- Until recently, Amazon-owned budget brand Blink
was mainly concerned with indoor cameras.
That is until it released its doorbell camera last October.
At $50, it's one of the cheapest of its kind on the market.
Half the price of a standard Ring doorbell
and four times cheaper than Vivint's Doorbell Camera Pro.
On paper, the Blink Video Doorbell checks all the boxes.
Battery and wired setup available, two-way audio,
1080p video, motion alerts and activity zones,
but I experienced a very different product.
More on that in just a second.
Like most doorbell cameras,
it works with batteries or doorbell wiring.
My house doesn't have a doorbell.
So I went with the AA batteries included in the box.
In there, you'll find the doorbell itself,
a flat back plate to mount to the wall,
you can also buy a wedged or angle back plate separately,
two AA batteries, wire extenders
for hardwiring to your traditional doorbell, screws,
wire nuts and wall anchors and printed instructions.
(gentle music)
Once I got everything out of the box,
it was time to set up the Blink Video Doorbell in my house.
Thankfully, setup was simple
with only batteries to worry about.
I added the doorbell in the Blink app,
popped in the batteries, followed the app instructions,
and waited for the magic to happen.
When it's online, you'll start getting alerts for motion,
and when someone presses the button.
Next, mount it to the wall.
Without wires, you can put this camera pretty much anywhere.
Here, I have picked a post on my front porch.
Use the back plate to mark
where you're placing your doorbell,
then drill where you've marked
and secure the back plate to the wall
with the included screws.
Finally, snap the doorbell camera to the back plate.
The whole process took me about 10 minutes.
(gentle music)
Both video and audio
from Blink's doorbell camera were underwhelming.
They got the job done,
and I was able to see and hear what was going on in clips,
but it definitely wasn't quality.
The 1080p video is clear enough to make out faces,
vehicles, and see bigger picture things,
but not sharp enough to impress me.
The night vision was also really harsh.
There was too much contrast, not enough detail,
and adjusting the infrared lights
didn't make much of a difference,
and the audio coming from the camera
and in recorded clips was disappointing, too.
It took me several attempts
and a microphone just to get this clip.
Hey, this is what the Blink Video Doorbell sounds like.
It was pretty quiet before
so I added a microphone next to it.
Here's a taste of what the audio sounds like
in the recorded clips from Blink.
That's because,
doorbell doesn't work with.
The video quality's not great.
The audio quality, even more not great,
but the biggest issue was live view.
For IP security cameras of any kind,
this is the most crucial of features.
It's where you see what's happening live,
snap stills, record footage, and use the two-way audio,
but when I went to check the live view in the Blink app,
it wasn't available.
At first, I thought this was a user error.
Maybe I installed the camera incorrectly
or my internet speed wasn't up to snuff,
but no matter how many things I tried,
I could not get the live view to work.
That's when I finally called customer service.
The rep I talked to was super nice,
but I was not happy with what she told me.
Basically, these doorbells aren't meant
to use batteries alone the way I did.
Live view is available anytime
if you hardwire your doorbell
or pair the battery powered with a Sync Module 2,
but that requires you to either one,
have an existing doorbell,
or two, buy the $35 module with your camera.
I could still technically see live view, but to do so,
I had to check the camera's notifications
within 60 seconds of it appearing.
Otherwise, I'd have to watch the footage later
in the app's library.
So basically, if you're going
for the $50 battery-powered doorbell,
you'll also have to shell out another $35
for an extra device, or be really, really on top
of your notifications.
To add to all of this,
you can only access the two-way audio
through that live view.
So I could only speak to someone on the other side
if a notification happened to pop up
and I caught it in time.
Top all of this off with mediocre video
and really crackly audio, I'm not impressed.
(gentle music)
Moving on to the Blink app,
this is the control center for your Blink Video Doorbell
and any other Blink cameras you might have.
From here, you can arm and disarm your doorbell
just like a security system.
Arming and disarming sets the motion
and ring alerts into action.
Arm the doorbell and you'll get a notification for both.
Disarm it and the app stays quiet.
I thought this was a pretty neat idea
and different from other doorbell cameras I've tested
like Kami, but adjusting any settings like this
can get really clunky in the Blink app.
When you change settings in the app,
you also have to press the doorbell's button
to make those changes go into effect immediately.
Otherwise, it takes up to 24 hours,
or until someone rings the doorbell to save those settings.
Maybe this is just another battery life-saving feature
like no live view, but it was a real pain in my test.
I'd adjust the setting,
have to get up and go ring the doorbell,
then check and see how that setting changed things.
You can adjust features
like motion detection, activity zones,
ringer, and speaker volume, night vision status,
and infrared intensity.
There are also options to tweak video quality, clip length,
and find refreshers on the installation instructions
just in case you need them. And in the events log,
you can look through past events that the camera's captured
like anyone ringing your doorbell
or motion captured within the past 24 hours.
These were really easy to look through and share,
but it's hard to ignore how bad the video and audio is.
(gentle music)
You gotta store your footage somewhere.
Blink offers local storage through its Sync Module 2.
That's the $35 device I didn't have.
With that device and a separate USB flash drive,
you'll be able to store your footage offline
without the need for a cloud subscription.
But if you're like me and didn't grab a Sync Module,
Blink's cloud storage comes in Basic and Plus plans
starting at $3 a month.
The doorbell I tested
came with a 30-day trial for Blink Plus,
which helped my testing a lot.
Whether you're on team local storage or team cloud storage,
keeping notable events available is a smart thing to do.
Having that footage can help you prove
when a package is stolen, for example.
Between you and me, I think I'm just bitter that Blink
wasn't clearer about how important the Sync Module is
for using the doorbell with batteries.
As for smart speakers, Blink is an Amazon-only device.
It only works with Amazon's platform,
but if you have an Echo with a screen,
you can stream footage from your speaker
and see who's at the door
without having to pick up your phone.
Your smart speakers can also announce
when someone's rung the doorbell,
making it a kind of stand-in doorbell chime,
but unfortunately for Google
or any other smart speaker users,
this is all exclusively Amazon.
The Blink Video Doorbell is a bargain for sure,
but if you don't have an existing doorbell to wire it to,
you might wanna consider other options out there.
It's hard to definitively say that this video doorbell sucks
since I have had such limited experience
without the Sync Module.
Most of my problems with this device
were because it cut out features
like live view to save power,
but I've tested plenty of battery-powered cameras
that let you access live view and two-way audio
without turning it into a race against time.
All that aside, I was still disappointed
in Blink's newest product.
Its audio and video quality was subpar
and the night vision was just as bad
and add all of that to the weird settings quirk
that requires you to physically press the doorbell
or wait 24 hours for changes to go into effect.
No thank you.
This might all be a different story
if you wire a Blink Video Doorbell,
or just want a simple upgrade
to check in on important events.
(gentle music)
We have a whole list
of our favorite video doorbell cameras on SafeWise.
You can find the link to that in the description,
and like and subscribe to our channel.
We'll be reviewing more video doorbells
throughout the month and leading up to our lineup
of the best battery-powered video doorbells
at the end of June, so don't miss that.
Thanks for watching and stay safe.
Thanks for watching, and if you want more safety,
head over to safewise.com and you can find reviews
and our lineups of best home security systems,
best wireless cameras, and more, stay safe.