No — DJI is not banned to fly. Since December 22, 2025, DJI, Autel and all foreign-produced drones sit on the FCC's Covered List, which blocks new US equipment authorizations. Aircraft you already own stay legal to operate. What is banned: federal purchases, federal grant money, and public-agency buys in a growing list of states.
That distinction is where most coverage of this story falls apart. Getting it right is the difference between a fleet you can plan around and a panic buy you regret. Here is what changed, what it costs you, and how to decide.
Four separate questions hide inside one phrase. Keeping them apart is most of the work.
| The restriction | What it actually stops | Grounds your aircraft? |
|---|---|---|
| FCC Covered List Dec 22, 2025 |
New FCC equipment authorizations for DJI, Autel, and every foreign-produced drone and drone critical component. | NO |
| Federal procurement bar ASDA + DoD 1260H |
Federal agencies buying or operating covered aircraft, and federal grant dollars paying for them. | NO — but it can end a federally funded program. |
| State law Six states so far |
State and local agencies buying, and in several states eventually operating, Chinese-made aircraft. | YES — inside those states, for those agencies. |
| A ban on flying | Nothing, because there is no such ban. The FAA has not restricted Part 107 or recreational operation of aircraft already in the United States. | NO |
Nothing was disabled remotely. Nothing was recalled. Aircraft in US hands on December 21, 2025 were still lawful to fly on December 23.
Nine dates carry the whole story.
The American Security Drone Act becomes law inside the FY2024 NDAA. A two-year clock starts running on federal agencies and federal money.
The FY2025 NDAA is enacted. Section 1709 gives an appropriate national security agency one year to determine whether DJI and Autel communications and video surveillance equipment poses an unacceptable risk. The statute adds a default: if nobody rules, the FCC shall add that equipment to the Covered List.
The FCC votes 3–0 to adopt rules letting it limit or revoke equipment authorizations it has already granted, where the manufacturer is later listed.
The deadline passes without the DJI and Autel determination Section 1709 called for, so the automatic listing provision operates. The FCC's Public Safety and Homeland Security Bureau adds DJI and Autel under Section 1709 — and, on a separate national security determination of its own dated the day before, adds every foreign-produced drone and drone critical component as an entire category. That second half was the surprise, and it reaches far past DJI. The same day, the ASDA's federal procurement and federal-funds prohibitions take effect.
The FCC carves two routes back out: equipment on the Defense Contract Management Agency's Blue List, and equipment qualifying as a domestic end product under the Buy American standard, meaning more than 65 percent domestic component cost.
The FCC extends its software and firmware update waiver to January 1, 2029. Security patches and substantive software fixes keep flowing to already-authorized foreign aircraft until then.
Both carve-outs are extended to January 1, 2028, and conditional approvals stop expiring so long as the holder sticks to its onshoring plan. The same day, the FCC opens the next proceeding.
That proceeding, PS Docket No. 26-189, reaches the Federal Register. The comment deadline is September 2, 2026; once the record closes the Commission may issue a final rule at any time, and the 180-day wind-down runs from that rule’s publication rather than from the deadline.
The D.C. Circuit affirms in part and reverses in part in DJI's challenge to its Section 1260H designation. DJI stays on the Pentagon list; one finding goes back to the district court for review of the classified record.
PS Docket No. 26-189 is the live one, and it is aimed squarely at equipment the FCC already approved.
The proposal would prohibit continued importation and marketing — advertising, distribution, sale — of foreign-produced "military-grade" drones and critical components already on the Covered List, for buyers other than the US government, after a 180-day wind-down following a final rule.
Read the definition before you relax. A drone counts as military-grade if it does any one of seven things:
Thermal. LiDAR. Docking stations. That is not a description of a weapon. That is a description of a transmission-line inspection aircraft, a roof survey, a corridor mapping run, and a drone-as-first-responder site. Consumer models already on shelves have been named in trade coverage for the LiDAR criterion alone.
End your ability to buy another covered aircraft, and your dealer's ability to sell the one already on the shelf — 180 days after a final rule. For a fleet planning on a five-year replacement cycle, that is the constraint that actually binds.
Ground anything. The notice states directly that the prohibition "would not affect continued use or operation of already-purchased UAS or UAS critical components." Federal government use, R&D and testing, and exempt equipment are all carved out — and because the proposal reaches only foreign-produced aircraft, a domestically built platform sits outside it whatever it weighs or carries.
The comment deadline is September 2, 2026. Utilities, agencies and operators with something to say about the LiDAR and thermal criteria have until then to put it on the record; after that the docket is closed to comment and the next move is the Commission’s. No final rule had issued as of this page’s last review — check the docket before acting on the 180-day clock.
The same rules land very differently depending on who signs the purchase order.
