Easy to set up and easy to use. Great for senior folks in lockdown. Hands free and cool feature that focus and zooms in on major speaker. Can use voice control- listen to music and other apps. No glitching and clear focus. Bundle package and save money.

Amazing Portal Product from Facebook. Was surprised to see all integrations. Whatsapp, FB Messenger, Alexa and all in one specially web browser inbuilt. Its better that Echo Show. I am impressed with its capabilities along with using as media center and photo frame. Must have device at home. Camera quality is great specially for video calls. No phone no problem. Use portal to call whatsapp or Fb messenger.

---SETUP--- The setup of the Facebook Portal mini was quick and easy. It comes in a neatly packed box and includes a charger/stand combo that requires to be snapped on. After plugging it in, connect it to WiFi and you are good to go. It will start auto-updating and the screen will show you step by step how to connect it to your Facebook and Whatsapp accounts. ---FEATURES--- The key feature of this portal is that you can communicate with your friends and family even if they don’t have a portal. More features are discovered if both parties have a portal such as a smart camera that follows you as you move, co-op and competitive mini games, animated overlays and voice modifiers for comedic effect. Additionally, it has peace-of-mind features that allow you to turn off the camera and the mic that is always listening with a switch slider. It has integrated Alexa, so you can ask it to do things without having to touch the screen at all. ---PERFORMANCE--- The performance of this portal was fast and intuitive. After connecting you Facebook account, you see notifications of people that are active and displays them on your screen. It will give you text prompts of things you can say such as, “Alexa, call Maria.” Both, my voice and touch commands were quickly understood. I use it to check the morning weather before leaving for work, to communicate with my sister who has another portal, and to listen to the news while tending to house chores. The speaker is large but not noticeable, since it will be behind the screen. As a result, you get a loud booming sound if you higher the volume a lot, which is nice if you’re listening to your family or music with the available music apps. ---EXPECTATIONS--- The product meets my expectations. The product is the kind that you think you don’t need it and tell yourself that you probably won’t use it but once you try it, you’ll want to show it to everyone and encourage them to buy it too. My sister, who isn’t a techie, was able to plug hers in and update it with ease. She loved hers so much that she now uses it to call me more often and we will play games by changing our voices. She lives in Texas and I live in Tennessee. Since this Thanksgiving we won’t be able to see each other, she is taking it to our parents home where she will set it up while they eat dinner in Texas and our family in Tennessee. The camera can easily fit 2-3 people but the mic easily picks up all conversations taking place while reducing unwanted background noise. When not in use, it serves as a digital frame with rotating pictures of your choice or from your Facebook account. It also adjusts to the lighting in the room to give you the best picture quality available as the light source changes. ---VALUE--- The price for the Facebook Portal mini in terms of value is worth the purchase for all that it offers. ---APPROVAL--- I highly recommend this product for people who have families that live far apart but need a more convenient way to stay in touch. You’d think that just using your phones would suffice, but this brings a new level of immersion with your family and friends that you will quickly prefer this over text or video chats.

