season around Black Friday is the next likely window.
Q: Which is better: mirrorless or DSLR?
For a new camera, mirrorless. Camera makers have moved their new bodies and lenses to mirrorless systems, and you get features like subject-detection autofocus that DSLRs largely missed. A used DSLR can still be a bargain if you already own lenses for it, but new glass for those mounts has mostly stopped.
Q: Can modern cameras use vintage lenses?
Yes, and mirrorless cameras are especially good at it. Their short lens mounts leave room for inexpensive adapters, so older manual-focus lenses can work on bodies like the Nikon Z fc or Fujifilm X-T30 III. You’ll usually focus by hand, which is easier with the focus magnification and peaking tools most mirrorless cameras include.
Q: Can you buy the DJI Osmo Pocket 4 in the US?
Not through official channels as of our research. DJI launched the Osmo Pocket 4 in April 2026 with its FCC authorization still pending, per DroneXL, and Amateur Photographer reported in June that DJI’s products remained off the US market. The Insta360 Luna Ultra, our vlogging pick, is sold at Insta360’s US store and major retailers.
Q: Is there a Fujifilm X-E5 under $1,000?
Not new. Fujifilm’s US store listed the X-E5 body at $1,699.95 in October 2026. The Fujifilm X-T30 III gets you the same X-Processor 5, a film simulation dial, and a viewfinder for $999.95, body only, with a 26.1-megapixel sensor instead of the X-E5’s 40 megapixels.
Final thoughts on the best cameras under $1,000
Best overall:Canon EOS R50, $849.99 with a lens ($529 refurbished when Canon has it), for uncropped 4K and beginner-friendly auto modes
Best for vlogging:Insta360 Luna Ultra, $769.99, for a 1-inch sensor, a 3x telephoto, and a mechanical gimbal in your pocket
Best for video on a budget:Canon EOS R50 V, $619.99 body only, for creator features on the R50’s sensor
Best Fujifilm camera: Fujifilm X-T30 III, $999.95 body only, for Fujifilm color and a film simulation dial
Best retro camera:Nikon Z fc, $756.95 body only, for real dials and FM2 styling
Best point-and-shoot:Canon PowerShot V1, $849, for a big-sensor point-and-shoot with a cooling fan
Best full-frame:Canon EOS RP, $899 body only, for full-frame while stock lasts
Best action camera:GoPro Mission 1 Pro, $699.99 (and $599.99 on sale this fall), for a 1-inch sensor in a waterproof GoPro body
Pro cameras still cost thousands of dollars, but $1,000 buys a lot of camera, as long as you pick for what you shoot. Photographers should start with the Canon R50 or Fujifilm X-T30 III, and video-first creators on a budget should look at the R50 V. If you mostly film yourself, get the Luna Ultra. Whatever you buy, learn it well. A great camera won’t do much without the person holding it.
Fall is here, and with it comes very determineddeer. Mating season for the hoofed ruminants typically begins once temperatures dive and the days grow shorter, but the annual event also poses problems for humans. The deer have one thing on their mind, which means they pay even less attention to vehicles and roadways. In New Jersey, roughly 41 percent of all annual animal collisions occur between October and December, while the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety routinely tallies over 275 fatalities from similar accidents nationwide every year.
Driving gets even riskier in rural areas, which frequently host higher deer populations and much darker roads. However, a recent pilot program in Virginia offers a promising tool that may keep commuters safe while also allowing the animals to do their thing. At the Virginia Tech Transportation Institute (VTTI), researchers designed an automated digital roadside sensor system that warns drivers of large jaywalkers like deer and elk.
According to VTTI engineer Shreyas Bhat, the year-long trial demonstrated a “measurable change” in how local drivers responded when alerted to oncoming wildlife. Bhat and his colleagues tested the system with help from the state’s Department of Transportation along a 14-mile section of Route 460 in southwest Virginia. The array was composed of eight portable, solar-powered trailers and customizable digital message signs. Each station included thermal cameras analyzed by onboard machine learning software, which triggered the sign alerts whenever it flagged nearby medium– to large–sized animals.
Over the course of the trial, researchers amassed driving data on over 10,000 vehicles, while the detection system maintained an estimated accuracy of around 97 percent. This is particularly impressive given the region’s environmental and infrastructural challenges.
“This system is unique because of the requirements of the area—it needed to be solar powered, portable, and be able to withstand all weather conditions,” explained VTTI engineer Jean Paul Talledo Vilela.