A private utility is not a federal agency, so the procurement bar does not reach you directly. Exposure runs through four other channels: any federal grant or cost-shared program funding the aircraft, the supply of replacement airframes and spares once import and marketing tighten, resale value on a fleet nobody can lawfully re-market, and your own supply-chain security standards — which regulators, insurers and your largest customers are all probing harder.
Utilities running LiDAR and thermal inspection are exactly the profile PS Docket No. 26-189 describes.
Squeezed from two directions at once. Federal grant dollars stopped being usable for covered aircraft on December 22, 2025, and grant conditions bite at audit, not at purchase.
State law is the sharper edge. As of August 2026, Florida, Texas, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi and Connecticut had each restricted public-agency use or purchase of Chinese-made drones, and more states have bills moving — check your own before you buy. Florida’s rule forced agencies to replace fleets already in service; Connecticut’s phase-in runs to 2028. If you run a docked DFR program, docking stations are one of the seven criteria in the new proposal.
This one closed already. The ASDA prohibition on procuring and operating covered aircraft, and on federal funds paying for them, took effect December 22, 2025, and is implemented at FAR 52.240-1.
DJI's Section 1260H designation is a separate matter and survived the August 14 ruling intact.
The least exposed group here. Fly what you own, keep flying it, and plan around three things: spare parts, resale value, and January 1, 2029, when the firmware waiver ends.
Your risk is commercial, not legal — availability and residual value, with no enforcement exposure behind it.
Run these in order. Most fleets stop worrying somewhere around question four.
If a federal dollar touches the purchase or the operation, the aircraft has to be compliant now, not in 2028. Trace the funding before you trace anything else, and read the grant conditions themselves, not the headline.
Six states are on the record restricting public-agency aircraft, with different mechanisms and different dates. Legislatures keep adding. Your own statute is the one that binds you; a national summary is not.
A thermal payload, a LiDAR payload, or a docking station puts the aircraft inside the scope of the PS 26-189 proposal. A bare visual-inspection quad does not.
Firmware support runs to January 1, 2029. A working enterprise airframe lasts three to five years. Run the two dates against each other and a fair number of fleets turn out to retire on schedule before any of this bites.
Grant clawback, a program grounded mid-season, an audit finding, a procurement freeze. Price that against replacement cost and the arithmetic usually answers itself.
For most fleets the answer is not "replace everything now." It is narrower and cheaper: stop buying more of what you will not be able to buy again, spend the next budget cycle on compliant airframes for the missions carrying grant money or state exposure, and let the rest age out on its own schedule.
Four terms get used as though they mean the same thing. They do not, and a vendor who blurs them is telling you something.
| Term | What it actually certifies | Who maintains it | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| NDAA-compliant Section 848 |
A supply-chain claim: no covered Chinese flight controller, radio, ground station or data link. | Statutory standard; usually self-attested by the manufacturer. | Baseline. Ask who verified it. |
| Blue List | Cyber assessment and policy review for Defense Department use. | Defense Innovation Unit programme, list maintained by DCMA. | Strongest. Also an FCC exemption route through Jan 1, 2028. |
| Buy American domestic end product |
More than 65% of component cost is domestic (FAR 25.101, current threshold). | Federal acquisition standard. | A cost-accounting test, not a security assessment. The second FCC exemption route. |
| FCC equipment authorization | The radio in the aircraft, and nothing else. | FCC. Every lawfully marketed drone has one. | Necessary, not sufficient. Ask for the FCC ID. |
If you are replacing a Mavic 3 Enterprise or a Mini, Harris Aerial is not your answer. That is a different aircraft class with different economics, and we would rather say so than sell you the wrong airframe.
What Harris builds is the heavy end: American-made industrial platforms carrying 4 to 40 kilograms, engineered and manufactured in Florida to NDAA Section 848 supply-chain requirements. On 5 June 2026 three of them — the Carrier H6 Electric, the Carrier H6 Hybrid EFI and the Carrier H6 Heavy Lift (H6HL) — were added to the Blue List. That listing is one of the two categories the FCC carved out of the Covered List prohibition, currently running to 1 January 2028. It is a separate mechanism from the one in §03: a domestically produced airframe sits outside the PS 26-189 proposal to begin with, because that proposal reaches foreign-produced aircraft. The Blue List route matters for the critical components inside an aircraft, which is where a US-assembled platform can still be caught.
