Advances in earth observation using unmanned aerial vehicles: a bibliometric and content analysis (2000–2024)

Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV)-based Earth Observation, as a core technology for geospatial information acquisition, has profoundly reshaped data paradigms in fields like environmental monitoring, disaster response, and precision agriculture. This transformation is driven by its high resolution, flexible deployment, and multi-sensor collaboration capabilities. This paper reviews the technological evolution, current challenges, and future trends of UAV-based Earth Observation since 2000. Given the extensive and heterogeneous literature, we focus on the most relevant interdisciplinary research themes and their interactions. We analyzed 10,524 relevant publications; the country and journal contributing most to the field were China (2,950) and ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (3,400), respectively. Finally, we address critical future challenges:1) Technological breakthroughs (e.g. heterogeneous perception, multi-modal data fusion, knowledge-driven autonomous collection, and lightweight edge-AI models);2) Ethical governance (including privacy-sensitive data desensitization, fair/interpretable algorithm design, and low-altitude regulatory policy adaptation).We believe this analysis will inspire next-generation drone technology development and foster interdisciplinary innovation.