The team reported an average reduced speed of about three miles per hour thanks to the roadside warning signs. That may not seem like much, but even a slight slowdown can save lives. It also proved people took note of the system.
“Speed is an important data point to understand if drivers were actually paying attention to the message board,” said Talledo Vilela. “Even if they are not braking aggressively, some reduction in speed indicates that they may be paying more attention to their surroundings because they got that alert.”
While Talledo Vilela, Bhat, and their collaborators are still parsing through data from the program,(it ended in September) the initial findings remain promising. From here, the team hopes to refine the overall system while organizing future trials in other regions of the country. If successful, the relatively simple installations could also be adapted for other year-round road safety situations like construction or real-time weather hazards.
But what particular night above Saint-Rémy-de-Provence, France, did the troubled post-impressionist painter actually put on the canvas? A new analysis points to July 22, 1889. During the early morning hours at that time of year, a waning crescent moon, the planet Venus, and the Hyades star cluster in Taurus appeared close together—all of which are seen in the painting. A study published today in the journal Scientific Reports details the findings.
Like many of his paintings that year, “The Starry Night” was created in several sessions during the day, under different weather conditions. The village nestled below the hills was also based on other views, and could not be seen from his window. Although van Gogh reconstructed some of the features in the night sky as he saw them, he also altered the celestial shapes and added a sense of glow.
“Van Gogh assigned an emotional language to night and nature that took them far from their actual appearances,” the museum writes. “Dominated by vivid blues and yellows applied with gestural verve and immediacy, ‘The Starry Night’ also demonstrates how inseparable van Gogh’s vision was from the new procedures of painting he had devised, in which color and paint describe a world outside the artwork even as they telegraph their own status as, merely, color and paint.”
Historically, the painting has been dated based on a letter van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo around June 18, 1889. However, the waning gibbous moon from mid-June does not account for the slender crescent seen in the painting. By July 22, 1889, the Hyades star cluster rose in the eastern sky alongside Venus, and the moon’s shape looked closer to the crescent on the canvas. This new study uses observational geometry to find an answer.
“To an observational astronomer, the cluster of stars in ‘The Starry Night’ is the Hyades in Taurus,” said study co-author Elijah Jeong-hyun Kim. “But the moment I read the earlier studies explaining it as Aries, I heard the painting calling to me.” Kim is the CEO at South Korean robotic telescope company SLLAB and a PhD candidate at Kyung Hee University.
For this research, the team combined astronomical simulations and measurements of star positions, with historical weather records, and van Gogh’s own letters. They also used earlier sketches of the landscape to reconstruct the narrow field of view represented in “The Starry Night.”
(A) The central cluster of stars in “The Starry Night” (1889), left, and the Hyades cluster in Taurus, center. At right, the five stars in the painting (orange) are overlaid on the real stars (blue) after matching for size, orientation and position; red dashed lines show the residual differences. (B) The stars in “Café Terrace at Night” (1888), left, and the stars around the Summer Triangle, center. The panel at right follows the same layout as in (A). Image: Kim et al., Scientific Reports (2026), Figs. 2, 4 and S1.
According to the team, the crescent moon, Venus, and the Hyades star cluster in the constellation Taurus would have been visible around dawn on July 22, 1889. This configuration generally corresponds to what is portrayed in the painting. Weather records suggest that the night sky around July 22 would have been clear enough for this astronomical arrangement to be visible. Additionally, the frequent mentions of cicadas in van Gogh’s letters suggest that the region was seeing a period of hot weather, which matches the recorded temperatures in July 1889 better than in June.
The team also verified that the painter’s field of view in another painting titled “Starry Night over the Rhône” (1888) with photographs taken on site was painted when the sky was in Aries. Using the same method, the team also believes that the stars in “Café Terrace at Night” (1888) may be the Summer Triangle.
“I hope this work prompts a renewed, multidisciplinary look at the sequence and working methods of the Saint-Rémy paintings, and at Van Gogh’s movements that summer,” Kim said. “Our conversation with Van Gogh’s other skies is still ongoing. We plan to tell those stories one by one.”
Dr. Nick Medford’s patient had plenty of reasons to be terrified of a simple blood test.
His body had shrunk down to a fraction of its size, or so he believed, and the physicians looming over him were enormous. Then there was the needle about to pierce his vein: to the patient’s eye, it was larger than his entire arm.
It might sound like something out of Alice in Wonderland. But this patient’s story belonged to a different genre entirely. Horror, namely. As far as the patient was concerned, there was no point in taking his blood. It was no longer human. Neither was he.
