GoPro alternative?

Budget?

£80 - £100 ? Is that doable ?

I've got an Akaso Brave 7 LE from Amazon which I'm very happy with. I can't always be bothered to record/edit stuff so I didn't want to make a huge investment. They do a wide range to suit all budgets.

It's got all the essentials, decent quality footage, smart phone app to download clips, water resistant as standard (waterproof in the extra case) comes with a load of mounts and wrist watch style remote control.

With mine they contacted me after purchase and offered an accessory pack if I left a review (didn't stipulate a good one!) That included loads of extra mounts, a chest strap etc. 😀

I've been using a Yi 4K for a few years now. Doesn't seem to be a thing on Amazon any more however. Shrug. It's good, but not great. No image stabilization (or maybe I just wasn't satisfied with it so never used it), the usual high contrast issues on bright sunny days when moving from tree-cover to the open for instance which make me want a GoPro or an Insta 360.

I mainly use it set up on a tripod now though. Recording in 2K works for me. Suspect the ~£80 '4k' cameras on Amazon will be similar.

Would also recommend getting a filter pack (think the ND filter is the one I always use) for it to help with sun glare, they can be had pretty cheap, just need to make sure you get ones that fit though!

My 12 year old used his savings to get an insta360 go 2 on eBay.

It's a great wee thing - magnetic medallion mount as well as tripod etc.

Battery life is relatively limited as is storage but it has been great fun and it's incredible to see how he's picked up editing clips with music etc..

Got myself a 'KitVision Escape 4KW’ off Amazon for ~£15 a month or so ago, for the money it's surprising good, doesn't seem to make my riding look any more impressive but unless you're actually producing proper sick edits I can't imagine why you'd need something that can actually do 4K/120fps

I assume for 4x what I spent you must be able to get something awesome from the same Chinese GoPro knock-off merchants...

Just buy him three cheap ones and all the mounting brackets he could ever need, the best shots seem to come from putting action cams where they're more likely to get broken...

OLFI
https://www.olficamera.com/product-category/camera/
Plus they are UK based

You can get the GoPro Hero 2018 model off eBay from around £100. The firmware can be updated so it's the same as a Hero 5.

You could get him an actual gopro within budget, it’ll be older, and used, but still.
Just as an alternative point of view.
Seen a couple on ebay.
That does make it easier to get mounts/cases etc at a later date.

Another recommend what you've got...

I don't video enough to justify the Go-Pro cost, I have had 2 in the past that have failed.

Ended up with an Akaso V50pro & haven't been disappointed. Plenty of good YouTube reviews. They're just over £100 but do come with quite a few accessories

Just buy him three cheap ones and all the mounting brackets he could ever need, the best shots seem to come from putting action cams where they’re more likely to get broken…

I'd suggest this. Not because they'll get broken if they're in cases, but it means you can capture that corner/jump from 3 angles at once then do some editing.

One single camera limits you to either doing a LOT of runs, or POV stuff.

Worth looking at older Go Pros 2nd hand as an option - I sold my 7 for £100 to a mate who uses it for filming canyoning trips. He churns out lots of fun wee short videos with good quality footage.
Modern phones give decent footage as well, so it’s easy enough to combine stuff you’ve filmed on a phone with your GoPro material, and the current Quick app from GoPro lets you pull in material from various sources and compile a useable edit on your phone. You can buy the app even if you don’t have a branded GoPro btw.

Yeah, still using a Hero4 Black after many years of skiing, diving, coastering and skydiving and it still keeps working. The only reason I am thinking of upgrading is that I want Hypersmooth and the 4 does not have that. Well, and I have a dedicated camera helmet now for when I film skydiving.

The cheap GP knock-off I bought had issues with software and cracked the rear screen very early on, but shot decent video for what it was.

Olfi use here. Great little cameras in terms of ease of use and video.

Still image quality isn't great IMO if that matters.

My only real niggle with it is the inability to set a manual shutter speed for video work - I often use mine for selfies (grabbing frames from 4k footage) and this is an issue in some lighting conditions. Admittedly this is a of a bit niche issue but will see me looking at GoPro or Insta360 (if the latter even has this feature?) when it's time to get a new camera.

I originally had a Crosstour 4k from Amazon. I was generally quite pleased but as I was shooting in POV for most of the time I just wasn't happy with the stabilisation.  The Crosstour was supposed to have stabilisation built in but it just wasn't doing the job for me.

In the end I bought a GoPro 8 which was just in a different league and the hypersmooth function is just great.

I realise that this probably doesn't help the OP as there is a big difference in the cost involved.but expectations on performance and output need to be considered depending on the actual requirement.