Atomos Just Reinvented the Ninja – What You Need to Know About the 2026 Lineup
By Stephanie R
After seven years, the iconic Atomos Ninja V design has officially been retired. In its place, Atomos has launched a completely reimagined generation of 5-inch monitor-recorders built from the ground up for modern production workflows — and the 2026 lineup is worth paying close attention to.
Here’s a breakdown of the full 2026 Atomos lineup:
Learn more about Atomos here
Read the full transcript below:
[music] [music] The latest Atomos Ninja is here. This is the Ninja RAW and it completes this new lineup of three models. the new Ninja Roar, the Ninja TX go, and the [music] Ninja TX to form the new generation of 5in Atomos monitor recorders. And this new generation is a huge step forwards for Atomos. The Ninja form factor has remained largely unchanged since the Ninja 5 launched seven years ago, [snorts] but that design was far from perfect with ports on its side, the battery mount over to one side which unbalanced everything and it used large SSD drives and at the time that was great, [music] but it now definitely feels outdated. The new body design fixes [music] all of that with a CF Express slot on the side, central MPF battery slot in the middle, which is perfectly balanced, dual HDMI and dual SDI ports as well on the higherend models, where they should be on the back of the unit, and of course, a whole host of smart cloud features and extra functionality as well. So, let’s go over the range, the differences between them, and the benefits that this new generation bring, which they all share. So, let’s start by explaining the [music] differences between the three models because I’ve got to admit it’s not immediately obvious from the product names. [music] The Ninja TX is the flagship model which does everything. All of the cloud functionality, all of the recording functionality, SDI and HDMI in and out, everything that the Atimos Ninja products can do. Then the TX go is the same thing but without the SDI ports or the wireless time code. The HDMI ports are slightly less capable as well. It can do up to 6K 30p rather than 8K. Then there’s the new Ninja RAW which also removes the Wi-Fi antenna connections. So that means no camera to cloud, no live streaming, no NDI functionality or any of those features. There’s also a couple of recording differences. You can’t do simultaneous proxy recording on the RAW and you can’t do Avid DNx HD. So that’s the range. The Ninja RAW is the ordinary monitor recorder if you like HDMI only, but you still get 6K raw recording over HDMI and camera control and all of the monitoring functions. All of what we think of as the normal Atomos Ninja features if you like from the Ninja 5, but with this new updated design. And then you can step up to the Ninja TX go to get the cloud functionality. And then you can step up to the flagship Ninja TX to get the SDI ports as well. I mean, that is oversimplifying things. Of course, it is. But hopefully that helps explain what’s going on here a little bit. So, let’s now take a closer look at this new physical design. And it all feels very familiar at first glance, but on closer inspection, everything is different. from the ridges around the screen to the exhaust fans. And they’re light at 400 grams each. That is slightly more than the previous generation, but to be honest, it kind of doesn’t matter because they’re now balanced on top of your camera because of the central battery slot and the smaller media. The previous design was so sideheavy, which really made it feel heavier than it actually was, if that makes sense. Even with smaller batteries. One small touch which I really like is that the base underneath the battery mount has a flat angle to it, meaning that if you need to, these Ninjas can stand by themselves quite reliably on a desk or table. On the back, we have the ports, of course. This is the flagship Ninja TX, which has everything. HDMI in andout on the right and 12G SDI in-n-out on the left, and it can cross convert between those, which is useful. There’s three USBC ports, one of which is dedicated for PD power input. It needs 45 watts, which most of the bigger camera batteries or V-logs with a USBC out on them can handle. The other two USB ports can do a few things. You can connect storage and record onto them directly, which is great for when you don’t want to use CF Express Media or when you want to go straight into your editor as quickly as possible. Or you can connect a network adapter to connect an Ethernet cable for live streaming or camera to cloud instead of relying on the Wi-Fi. And of course, this is how most of the camera control functionality is working over one of these USBC ports. So having three is very welcome. There’s then three antenna ports on the top, two for Wi-Fi and one for their wireless time code system. That’s all on the Ninja TX though. As we move through the lineup to the TXO and the new Ninja RAW, as you can see, ports start disappearing depending on the model. The HDMI in andout and the USB C ports remain unchanged though throughout. The biggest difference though with this new design is definitely the CF Express TypeB card slot, which is exactly the right choice of media. The cost per gigabyte has come down massively in recent years. The speed is fantastic and it’s now the main media type in most modern professional camera systems as well. So, it’s a fantastic media system to be investing in. We also get a tally line now which is a nice physical change. And something else that’s worth mentioning is that the HDMI ports and the USBC ports have these locking covers which you can screw on. Now, this lets them work with Atomos’s locking HDMI and locking USBC cables. And you get one of those locking USBC cables in the box