Medford’s patient was suffering from clinical lycanthropy, defined as the delusional belief that one is turning into a werewolf. And unlike the flesh-tearing beasts of folklore, who terrorize the unsuspecting by the light of the full moon, patients like Medford’s are often the ones haunted, trapped inside a body-horror nightmare.
According to Medford, his patient knew something was wrong, but was as confused about his condition as anyone. “Not only did he think he was a werewolf, but he would also talk about things like wanting to realign the cosmos and wanting to kill God,” says Medford, a neuropsychiatrist with the South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust.
“And then you would say, ‘Do you believe in God? Are you religious?’ And he’d say, ‘No.’ His ideas didn’t really make sense even to him, which was a part of his distress.”
So, what causes this rare condition? And why does it take the form of one of Halloween’s classic monsters?
Rarer than movie werewolves
If you’ve never heard of clinical lycanthropy before, there’s a good reason: Hollywood’s werewolves easily outnumber the real-life cases of this condition. Only about 25 instances have been reported in the medical literature.
Because there are so few cases, Medford says it is difficult to identify a common cause or predictable disease course. However, he says that typically it is seen in patients already experiencing mental illness.
“In around 40 percent of published cases, it occurs in the context of schizophrenia,” Medford says. “There are also reports of it occurring in the context of bipolar disorder or psychotic depression. So, in the context of severe mental illness, basically.”
Experts debate whether German artist Lucas Cranach the Elder depicts a werewolf or a cannibal in this woodcut print from the 16th century. Image: Public Domain
Medford’s own patient had been diagnosed with Huntington’s disease, an inherited, fatal brain disease that causes psychiatric symptoms and uncontrolled body movements. The case, which Medford documented in a 2023 report, was the only published instance of clinical lycanthropy associated with Huntington’s. Although Medford says it is uncertain what then led his patient to believe he was a werewolf, he says the physical changes associated with Huntington’s may have fed this idea.
“There may be some change in the person’s body or in their perception or their experience of their body,” Medford says. “That might be, if you like, the seed from which this idea can develop.”
This seems possible in the case of Medford’s patient, who exhibited involuntary writhing movements and other strange physical sensations.
“He did not seem to be aware that he was having these abnormal movements, but he was aware of some weird sensations,” he says. “He described freezing sensations and electric-shock-like sensations. He had some sense that something strange was happening in his body.”
Why wolves?
But physical changes alone don’t explain why the patient imagined he was turning into a werewolf. Which raises the question: Why do these delusions so often focus on lupine metamorphoses?
They don’t always, Medford notes. There’s a broader term—therianthropy—for the delusion that one has turned into any animal. But most of these cases involve canines, he acknowledges.
“Most of them are wolves or dogs or something of that type,” he says. “And then there’s a whole range of other strange things. There’s a report of someone who thought they’d turned into a bee.” That would make for an underwhelming horror movie, to be sure.
So, is it a coincidence that many of these patients report delusions ripped straight from a creature feature?
Probably not. In their case report, Medford and his co-author, neuroscientist Natasha Sigala, note that “delusions are influenced by culture,” and few cultural images of human/animal shapeshifting are as deeply embedded as the werewolf.
“The werewolf folklore and werewolf mythology goes right back to antiquity,” Medford says. “And it’s kind of interesting that the werewolf or something like it seems to pop up in a lot of different cultures and different times and places.”
American actor Henry Hull poses for a publicity portrait for his 1935 film Werewolf of London. Image: Getty Images / Stringer / Archive Photos
Why is the werewolf legend so potent and enduring? Medford suspects it may tap into something primal.
“The werewolf symbolizes something about the human condition,” he says. “We live in civilized societies, and we adhere to social norms, but there’s a sort of animal part of us that perhaps chafes against that.”
That internal conflict may explain some of the patient’s other fixations. He described urges to strangle his wife and to defecate in a church. Medford notes that Huntington’s may also have impaired his sense of disgust, which can happen as the disease progresses.
Yet the patient also fought against his own impulses. At times, he lunged at staff, only to pull back and apologize.
“You could see the conflict in that moment,” Medford says. In that sense, the patient wasn’t so far from the werewolves of fiction. Like a movie werewolf beholding his mirror image in horror, he looked at his reflection and saw himself changing in ways he couldn’t control.
