Outdoor Camera which Automatically Arms/Disarms Alongside ST

Devices & Integrations
1

Hi All.

I’ve had a quick search through the forum and I can’t see anything on the topic which is incredibly recent.

I’ve been using an Arlo Q camera successfully with my SmartThings integration for a few years now and it has worked relatively well. A few days back I dived in and purchased one of the new ‘Arlo Essentials’ cameras… only to discover shortly after that is isn’t compatible with SmartThings! In my naivety I assumed that all Arlo cameras were compatible.

This is really sad news! So now I’m back to the drawing board on choosing an outdoor camera. I’m loathed to go with one of the ST compatible Arlo cameras (e.g. Arlo HD or Arlo Pro) because (a) they are still quite pricey despite their age and (b) I only ever hear bad things about their battery life. I’m also under the impression that the smarter features (e.g. person detection and activity zones) also aren’t compatible with these cameras.

I’ve read on here that Blink cameras may be an option if linked via IFTTT. This sounds promising for me. As long as I can automatically arm/disarm these cameras via ST I will be happy. I’m not overly fussed about being able to actually view the camera within the ST app. Having said that, is it possible to arm/disarm all of the Arlo cameras via IFTTT and ST?

In a nutshell I would like an outdoor camera which arms/disarms itself automatically alongside ST.

Thanks in advance for any thoughts.

Cheers
Nick

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Ah so perhaps I should have actually had a quick look on IFTTT before posing the question!

It seems it is possible to arm/disarm Arlo based on ST mode via IFTTT. Does anyone have any experience with this? Is is reliable, fast to respond etc?

I notice that IFTTT has now gone to ‘paid for’ model so have quickly signed up to it whilst a lower price can still be set!

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Nick,

I don’t have Arlo but I can give some perspective on Blink/IFTTT/ST interface.

Since Blink is owned by Amazon, all official integration with ST was cutoff some time ago. IFTTT works for arm/disarming and motion detection. Looks like Arlo has similar options.

IFTTT is my opinion has always had latency issues. The response rate with Blink/IFTTT is somewhat lacking, sometimes up to a few minutes to register motion detection. Arm/disarming is usually faster but still in the 10-20 seconds range. It is an IFTTT issue, Blink issue, or combo ¯_(°_°)_/¯.

A big downside to the IFTTT integration is that it is one way communication ST to Blink so if you manually arm/disarm Blink in their standalone app, ST is unaware. Not sure if that applies to Arlo as well.

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