Arlo - Essential Spotlight 4 Cameras and Yard Sign, Indoor/Outdoor, Wireless, 1080p Surveillance System Bundle - White

Pros: - Easy setup (with Arlo hub) - easy installation outside - Picture quality Cons: - Difficult hardware - Configuration - Difficult setup on multiple Accounts Adding the Alro Essential spotlight camera to my existing network of Atlanta cameras was a breeze. The Alro Essential will work with, or without the Arlo network hub, but for the ease of installation I would strongly suggest purchasing another Arlo camera, or the Arlo hub for your home (without it, you would have to manually install it using IP addresses in with your home network making a typical setup non-intuitive for someone who does not have much experience with networks). Unpacking the camera went well. After charging it for the recommended three hours, I opened up my Arlo app, selected the "Add device," and followed the process of adding the Arlo essentials camera. The setup time took approximately two to three minutes. I went outside, found the spot I was looking for, and before installing the camera outside, I made sure the bandwidth/signal was not an issue (it is recommended to do this before you drill the base into your home outside to ensure there are no lag, or dropout issues). After installing the base and attaching the camera to it (this was an issue that I will mention later), I testes the picture quality in the app by specifically setting it up to have a better picture (I would suggest this setup; you may lose battery quicker, but your picture will look better overall). After a few days of usage, the picture, and sound quality was excellent for the use I had of the product. I only lost some picture quality at night, but with a 1080 P camera that is expected. Unfortunately, the camera and Arlo app have their downfalls that I do want to point out. First, the hardware (or base of the unit). The base is equipped with a trackball that allows you to "move" the camera in any position you want. However, what I found difficult was the knob to twist, and keep the adjusted setting. Please know that over tightening the setting may cause the trackball to slip, and your camera may fall over. Also, the back of the camera you physically have to twist onto the connection base so that it holds position while on is rather difficult to take off. What the user should do to recharge it, is carefully hold the base, and gently twist the camera off the base to avoid moving your adjustment setting (when I did not do this, the trackball gave out and the camera fell down and out of place). Second, one of the downfalls of the app is setting up your space to record. I found that this takes a lot of time setting up your zone for recording movement, etc. If you do not set this up appropriately, your camera will record any movement including cars, people walking, and even tree branches swaying in the wind, thus your camera's battery life will fail in days (especially if your picture quality is set to the highest it goes). Also, when adjusting your zone for recording, you may see a loss in any movement if you are not careful. For instance, I was walking near the sidewalk and onto my front lawn and the camera did not record. Unfortunately, this poses a problem because you may want to record someone physically entering onto your property. Again, careful adjustment to your zone settings is needed, and you may experience drastic recording experience; this takes a bit of playing around with, and it mat frustrate the user. Lastly, my wife and I have two different Arlo accounts with an Arlo camera on it already. Now, you cannot use the same account login on multiple phones or devices. Instead, you will need to create multiple accounts and add the cameras separately. Unfortunately, when adding the Essential camera to my wife's account, for whatever reason, the phone would not find/add the camera to it (my wife has a newer phone than I do and we could not scan the QR code for the camera to install). The issue of not having the second camera on her account poses a problem for security, as I am the only one that can view both cameras (if I cannot view it and something happens, it defeats the purpose if my wife cannot see it either). I would strongly recommend a different approach for Arlo in the future for camera installations when pairing across multiple accounts. Overall, the camera performs like it is supposed to. With a little elbow grease and some patience, recording zones, and picture/sound quality are there for the Arlo Essential camera. If you are looking for a better picture, I would suggest upgrading the Arlo 4K camera for better quality overall (at both night and day).

This camera is a great addition to our home. We wanted something to monitor activity in our backyard and it's doing a great job for that. One thing I didn't realize was when it's too cold outside, the camera won't function. It operates with battery power not direct wiring so that is why. Something I can live with as the number of times that happens is limited.

Pros: * Nearly all of the features and capabilities at a lower cost. * Built-in long-lasting rechargeable battery. * Flexible mounting options. * Great features. * Great video quality and range. * Can connect to WiFi directly or the Arlo Hub for better range/quality. Cons: * Slightly cost-reduced materials. * Non-replaceable battery with Micro-USB charging. * Plastic mounting bracket instead of metal. Review: The Arlo Essential Spotlight Camera is just as its name implies- the “essentials” for what make Arlo cameras great. It has all of the battery life, the range, the video quality and the smart features as its more expensive big brothers but at a fraction of the price. For comparison, I already own a few Arlo Pro 3 cameras and the hub station that came with them. These cameras are great, but the Arlo Essential is 90% of the features for roughly a third less cost. If you’re considering this camera, you already probably know the benefits of Arlo cameras in general; great connectivity, awesome video quality and a full suite of smart features even if you don’t choose to subscribe to their service; although the service offers even more smart benefits. I’ll compare the Essential to the next similar camera up in their line, the Pro 3. Note that the Pro 2 has similar resolution to the Essential but is missing the spotlight and siren, and only does black & white at night, so the Pro 3 is probably the next step up from the Essential. For the cost savings, the main differences seem to be slightly lower video resolution, a non-replaceable battery and slightly cost-reduced materials. The materials are not a huge deal, at least to me. I can tolerate a visible seam around the case and a plastic mounting bracket versus the Pro 3’s seamless design and metal bracket. The replaceable battery would be handy when the battery no longer holds a charge, but that’s a while down the road. So the main difference is the video resolution. 1080p is still HD and is probably sufficient for most uses. So… unless you need the extra resolution of the Pro 3, this Essential really is a great balance of all the features you want and need at a lower cost. The main aspects that I didn’t like as much as the Pro 3 is that the camera has to be dismounted and plugged in via MicroUSB to charge an estimated twice a year. The Pro 3 has a magnetically-coupled cable or you can leave it installed on the mount and just swap out the battery. The camera was easy to set up with my existing Arlo system and so far has worked reliably well both during the day and at night. I even set up it to integrate with Apple HomeKit with just a few clicks. Overall, the Arlo Essential is a great camera with a robust feature set.

The cameras were a pain to set up. Everything I looked up online, seemed like a lot of people had the same issue that needed to be resolved by contacting Arlo support. I have to say there support team have great customer service, but I have not been happy with the product at all. After days and many attempts to get working, I finally got it to work. I leave town and a day later the cameras are offline. The solution was I needed to do something with the cameras which I couldn’t because I was away. Well, those cameras became pointless during trip. Maybe they work better some others and what they are using them for, but for me they weren’t a good product. I will try something else.

Upgrade from my old cameras to the essentials spotlights and it’s been great longer battery life and bigger

These cameras are really useful for outdoor use age. They have great visuals and only have like a 2 sec delay. Only downside to them, is the WiFi setup. If activity is happening consistently, the battery’s can die pretty fast. But the positive side to that is, you only need to turn them on when your not home or when you go to bed, instead of having them run all day everyday.

Requires a VERY robust 2.4 ghz connection. Once we got that, the connection was stable. The newest issue is that it stopped recording even though the light comes on when motion is detected. I can see the live view but nothing records. We've talked with service and did all they asked and it still has issues unless we check every single day and restart them when we notice its happening again. We will never buy Arlo again and have steered people away. Of course all this happens outside of warranty. Once the rest of the cameras stop working, we're switching to a better brand.

I really like the camera, I already had two needed another one for the backyard!!East to install &add to the ones I have.