In today’s day and age, there is no one tripod which is universally the best DSLR camera tripod. This three-legged friend that every photographer possesses comes in different sizes, shapes, colors, and types. What is best is what suits your needs the best. 

How to choose your tripod?

The tripod is structurally not as simple as it looks. The tripod is made up of multiple components like its head, the centerpiece and the legs. There are different substitutes for each of these tripod accessories depending on the usability of it. The components which have an alternative to it are:

Head

All the best tripods have interchangeable heads. It is for you to decide which tripod head suits your needs.

Ball heads are the most basic head which is easy to use. It increases stability and provides a more accurate rotation of the camera. 

A gimbal head is for professional photographers who use heavy cameras and lenses.

Legs

The strength of the leg decides if it is a small camera tripod or for heavy gears. It is always advised to buy tripod legs and head for your tripod with a capacity twice or thrice of your commonly used camera and lenses.

Legs were traditionally made with aluminium but now they have shifted to much lighter and durable carbon fiber.

Usability of tripods

The most important thing to understand is that tripods are designed to cater to your needs. It completely depends on what your gears are and the environment you will be using. These are a few ways you could decide which tripod suits you the best:

Travel

Travelling all around the globe with a heavy tripod is not feasible. The best camera tripods for travelers are the ones that are light and portable. 

Ideally, any tripod is a travel tripod if you are willing to carry them around. But a few of them are designed to be compact. They have three to five sections which could be adjusted as per the photographer’s needs.  A mini tripod is the most suitable, convenient and light weight to carry while travelling.

Adventure

The most important asset for photographers who love adventure are lightweight tripods. Octopus tripods, also known as a flexible tripod, are small but designed for adventure. Its height is as high or low as the surface you set it on. 

Depending on the mounting you use, an octopus tripod could be interchangeably used as a tripod phone and camera as well

Vlogging

With a rise in the number of content creators who use their smartphone to create content, the need for smartphone tripods and phone camera stands have skyrocketed. This is the best budget tripod for a beginner who is looking to experiment and explore their niche in phone photography as well. Video Tripods are best suited for vlogging.