Can anyone recommend a good indoor wireless (WiFi/battery instead) camera? I’ve Googled but am overwhelmed with the options. I just want to check on my dogs while I work. I don’t need night vision or a ton of storage, but would appreciate two way audio and video and the ability to see past videos for 24 hours or so. However, to avoid crazy subscription plans, I would settle for live stream only.
Update: I have a SmartThings hub (why I’m inquiring here) and would like everything to integrate there if possible, but that might change depending on the price.
Lots of options with widely varying levels of cost and features.
I went cheap with Wyze cams, but they do what I need, were very low cost, and I’m not paying any subscription fees. They allow live streaming through their app, have free 7 day cloud storage of 12 second motion triggered clips, allow continuous (or motion triggered) local recording to a micro SD card, have two way audio, and night vision with IR lights. They also have notification capability for motion or for person detection, and take you straight to the 12 second clip when you click on the notifications. They can also listen for smoke alarms and CO alarms and notify you if one goes off. On the less positive side the audio quality isn’t great, there’s a 5 min cool down period between motion events for the cloud clips and corresponding notifications, and navigating the recordings on the SD card is a bit cumbersome. But they’re only $25 and there’s no subscription. They are powered by a USB cable.
I have a family member with Nest cams, and upon comparison they seem pretty similar to me, but have slightly smoother video (same resolution but higher frame rate), and they pay $5/month to get 5 days rolling cloud storage (I think they offer only 2 or 3 hours cloud storage for free).
Other popular options seem to be Arlo Pro, and Ring.
Hopefully others will chime in with their experiences with more full featured options soon.
This forum is specific to the Samsung SmartThings ™ home automation platform. So all of the questions and answers are assumed to be in the context of that platform.
(It’s a very busy forum, so it often comes up near the top in general Google searches, but it is not a general forum.)
Anyway, if you are using SmartThings and you want something compatible with that platform then your two choices are the new smartthings brand Wi-Fi camera or Arlo. Both are worth looking at.
If you don’t need integration with SmartThings , it’s hard to beat the Wyze cameras for basic features At a great price.
For checking in on pets, I would recommend the slightly more expensive model that has tilt and pan so that you can look around the room.
Thanks @JDRoberts and @MinerJason for the recs! I just read up on the Wyze camera, and it does seem to meet my needs. I’m adding it to my Christmas list right away
RBoy
(www.rboyapps.com - Making SmartThings Easy!)
6
There are other options for the SmartThings platform you can consider, the Foscam (which has a live feed video and motion detection available through ST using a custom integration) and Blink Cameras which can be integrated using IFTTT (no live view, only motion detection and arming). Blink cameras run on batteries and are the best in the market for battery operated cameras.
@RBoy, does your custom Integration work with the new ST v3 App? TIA
RBoy
(www.rboyapps.com - Making SmartThings Easy!)
8
The DTH works just fine, you can enable/disable/report motion detection, adjust device settings and take actions on motion detection.
ST has not provided the live view or custom controls option as yet in the v3 app. We update the DTH’s/App’s updated as and when ST releases new controls, so for now the full UI features are available in the Classic app.
