Customer Ratings & Reviews

I love the cameras , perfect for indoor monitoring or even outside.U can move them around and are wifi /wireless..GREAT PRODUCT

The Arlo Essential 4 camera 2k set is a great way to provide video security in your house for not a lot of money. The 2K video is very clear and provides 130-degree Field of view and has an integrated spotlight and color night vision. The spotlight is fairly bright and seems to assist in the color night vision. Battery life in the essential cameras have been pretty good, but if you have a hard-to-reach place to install one, I would suggest either the XL model for longer life, or getting a Solar panel to charge it. Mine have been installed for about 2 weeks now and the battery is down about 20 percent. I expect to get about 3 months max out of the battery at this point. My Alro Ultra camera (which is at my front door and gets the most activity) lasts about 6 months easily. I was not happy with the mounting options that come in this box, and I had to get some articulating mounts. The ones in the box are only designed for these cameras and they only provide a level install. You cannot angle the camera at all with these mounts. Another feature that these cameras have is a siren and the ability to two-way talk to someone on the other side. The volume of each of these leaves something to be desired and they are basically useless in my opinion. Installation is where I really hate these things though. I am not sure if it really is the fault of the app or my Orbi wi-fi home mesh network. These require a 2.4GHz network and I have some dedicated for my IoT devices such as this. For some reason the Arlo cameras are not very consistent with the set up. The first camera usually works very smoothly and connects w/o any issues. The second camera I tried right after, would not connect no matter what I did. I restarted my phone, reset the Arlo App, rebooted my routers, nothing. I then took it to my office and set it up there w/o any issues. I brought the camera home again and it set up just fine on my network after that. However, once they are connected, they are very reliable and good to go. So, your results may vary since your home set up will always be different. Overall, I really like having these cameras and I do subscribe to the Arlo Secure Multi-Camera plan. This covers all the cameras that I have 11 of them overall. You do get a free 30-day trial that comes with these cameras and once I added these cameras, I automatically got a free month. This allows to have one camera set up for package detection (front door) and all of the cameras can detect Vehicle, person, or animal. I find this detection to be accurate for the most part and you are also given a 30-day cloud storage option as well. Arlo still has the free plan which includes the 7 days of storage, but no smart detection.

I like these cameras but it is a bit confusing to use them. And the worst thing is you have to have a subscription for them to record anything for you to look at

I am a DYI type person, I found the installation and set up very easy to do.

Love the arlo cameras because they have a quality picture without paying a monthly fee

It’s okay, it doesn’t always auto record when there’s movement happening so when I want to look back on some footage that it should have recorded, nothings there. The quality is okay, not crisp, but do able

They download very quickly, that's the only problem.

Easy to use and setup. Picture/video is crystal clear

Excellent purchase of genuine tooth, having high quality products for our safety and above all great service from Best Buy; The best satisfying our needs

Don’t buy these if u going to put them high on the wall bc the change will end in 1 to 2 day of u putting them on but if they going to be where u can reach then they are good for u

The Essential outdoor camera a new addition to the Arlo camera arsenal. This camera is very well made and it has a small footprint. It is slightly larger than the Arlos pros but not by a lot. It comes with an internal rechargeable battery that will last up to 4 months according to the manufacturer. In about a week of use, the battery is around 80%. To recharge all you need to do it plug it to the power with the included USB-A to USB-C cable. The setup is very simple and took about 5 mins or so. If you already have the Arlo Secure app like myself all you need to do is add the device and follow the instructions. The hardest part is finding a good spot to mount it. The mount itself is small and sturdy, kind of hard to get the camera out once mounted. This camera comes with some nice features: motion detection, night vision, spot light, siren, and two way audio with noise canceling. You can also set detection mode zones and adjust the recordings to 120s and more. The 2k image it’s actually pretty good, and the zooming is very detailed. The night vision is also good but to see the color during the night there has to be some type of light like the spotlight. The spotlight is actually bright and the brightness can be adjusted. This camera lacks internal storage so you rely on cloud storage. The 130 degrees field of view is plenty to get most of your front or back yard. The speaker and siren sound are pretty much what you would expect from a camera this size, not super loud but loud enough to be heard. Overall this camera functions as you would expect from Arlo cameras. It has good video quality and plenty of features without breaking the bank. It’s compact, well made and easy to setup and install. In the box you get the camera, installation kit, USB charging cable and manuals. Included with the purchase you get Arlo secure for 30 days.

