Wife wants to buy a Ring as she likes the video doorbell as we both work. Anyone use/have one and how do you like it?
We have a Ring and overall I’m very happy with it. It can be tricky to manage the sensitivity so it is not going off when cars drive by the front of our house and the best we’ve managed to get is it won’t be set off by cars but is still being set off by big trucks.
I also find that when someone does ring and you get the alert on your app that it can take a bit for the app to allow you to answer it - longer than I feel it should and long enough that it starts to feel awkward that you haven’t answered yet.
But I like the piece of mind that it gives me that I have video evidence of packages being left should any of those packages go missing.
My neighbors just installed a Nest video doorbell and love it. You may want to compare features with the Ring.
When we got our Ring the Nest wasn’t on the market yet. I think they have similar features and are similarly priced. We have a Nest thermostat and smoke detectors so it would have been nice to have the video doorbell integrated with the same app. But overall not a huge issue.
Figured i will buy one on Black Friday.
Post any deals you find for us!
I have it and bought several other ring cameras for around the property. It can be delayed to see the porch, but you can also be out of the house and speak through it to the people on the porch.
We have a RING. The battery is not lasting very long. Needs to be recharged every few weeks.
Yes, @adlgel, nest would have been easily integrated into the thermostat, camera, etc app. The Nest/Yale door lock is a good addition too.
@dadoftwingirls Costco will have the Ring 2 video doorbell $40 off during the week of Nov. 16-26th. It includes 1 year of cloud video storage.
We had one for several months earlier this year and removed it when the portion that’s plugged in inside the house started smoking!! Thankfully DH was home for lunch when it happened and was able to unplug it. It was called Ding. Customer service was terrible when he tried to get our money back. Also, the camera/doorbell portion had to be screwed into the brick wall by the front door and was smaller than the original doorbell plate so we had open screw holes showing. I guess it was the wi/fi part that was plugged in inside the house. The camera wasn’t that great unless somebody was standing directly in front of it. I’d get a text when the doorbell or camera was activated; however, by the time I got the text and the video, the person was often already headed away from the camera. It also had a voice system where you could talk to the person; however, it almost never worked because you couldn’t get the volume turned up loud enough for them to hear you or you to hear them.
Definitely do your research. Check the camera angle and the amount of time that it records and how quickly you’d get a text.
OK – can I just share that I got way too little sleep last night, and when I first saw this thread I thought it said “Voodoo Doorbell - Thinking of buying one”. I admit to being a tad disappointed now! And clearly I need to head home from the office to get to bed early! Thanks though; I got quite a good laugh at myself! 
I have a Ring I bought from Costco just over a year ago. Not sure what we are going to do with it now that the “free” year of service has ended. The company was bought by Amazon. I think their eventual plan is to have the Ring doorbell somehow unlock the door so that a package can be delivered.
Since I no longer have an Amazon account, I’m thinking of getting rid of the Ring doorbell in favor of something I can coordinate with cameras or some other electronics.
I too find that I can’t answer the door on my phone using the Ring app with any useful immediacy. It also chimes whenever a heavy truck goes down the road but at least it’s a pretty sound.
It was a bit freaky when I visited a home bound member of my church and her son spoke to me when I rang the bell. From Iraq.
We have the Nest and can watch videos from Hong Kong. A few days after we left a group of our neighbor’s kids came to our door and rang the bell. They seemed very puzzled by why we weren’t answering the door. We could hear them talking, but we have no idea why they were there. Maybe selling wrapping paper? They were very cute. It’s nice though, as we can tell neighbors when there are packages left on the doorstep. There shouldn’t be any, but there have been a few. The last one actually was supposed to go to our next door neighbor.
The software interface on Ring is not as intuitive or as nice as the interface from Arlo. (The difference between hiring programmers from SoCal rather than from NorCal lol). You can delete videos by day for example on Arlo, but with Rinflg, it’s either you choose one at a time, or everything. Also, Ring can take upwards to 2-5 minutes before it will flush the video to a viewable state by the user, whereas Arlo will almost always be viewable without a few seconds. And Arlo storage in the cloud is free for a few weeks while Ring is not free unless you get the Costco version, in which case it won’t be free after the first year.
Personally, I would just stick an IP camera such as Arlo outside the door, rather than have the Ring doorbell. Half the price plus you get way more video coverage, instead of looking at videos as if you were looking thru a peephole.
Do note that my opinions on Ring is based on the fact that I have their Floodlight Cam product.
Our Asian high rise apartment has a video doorbell system. We love it. Not so much when expected guests ring, but when unexpected people ring. It’s great to be able to see who is there before we release the security door to the elevator. I don’t think we would need one at our house in Maine, our driveway is long, and dirt. You can see through the side door window, and hear wheels on the dirt and gravel quite z long way before anyone is actually near the house.
@cameo43 lol!
We just had a Ring doorbell installed about two months ago and love it. It replaced a wired doorbell so no battery to recharge and our front door is far enough from the street that nothing has set it off other than someone pressing it. The app interface could be faster but we are able to open it and see who’s at the door. We have yet to speak with whoever’s been there thus far; so far, when we haven’t been home, it’s been delivery people.
We installed the Ring2 video doorbell, and so far I’m really liking it! My son and I were adjusting some lights on the front porch, and my husband got a notification that motion was detected at the front door. He started talking to us from his office through the doorbell! We haven’t gotten any false alerts, so overall we are very pleased.
We also installed Arlo Pro cameras, but they aren’t a substitute for the Ring, IMO. Our cameras have a slight delay versus the Ring which does not. The Ring is also much better for speaking with the person outside - it’s hard to understand what is said through the Arlo cameras. The Arlos do their job of recording comings and goings, so a combo of both is the way to go. 
We have had the Ring2 video Pro for about a year and really like it. We bought some sort of voltage converter at Home Depot because our door chime wiring did not have the right oomph. I don’t think hubby connected it properly as our chime isn’t loud enough, but it does work great on my phone and on the $25 wifi extender we put upstairs.
I have asked FedEx from Europe to please leave a package at the neighbors, rejected a few unwanted sales calls and told my neighbors cat to scat! I also like to glance at the live feed from time to time.
I think I now pay about 3 dollars per month to save the videos until I delete them.