Arlo Integration Problems

I’m at my wits end with Arlo integration. I installed three cameras and have them working with the Arlo app without issue. When I integrate with SmartThings, I get the Arlo Smartthings mode, and three “rules” created under teh SmartThings mode. Oddly, the rules make little sense: “If motion on camera A, do nothing on camera B”. I edit the rules to match what I want: specifically having each camera record 30s if it detects motion, and I give the rules names that make sense to me, as opposed to the serail number names they are initially given

Within Smartthings, I have kept my rules fairly simple: Turn on all the cameras when we are away, turn two of them off when we return, and turn them on at night. Everything works fine for a few hours until all of my rules within the Arlo SmartThings mode are removed and replaced with the original nonsensical rules. I have repeated the process a few time, removed the camera and Arlo app form smartthings and reconnected, and always the same behavior.

My hope was to use SmartThings to simply turn cameras on an off, and have the camera behavior defined in Arlo, as motion detection and recording triggering appears to be much faster if I don’t use SmartThings to trigger the actual recording.

Any help is welcome.

In the Arlo app delete the Smartthings rules and arm the Cameras using the Arlo rules. Smartthings can continue turn on/off Cameras using routines or switches.

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I appreciate the reply. If I understand, i’d set Arlo to the “Armed” mode instead of SmartThings and set my rules up there. I can then use SmartThings to turn cameras on and off?

I feel like I’m missing something with the SmartThings mode and the associated rules. It doesn’t appear to be useful or functional right now.

Was just going through the same challenges; new to Arlo but have had Smartthings. I’m using SmartThings to turn cameras on / off as part of my goodbye, I’m back routines that run with presence sensors. The Arlo Cameras are considered switches in SmartThings for that setup. In the Arlo app, I always use it’s Armed state with recording configurations instead of the SmartThings mode. This seems to be working well. I also have some rules in SmartThings that trigger recording if a door is opened when in away or night mode. This all seems to work well so far. I have 1 camera I always want on vs my patio it goes off when home. I also created a virtual switch and a Smart Lights rule to turn all cameras on/off through Google Assistant voice commands so when doing yard work or playing with kids I’m not triggering recordings. At first I didn’t see the value with SmartThings but a bit of work made it awesome.

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You are correct. Just use the Arlo rules. Make sure you delete any Smartthings rules. I submitted a software trouble report on the Smartthings rule problem.

I thought I was good until last night. It seems SmartThings took over the Arlo armed mode now, I had the Arlo SmartThings mode deleted. I’ll need to submit a problem too as it likes to turn video recording off and set push notifications for audio only. Spring birds are out and set it off immediately. I added another camera last night so it was fine until then.

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It’s rubbish that the only support is armed/disarmed. I like to have different camera sensitivity and recording duration during the night, but there’s no way I can continue to use Arlo’s scheduled mode if I want to also use SmartThings.

We need a much better, tighter integration. And is that means Samsung working with Netgear to enhance the APIs then so be it.

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The integration is crap. Especially if you intend on using the Arlo video recording service instead of SmartThings. Smartthings keeps creating an Arlo mode which enables the cameras but turns off recording. Ha imagine that. It forces you to use Smartthings video streaming and recording which is crap. What I do is don’t use the Home security junk in Smartthings. Instead I setup a lighting director app in Smartthings that turns my cameras on and off based on SmartThings home modes. I setup 4 IFTTT timer events to arm Arlo every 15 minutes. For some reason every so often turning off a camera with a Smartthings rule will also change Arlo to the the Arlo Disarm mode. Turning on a camera from SmartThings will also set Arlo to the crap Arlo SmartThings mode which screws everything up. The IFFT events keeps the Arlo cameras armed which is fine since I am controlling which are turned on or off from SmartThings. So far I’m happy with the result.