with each of these ninjas. The screens are all the same panel on each model. They’re a 1500 nit HDR LCD panel which look great and they’re easy to calibrate. So that’s the physical design, but let’s go over the software functionality. Now this is going to be a quick run through, not an in-depth one as there’s a lot going on here. And also, most of you will have been familiar with the essential bits by now if you’ve used other Atomos products, especially recent ones. So, let’s break it up into two main areas. Firstly, there’s the features which we all know Atomos for, monitoring and recording. Now, this is obviously their strength. It always has been, and we get more now than we ever have before. There’s full L support, exposure tools like Arie, false color and Ezone, log conversion, grids and markers, focus assists, onion skinning options. You know, there is so much here and it’s all laid out so well, which I think is something that people often gloss over a little bit. This is one of the nicest and the best designed UIs on any on camera monitor on the market in my opinion, which makes a big difference. It’s a definite strength of Atmos products. And for recording, we get up to 6K 30p on the Ninja RAW and the Ninja TX go and then up to 6K 60p or 8K 30p on the flagship Ninja TX. Now, the elephant in the room with recording is of course that internal recording on modern cameras has got better and better over the years, and so there’s less need to rely on external recorders nowadays. And that’s absolutely true. Gone are the days of compressed internal 8-bit recording on your camera. But this is all about speeding up your workflow and making your life easier as a working professional. On the high quality end of the spectrum, that means using ProRes RAW, which is now supported in most editing software, including Da Vinci Resolve, and plays back really well, especially on Macs. But it’s not just about that high-end raw recording. Atomos can also do any flavor of ProRes or Avid DNx HD on the higherend models, which might well be the codecs which your clients are actually requesting you to be using. And if you want even smaller file sizes while keeping quality high, they are fantastic at H.265 recording, which incidentally is what we use for all of these videos. And you get four different quality levels of H.265 5 recording as well as a choice of 8 bit or 10 bit so you can find exactly the right level between quality and file size for your work and particular situation. It is great to see Atomos developing in this area as well as the higherend recording as so often companies focus on just pushing that higher end of recording formats forwards. And that is great of course. I’m certainly not complaining about that. But in reality, working professionals nearly always need to use a variety of different approaches depending on the project at hand. But then there’s all the features which have been added to these over the last few years that we don’t traditionally think of Atomos for. Camera control being the latest one. All three models here can do camera control and there’s a compatibility list for cameras on Atomos’s website. For this to work, you normally need to connect a USBC cable as well as your HDMI or SDI signal. So, it does mean a little bit more cable management if you’re on a lightweight rig, but it is worth it because the camera control works really well. It’s one of the best systems I’ve seen on the market. It’s quick and responsive with a clean and helpful layout. Touch to focus is easy, and it will start tracking modes on the cameras as well. It’s all so useful to have access to. Then, there are all of the internet access based functions on the TX and TXO. Of course, we’ve seen these on several models from Atomos by this point, but here it’s all integrated into the main unit, which of course is so important on these 5in models, which are all about portability. I actually did a video last year on the cloud functionality specifically, which I’ll link to down below. Now, it was before this generation of ninjas was launched, and you know, just like any other cloud-based service, updates are constantly happening all of the time. But the core information in that video is still relevant. So give that a watch if you’re interested in the cloud functionality. But you can upload footage to numerous cloud services for backup or remote editing workflows. You can do live streaming in several different ways. You can send and receive NDIHX3 signals. So if you use an NDI workflow, these become very useful. And on the Ninja TX, Atmos even have a whole wireless time code system which works with their Ultraync lineup of products. [music] There is so much going on in Atomos products these days. In terms of software, most Atomos products recently have been a world apart from the original Ninja 5, which launched 7 years ago now. [music] But until this lineup specifically, the actual hardware has been pretty much unchanged. [music] The Ninja Roar, the Ninja TX go, and the Ninja TX are a complete generational leap over that previous hardware design. The physical differences alone are likely going to be worth the upgrade over other Atomos products for most people, let alone the software advancements if you’re coming from older Ninja [music] recorders. the core Atomos experience, you know, great monitoring, great recording. It’s better here than it ever has been before. And there’s just so many extra [music] features on top as well, like the camera control and camera to cloud functionality. But what do you think of the new Atomos lineup? Let us know in the comments. And if you want to buy one of these for your own work, of course, we would be [music] happy to help here at Prov. Thanks for watching and I’ll see you in the next one. Hallelujah.