This is a great protection system for a great price I feel there is no better way too buy gadgets then bestbuy the best of the best

For a camera, the most important attribute, image quality which is very good in this case as I expected. This camera capable of capturing video of 2K in resolution, i.e., better than HD. Has 130° Field of View, integrated Spotlight, 2-Way Audio, integrated Siren and Color Night Vision. This camera is weather-resistant so it is suitable for indoor and outdoor use. Hopefully, it can survives heavy storm which is frequent where I live. The camera is battery powered but it is built-in and not user replaceable. To charge the battery, you will have to take the camera down and plug in a usb-c power source. usb-c power source is not included, only an usb-c cable is included. One month of Arlo Secure Plan Trial included. The camera is easy to setup, just install the app and follow the instruction in the app to add the camera. Also because it connects directly to Wi-Fi, the setup is very simple. There is no need to connect to a hub. However, it immediately requires firmware update to the camera and the process is a bit slow and it failed the first time, I had to try a second time to get it to complete. I have the Pro 2 camera so when I try to add this Essential 2nd gen camera, the app prompted me to upgrade the app. The specification on the web states this camera has PIR motion detection which is a plus because it is more accurate to detect motion. The website also states the wifi is using 2.4GHz, I believe this is for better range. However, the wifi range is not good compare to my S21 Ultra mobile phone. The camera barely works 55 feet away from my wifi router but any further will be too slow to connect. Coming from Arlo Pro 2 which is an old camera, after the app is updated, it no longer allows custom mode, only three modes are available; armed, disarmed and standby. Motion detection activity zones for existing Pro 2 camera no longer available. Also, a very big disadvantage, no local storage. You can no longer store video footage on usb drive connected to the hub.

If you’ve owned the Arlo line of security products, you’re probably used to needing a hub to setup your camera system. So, I was surprised to see that Arlo now offered an “Essential” camera which only required use of the Arlo App and your WiFi connection. In the box you’ll find the camera, a USB charging cable, a wall plate, and the screw on mount. Charging the battery was a simple as simple as uncovering the protective flap on the bottom and plugging it in. My camera took about an hour to charge before it was ready to go. To mount the camera, you’ll need to use a wall plate, which allows you to screw into the wall. It’s fairly straight-forward to install, and the manual does a good job explaining how to place it. The mount itself will require you to screw it into the camera using a Philips screwdriver, and then it essentially snaps into place with the wall plate. It’s important to note that the Essential camera can only be mounted from the rear of the camera, so keep this in mind when deciding on placement. In my case, I mounted this outside of my residence overlooking an area where I park my vehicles. The 2K resolution does offer more clarity than the standard Full HD cameras, and while not 4K, is very clear for objects that are closer to the camera. The camera can also illuminate it’s immediate area when used for night time playback or when capturing motion. While this does offer color night vision, I found that I often had to toggle off the built in spotlight to capture it clearly. The camera would then toggle it back on, leading to a basic night vision picture. I’m not sure if this was due to the environment, or just a default of the camera. The 130 degree field of view offers nice coverage area. The motion detection does a great job triggering the spotlight and starting a recording. You can also set up activity zones to set where the camera triggers motion alerts. There is built in 2 way audio, and does require the person to be a bit closer to the camera to hear you clearly if it’s a louder environment. However, the Emergency Siren (which can be set to trigger or enabled in the app) is LOUD, even waking me up in the middle of the night, since it’s right outside my window. There is almost no way this wouldn’t scare someone if they weren’t expecting it. Given this is their essential line of cameras, you won’t have much for local storage, so keep that in mind if you’re wanting an “all-in-one” solution without a subscription for some features. Overall, I was satisfied with the ease of set up and the clips it’s captured so far. The motion hasn’t skipped a beat, and does a good job ignoring smaller movements (like a bug flying by) compared to my previous Arlo camera. It’s also nice not being limited by a hub, but I do miss being able to store my recordings locally without it.