The werewolf fades
For Medford’s patient, that dreaded blood test ultimately was part of a turning point in his treatment. The bloodwork allowed Medford to keep the patient on clozapine, a potent antipsychotic. As Medford increased the dose, the patient’s delusional beliefs dwindled, and although the underlying Huntington’s disease remained, the werewolf soon was gone.
Medford hopes patients like his will be treated with compassion rather than sensationalism. “These cases, they’re rare, but when they do happen, they tend to arise in the context of serious psychiatric or neurological disturbance,” Medford says. “They are people meriting sympathy and treatment, rather than romancing about it.”
In Ask Us Anything, Popular Science answers your most outlandish, mind-burning questions, from the everyday things you’ve always wondered to the bizarre things you never thought to ask. Have something you’ve always wanted to know? Ask us.
Before giant manta rays (Mobula birostris) can grow to up to 30 feet long and 4,409 pounds, they must start small like most living things. Giant manta ray babies (called pups) in Central America don’t have their size to protect them from orca whales (Orcinus orca) and the numerous sharks in the open ocean. Their solution—sticking to the coast, where there is plenty of food to help them grow and defend themselves. A new study published today in the journal Frontiers in Fish Science details the baby rays’ behavior.
“We show that manta rays’ lifestyle isn’t a one-size-fits-all behavior. Giant manta rays in Central America undergo a dramatic shift in space use as they mature,” Jeffry Madrigal-Mesén, a study co-author and project leader of Mantas Costa Rica, said in a statement. “Juveniles remained strictly within shallow nearshore waters that serve as coastal refuges, but most of the tracked adults executed long-distance transboundary migrations along the continental shelf break into Central America.”
Puntitos, one of the immature mantas the scientists followed. Image: Jeffry Madrigal.
Where the pups grow
In the study, the team used multiple methods to track and identify mantas at five locations between 2018 and 2025. Acoustic telemetry uses underwater sound pulses to monitor fish movements and allowed the team to track 59 individual rays. With satellite telemetry, transmitters track movement and behavior from a distance and helped the team track large-scale movements of 12 individuals. Lastly, photo identification helped to identify individual manta rays.
“If we hadn’t used all three technologies together, we simply wouldn’t have been able to piece this puzzle together,” explained Madrigal-Mesén. “Combining these tools turned fragmented data into a unified, undeniable story.”
The team ended up with a dataset of over 12,000 detections. The data showed that young mantas (those with a body about 10 feet or less) stick to shallow coastal refuges. In these more shallow spots, the pups have a safe place that doesn’t overlap with their predators’ hunting grounds. They have plenty of food and places to hide, and even get essential services like cleaning from reefs.
“Mature adults can rely on their massive body size and their ability to dive deep to evade threats. But juveniles don’t have that luxury,” said Madrigal-Mesén. “What is truly amazing is seeing how strictly young manta rays stick to coastal waters as long-term refuges. We see the same individuals more often than once a year. In fact, just recently, they were sighted again at the exact same tagging location. It is always a joy to see them again—they have truly become a part of the family.”
Manta ray in close proximity to a diver. Image: Jeffry Madrigal.
By comparison, nine mature mantas in the study went on expansive migrations along the continental shelf break. One manta ray nicknamed Mickey Mouse because of a spot pattern on his belly had movements that suggest the fish also continue to display loyalty to a particular site once they grow up. Unusually approachable for a manta, Mickey Mouse allowed the team tag him multiple times over several years, which provided a continuous dataset. In 2020, he logged 462 acoustic detections at a coastal hub called El Secreto. He returned to the same shelf in 2023, and stayed there for 38 days.
“Nearshore cleaning stations transcend basic hygienic function; they act as primary social hubs where courtship and reproductive interactions take place,” said Madrigal-Mesén. “Returning to a predictable coastal depot allows mature rays to prioritize social and cleaning needs before undertaking large-scale regional migrations.”
Traveling the manta swimway—safely
Once they leave coastal regions, adult manta rays face different dangers. Coastal areas are often legally protected marine reserves, but the open ocean is another story. They no longer have legal protection and are exposed to dangers from industrial fisheries and vessel strikes.
According to the team, this shows that marine protected areas alone are not enough to protect this highly mobile species as it swims across Central America. They say that multi-national “conservation swimways” that link the domestic juvenile coastal refuges with adult migratory corridors could help keep the endangered rays safe.
“This study opens a new chapter for manta ray research in Central America,” Madrigal-Mesén concluded. “We hope it sparks fresh enthusiasm and encourages future collaborators to join us in executing the new ideas and research projects we have planned for the conservation of this species.”
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