All right, this thing is super fun! I love it! To start off with, I’d like to say that this Facebook 8” Portal Mini was packaged and presented, really wonderfully. It was like opening up a Christmas present! Getting the Portal initially set up and ready to begin the process of pairing and customizing the device’s many features, took some time, but there’s a lot this thing can do, so that makes sense. Just be prepared to spend the time to personalize what you want and need the Portal to be able to do, then you’ll be good to go. Of course, if you quickly skip over most of the features and just choose a friend (or family member) to try this out with, you can do that too. If you’re already familiar with using Facebook Messenger, you’ll get the gist of what this device is all about, and recognize some of the features it has. Though, there are definitely more fun, and useful, features available with this Facebook Portal Mini. The device can be set up in portrait or landscape mode, so you can decide which works best for you during your video calls. I’m not a big fan of Alexa (or Siri), one reason being that even after getting the device you’re using all set up and customized for all those nifty voice-activated features, more often than it seems reasonable, you have to repeat yourself to the darn thing just to be understood, and the AI gets it wrong anyway. Totally frustrating! So yeah, I didn’t bother trying out Alexa with this device, but the Portal does have that option available to add via ‘Settings - Accounts’ for those people who do like using Alexa. Although I don’t use Spotify or Pandora, they are available on this Portal Mini, both can be used while on or off a video call. I have been using iHeartRadio, which is another music streaming service the Portal offers. It’s super convenient being able to say, “Hey Portal. Play 80’s music,” and it does. During a call, you and another Portal user can listen to music together (as long as each user has these music apps set up on their device), with each person being able to adjust their own volume. Plus, by connecting the Portal as a Bluetooth speaker, you are able to play your favorite music straight from your phone. Speaking of which, the audio quality is great! It really is like being in the same room with the other person (or people) you are on the video chat with. Background “noise” was somewhat minimized, yet still there, but not enough to disrupt the video call. We could hear and converse with each other just fine. The Smart Camera ‘pan and zoom’ feature, which is meant to always be able to keep you “in frame,” sorta works as intended. I’ve had it do what I assume it’s supposed to, with more success in landscape mode, but less success while set up in portrait mode. Dunno why. Maybe cause there’s less viewable screen for you to move around in that the camera can see and follow? I really didn’t much care for the Spotlight feature though. Superframe is one of the coolest features of this Facebook Portal Mini. Think of this as mimicking one of those digital picture frame devices which display photographs in a sort of slideshow. This feature works much the same way. With Superframe, you can add photos from your Facebook albums, and if you download the Portal App from the Apple or Google Play stores, you are able to add photos from your mobile device directly to the Portal, without them being added to your Facebook albums for all the world to see. In ‘Settings,’ you can adjust the length of time photos are displayed on screen as they scroll through. Other ‘features’ worth noting: - Make group video calls with up to 8 people, including yourself, through Messenger via Facebook Portal. (I will say that adding another, third, person to my video call, caused the audio and video to became glitchy; though I think it was more the quality of this other person’s internet connection, rather than something to do with the device itself.) - Add friends and family from your Facebook Messenger contacts, to create a ‘Favorites’ list. - You can have up to four separate person’s accounts on your Facebook Portal Mini. - Hands-free voice control - say “Hey Portal” (just like you would with Alexa or Siri) and tell the Portal what you want it to do - make a video call, play music, or launch apps. - StoryTime - “become” a character within the story and read to family members via Facebook Messenger. - For selfie aficionados, Photo Booth will be right up your alley. I had a great time playing around with this! Create selfies ‘Off-Call’ using cool AR effects, and send them via Messenger. - Shared ‘In-Call’ Effects with AR masks and fun ‘mini-games’ to play. - ‘Off-Call’ FB Games are ad-free; a definite plus there. Games include: Draw Something, Words with Friends, and Battleship; a few of my personal favorites. - There are 3rd Party Apps you can download, such as a variety of news outlets, Facebook Watch, the Food Network, and Portal’s browser for even more content. And now, a few words about ‘Privacy.’ I really wanted to highlight this aspect. Trying to do all I can to preserve as much of my privacy as possible - of my personal information and in deciding what is shared, when, and how - is of utmost importance to me. Be aware, this Facebook Portal Mini uses AI technology. How exactly? Portal “listens” for the phrase ‘Hey Portal’ and when that is detected, the device sends a short audio recording and transcript of that voice interaction to Facebook, where a trained team reviews that recording. I do not like this! Though you do have the option to view, hear, and delete any of your ‘Hey Portal’ voice interactions found within your Facebook Activity Log. In addition, for further security, you can also turn this feature off in Portal’s ‘Settings,’ which means your voice interactions will not be stored or reviewed. I would encourage all Facebook Portal users to do this, during the initial set up process, before they really begin using their Portal device. I, myself, went into the Portal’s ‘Settings’ and made sure to deactivate the voice interaction stuff, just for my own peace of mind. For further security, and privacy, you can also disable the camera and/or microphone on the Portal itself. By sliding the switch, you can turn off the microphone and cover the camera lens. A red light confirms they are both off. Just a few suggestions, for future features, and to improve on the ones already available. Perhaps find a way to show ‘Off-Call’ FB Game notifications on the main screen? Maybe add more stories in StoryTime for other age groups/grade levels, up to 8-10 years old. And in the Effects feature, make it so that you could create a “mask” of your own face, and choose a hairstyle or customize your features. Sorta like what other devices and apps do. I’ll say it again, this Facebook 8” Portal Mini is super fun! I really, really have been enjoying making use of it, and its many cool features. Even though you can just use Facebook Messenger to stay in touch with friends and family via video chat - either on your PC, phone or tablet - there is more to be found here on this handy device. Worth the cost? Yes! Worth getting if you enjoy new tech? Yes! Worth getting, if you already use Facebook Messenger and that’s free? Yes! That is, if you buy new tech and will make use of this Portal Mini on even a semi-regular basis, and definitely can appreciate all the additional features this device has ... Yes! The holiday’s are upon us, and this Facebook 8” Portal Mini (with Alexa) would make a cool gift. :)

Tl;dr: High-quality video and sound connect you easily with your Facebook favorites. Fun effects with shared music brighten up your conversations. Close enccounters can be easily had when backlighting is not around. Great for Grandparents! Facebook’s portal provides a nice view into your friends and family’s living rooms. At its core, it’s a nicely packaged, application-specific android tablet. With touchscreen controls, set up is fairly straightforward. Because this is from Facebook, it primarily operates with Facebook messenger and WhatsApp. Set up is easiest if you have the Facebook app on your mobile device. Even without that, you can use the web to authenticate to your Facebook account. Set up is simple enough that most can manage it, even without a tech savvy grandson around. Once it’s set up, using it is a breeze for anyone. Just be care using the word ‘Portal’ as you would ‘Alexa’. Video quality was noticeably better with Facebook messenger, but WhatsApp video was slightly more reliable. The video frame rate was surprisingly fast with very smooth motion. The picture quality and frame rate were both better when using the portal compared to connecting to a galaxy S8 on the other end. Connecting to an iPad had similar quality, but more dropouts. The camera is designed to zoom in on your face and follow you around the room. However, it does not work well with bright backlighting. In my kitchen, we have recessed lights in the ceiling. With the portal sitting on the counter and pointing upwards, those lights are clearly in its field of vision and prevented it from doing its magic. It was still able to find my face most of the time when using the special effects messenger is famous for. However, panning and zooming were more limited. Using it in a different room without recessed lights yielded much more impressive results. Sound quality was very impressive. The microphone easily picked up my wife’s comments from two rooms away, while I was in a call with my sister. We also accidentally activated each other’s Alexa devices via the frame. On the speaker side, sound quality is surprisingly rich considering the picture frame’s compact size. The portal can easily be configured for use with iHeartRadio and Spotify. Amazon music requires a couple of additional steps including links to Alexa. When the portal is not in use as a videophone, it turns into an Internet connected picture frame. They can easily be set to cycle your favorite and your friend’s favorite photos. This is a nice way to keep folks in mind between chats! It also can connect to Amazon’s Alexa. Overall, it’s enjoyable to use and justifies its existence on my counter.