| Platform | Max payload | Endurance | Power | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Carrier H6 Electric BLUE UAS | 8 kg (17.6 lb) | 48 min | Battery, 32,000 mAh / 12S | General survey, mapping and inspection |
| Carrier H6 Hybrid EFI BLUE UAS | 5 kg (11 lb) | 240 min | 2.4 kW EFI generator | Long-duration corridor and pipeline work |
| Carrier H6 Heavy Lift BLUE UAS | 40 kg (88.2 lb) | 48 min | Battery, 300+ lb thrust | Maximum-lift logistics and equipment placement |
| Carrier H6 Hydrone | 5 kg (11 lb) | 180 min | 2.4 kW hydrogen fuel cell | Noise-sensitive, long-endurance survey |
| Carrier HX8 | 8 kg (17.6 lb) | 43 min | Battery, X8 coaxial | Redundancy-critical, high-value payloads |
| Carrier HX8 Tether | 9.5 kg (21 lb) | 24+ hours | Ground power, 5,000 W / 30 Gbps | Persistent overwatch from a fixed position |
| Carrier H4C Quad | 4 kg (8.8 lb) | 50 min | Battery, IP54 | Rapid-deploy inspection in confined sites |
Ask for the configuration, not the model name. The Blue List names a cleared configuration, not a catalogue. If a Blue UAS listing matters to your procurement, ask us — or any vendor — for the cleared configuration sheet that matches the build you are quoting.
Endurance figures are maximum values without payload; real-world endurance falls as payload increases. Blue List status is noted only for the three platforms cleared on 5 June 2026.
The work a small foreign airframe was never doing in the first place. Eight kilograms of LiDAR and thermal down a transmission corridor. Four hours of hybrid endurance over a pipeline. Twenty-four hours of tethered overwatch from a fixed position. Forty kilograms of equipment placed on a structure.
If those missions sit in your fleet plan and you need them to survive a procurement audit, that is the conversation to have.
The questions buyers actually ask, answered without the alarm.
Not in the sense most people mean. DJI is on the FCC Covered List as of December 22, 2025, which blocks new equipment authorizations, and on the Defense Department's Section 1260H list. Federal agencies and federal grant recipients cannot buy or operate DJI aircraft. Private ownership and flight remain lawful.
Yes. No federal rule grounds aircraft already in the United States, and the FAA has not restricted Part 107 or recreational flight of them. The exception is a public agency in a state whose law bars agency use — Connecticut's use prohibition, for example, arrives October 1, 2028.
Today, yes, if you find one. Models authorized before December 22, 2025 stay lawful to sell, and no new ones are being authorized. Customs detentions under the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act have thinned supply since 2024, independent of the FCC. The proposal now open would end importation and marketing of covered "military-grade" models 180 days after a final rule.
Not before January 1, 2029. The FCC extended its waiver in May 2026 to permit both routine security patches and more substantial software changes for already-authorized foreign aircraft until that date.
It depends on your state and your funding. Six states have restricted public-agency purchase or use, and federal funding has been off-limits for covered aircraft since December 22, 2025. An agency in an unrestricted state, flying an aircraft bought with local funds, has no federal prohibition to answer to today.
A private utility faces no federal purchase prohibition. The practical limits are grant conditions where federal money is involved, availability, spares, and your own vendor-security requirements.
It means the aircraft's supply chain meets Section 848 of the FY2020 NDAA — no covered Chinese flight controllers, radios, ground control stations or data links. It is a supply-chain standard, not a cybersecurity certification, and it is generally self-attested.
A Defense Innovation Unit list, maintained by the Defense Contract Management Agency, of aircraft cleared for Defense Department use after cyber and policy assessment. A listing there is one of two ways off the FCC's foreign-UAS entry, good through January 1, 2028.
For payloads above roughly 4 kilograms, the American-made field includes Harris Aerial's Carrier series alongside several other domestic manufacturers. Judge them on three things: verified payload at your real mission weight, whether that exact configuration carries a Blue UAS listing, and parts and service turnaround in writing.
Trace the funding, read your state statute, list which aircraft carry thermal or LiDAR, and compare your replacement cycle against January 1, 2029. Then spend the next budget cycle on the missions with grant or state exposure, leaving the whole-fleet question for later.
Sources and currency. Last reviewed 31 August 2026. Every date on this page was verified against primary and legal-press sources, including FCC Public Notices DA 26-758 (PS Docket No. 26-189), DA 26-761 and DA 26-454; the Federal Register notice published 3 August 2026; FY2025 NDAA Section 1709; the American Security Drone Act as implemented at FAR 52.240-1; the Buy American domestic-content threshold at FAR 25.101; and SZ DJI Technology Co. v. DOD, No. 25-5367 (D.C. Cir., 14 August 2026). Platform payload, endurance and power figures in the fleet table are taken from the current Harris Aerial product brochures (2026 revision), not from third-party listings. This is an active docket — DJI's petition for reconsideration and Autel's application for review remain pending at the FCC, and DJI's Ninth Circuit challenge is held in abeyance with an opening brief due 2 November 2026.
This guide is written for procurement planning and is not legal advice. Grant conditions, state statutes and agency policy vary, and the rules described here are being litigated. The current Blue List entries can be checked directly on the DCMA Blue List portal. Confirm your own position with counsel and with your grant administrator before making a purchase or retirement decision.