HomeKit Horrible HomeKit camera experience

[slyronit]

I bought a few HomeKit cameras for my home a few years ago. The experience has generally been great, except recently. Sometime a few months ago, the experience went down the drain. Now every time I open the home app, I can only see video recordings from several days ago. Then I have to sit around and watch the app catch up with more recent videos before I can watch recordings from the same day. It takes anywhere between 10-15 mins and it is not acceptable.

Has anyone else faced this issue? If it is just me, I will contact Apple Support.

 

[Elektrofone]

Which cameras are you using? I have a very custom setup using Scrypted to link Unifi Protect cameras which aren’t officially supported in HomeKit but they are working great.

It is very finicky so it could be a lot of issues and would be difficult to troubleshoot.

 

[slyronit]

I have Aqara cameras and all legitimately HomeKit.

 

[slyronit]

I don’t think it is the cameras, because once the cameras send the feed to Apple, they are not involved anymore. When I am scrolling through it ast recordings, the communication should be directly between my device and apple servers, the camera has nothing to do with it?

 

[forzagaribaldi]

Just to chip in that I have been experiencing the same behaviour, also with an Aqara camera (G2H Pro). Viewing in Home on my iPhone and trying to get to a particular day/time results in really erratic jumping about of the timeline.

 

[iBrooklyn]

I have this issue with both Aqara, Eufy but it seems like it only happens when someone haven't checked the cameras for sometime.

 

[slyronit]

Yes. After I had this issue, I checked my cameras everyday and everything worked fine. Then a couple days I didn’t check and again had to wait 10 mins for it to catch up.

 

[btrach144]

Technically your HomePod or appletv receives the video feed. Video analysis is done on the hub. Then the hub encrypts the video.

I’d make sure your hubs are good. Software up to date. Strong WiFi signal. Ideally Ethernet for the Apple TVs.

 

[slyronit]

I don’t think the problem is between cameras and apple servers, rather between apple servers and the devices used to watch the video