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guyguy17

macrumors member
Original poster
Mar 31, 2017
84
10
I have a Ring doorbell 2 and I have been using it for a while now. Although it is not perfect and it has missed some important times when I needed it to pick up something and alert me but it failed or missed it.

Obviously, Ring doesn't work with HomeKit so I am looking at different video doorbells to replace the Ring but is equivalent to it. Of course, every brand is going to come with some pros and cons to it.

With that said, does anyone use another brand besides Ring that supports HomeKit?
 

Itinj24

Contributor
Nov 8, 2017
4,480
2,562
New York
I pretty much tried them all (except for Arlo)

I just got the Aqara G4 for my back doorbell and it’s been rock solid for me. It has a wide view which some may like and some may dislike. Not great for package detection but love it for everything else. The physical doorbell is wide though so you have to make sure it fits in your space. My front doorbell wires come out of the door trim (double doors) and it’s exactly the same width as the trim.

My current #1 recommendation would be the Google Doorbell (wired) with the Starling hub.

Wemo stinks IMO. Loved the very wide field of view but that’s it. I swear I could see behind the camera lens lol. Dropped connection multiple times daily, night vision was atrocious, wasnt a fan of the image quality.

Logitech View. Camera angle way too narrow for my liking but I have a wide front yard with a circular driveway. May work for you. This also gave me frequent disconnections. The build quality I found to be very poor. I had two of these and the front glass was delaminated on both in under six months.

Original Nest Hello doorbell with Starling hub. If HKSV is not a must for you, this is the best of the bunch. Not having HKSV support was the only deal breaker for me with this one.

I also tried Ring back in the day when HomeKit support was promised. I’d get motion notifications finally when the delivery guy was getting back in his truck. Image quality was pixelated. Wasn’t a fan but in Ring’s defense, this was the first iteration of the Ring Pro. I’m sure they’ve evolved since.

Please don’t take anything I said as gospel. YMMV. A lot of variables in play here that may not be consistent with your experiences. These are my experiences alone that I’m sharing.
 
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