With a longtime repute for high quality good lighting, albeit at a hefty value, Philips Hue is a well known model. A transfer into the saturated safety market could seem incongruous, however there are causes to purchase a Philips Hue Secure digital camera. Trust, reliability, and seamless syncing with Hue lights will tempt some, however distinctly common specs, the necessity for a subscription, and the shortage of HomeKit assist make it a tricky promote for others.
Closing in on a month with the brand new Philips Hue Secure wired digital camera, I’m impressed by the efficiency and the tight integration into the prevailing Hue app. But the necessity for a Hue Bridge and a subscription to unlock the most effective options is off-putting, and there are a lot of extra reasonably priced choices in our greatest indoor and outside safety digital camera guides.
Solid Design
Photograph: Philips
The Philips Hue Secure digital camera is available in black or white with a magnetic mount and a 3-meter (round 10-foot) energy cable that slots into the underside of the digital camera and is completely connected to the facility adapter on the different finish. It seems to be like an oversize Google Nest Cam. It feels sturdy and scores an IP65 score, which suggests you should use it outdoors, although the big energy adapter gained’t match some outside sockets. There is an even bigger, battery-powered, wi-fi Hue digital camera that’s higher suited to the outside, although it prices an additional $50 and we now have not examined it but.
I put in the Philips Hue Secure digital camera in my workplace and opted for the model with the desktop stand, which value an additional $30. The robust magnetic mount makes it straightforward to regulate to your most popular angle and it slots into the weighted desk stand securely. There can be cable administration on the underside, however I’m nonetheless not satisfied the stand is definitely worth the further outlay.
A easy QR code scan had my digital camera up and operating inside a couple of minutes. This is a 1080p digital camera with a 141.2-degree area of view that allows you to maintain tabs on a large space, although there’s some fish-eye distortion. The footage was crisp and clear, and I discovered the digital camera coped fairly properly with blended lighting and motion. There’s additionally stable evening imaginative and prescient in black and white. Connectivity-wise, the digital camera helps Zigbee and each 2.4-GHz and 5-GHz Wi-Fi. I discovered it was comparatively swift to load the livestream and there was nearly no lag.
Motion notifications had been dependable and got here by means of swiftly to my Pixel telephone and iPhone 14 Pro. A helpful nonetheless body from every video offers you an concept of what the alert is about, so you possibly can resolve whether or not that you must evaluation it. You can livestream and set blackout zones, and all video is end-to-end encrypted, so solely you might have entry. If you might have a Hue Bridge ($60) and Hue lights, you possibly can set the digital camera to set off them. For instance, you may need an intruder set off flashing crimson lights.
I had the digital camera in my workplace set off the Hue lights within the room and was capable of set them to completely different ranges based mostly on the time of day. It’s neat and works barely higher than a movement sensor, turning the lights off extra swiftly while you depart. The Take Action button reveals choices to swiftly name an emergency contact or 911, activate shiny lights to see higher, and a slider to set off the siren and flash your Hue lights. You also can faucet the Talk button for two-way audio, which provides first rate sound high quality and nearly no lag, making it straightforward to hold on a dialog.
Slick Integration
To get the most effective from this digital camera you want the Hue Bridge and lights, and a subscription. You can both pay $4 a month or $40 a yr for a fundamental plan that covers one digital camera, or you possibly can pay $10 a month or $100 a yr for as much as 10 cameras. Both plans unlock video clip recording to the cloud (there’s no native storage choice), exercise zones, and AI-powered detection able to figuring out individuals, animals, packages, and automobiles. The Basic plan offers you 30 days of cloud storage and the Plus plan ups that to 60 days.