About a week after purchasing this camera, it developed a hazy picture. It appears that condensation has accumulated inside. Arlo support has been terrible… refusing to replace the camera, and eventually going silent and refusing to handle the situation. Terrible support experience on a defective product. Avoid Arlo!

If you actually got EVERYTHING these cameras are capable of doing for the purchase price alone, this package would be a really good value and pretty easy to recommend. However, as is becoming more common these days with DIY home security systems (Arlo is not alone in this shortcoming), virtually all significant features that would seem to be fundamental to providing more than simplistic after-the-fact video monitoring is locked behind a subscription paywall. Add to that an inexplicably dodgy network experience (at least for us), and severely limited mounting options, and you’ve got a recipe for a poor value for your dollar…unless you head into things prepared to add nearly 1/3 to 1/2 of the purchase price (depending on whether you got it on sale) every year just to access the features that may have attracted you to the security camera system in the first place. You’ll need to have the Arlo Secure app downloaded and ready to go before you begin. Unfortunately, because there are 24/7 emergency response options included in the paid subscription services (and in the one-month services trial), you are asked to provide a lot of very specific detail about yourself and your residence that may bother some who are concerned about yet another company wandering around with all their vitals. From there, the Arlo Secure app provides a host of colorful, full-motion setup screens that walk you through camera unpacking, installation, and network access. First-time setup for each camera took a while for me because each camera required an update that took maybe 12-15 minutes to complete. Physical installation would seem to be straightforward. Using two screws, you affix the backplate to your mounting surface, screw the mounting arm into the back of the camera, then slide the camera and attached mount into the plate. It is here where some design choices/flaws started to make themselves known. The mounting plate system would seem like a great idea to hide/secure the mounting screws underneath the camera, until you realize that the internal batteries are not removable. So, once you need a recharge, you have to force the camera mount off of the snap-together fitting on the backplate and bring the whole assembly over to a charger. I found this process to be nerve-rackingly difficult because of how much force was required to break the hold of the snap-lock tabs between the mounts. There is also no pivot or tilt in the mounts themselves, so you have to count on the mounting surface to be angled and oriented just how you want it or settle for whatever you get from the camera sticking out perpendicular to the wall and level with the ground. Granted, the FOV is pretty wide without substantial fisheye distortion, but to not even be able to angle the camera downward from a really high mounting point (like where would-be hooligans can’t yank or break the camera from its mount) feels like a significant obstacle to placement in some cases. Assuming you do get things mounted to your liking, the video performance of the cameras is actually quite stellar. 2K images and video feeds are clear and colorful and the included spotlight is shockingly effective at illuminating large swathes of real estate (traditional night vision is also available)—I’ve included 3 nighttime snaps from our second-floor deck down into the swimming pool area to give you a sense of what unassisted video vs night-vision vs LED floodlight images will get you. Motion detection sensitivity, custom detection zones, person detection features, image quality settings, etc. can all be customized in the app—but a rather significant feature like, oh…say…recording motion events to review at ANY time later, is a paid premium feature. This becomes significant for virtually any detected motion because you WILL get scads of motion notifications pushed to your phone (motion detection itself seemed to work VERY well), but if you happen to not be able to attend to your phone right then and there, you cannot call up the video feed for the indicated camera to see what triggered the alert unless the person, animal, event, etc. is still conveniently positioned directly in front of your camera’s field of view. I DO understand that security subscription services including cloud storage of event recordings are becoming the norm for DIY home systems like this, but to not even offer a paltry few GB of local storage severely cripples the usefulness of these cameras once you’re outside of the trail period and/or elect not to use the subscription services at all. At that point, the cameras feel less about security and more like an always-on livestream cam that happens to push-notify when something happens in front of the lens. Strangely, I didn’t get any push notifications from my iPhone to my paired Apple Watch as I have with some other similar home security products; this would at least have alerted me to grab my phone if it wasn’t within earshot for the alert, or already vibrating in my pocket to respond to a motion/security event. 2-way audio is available between the camera and the app even without subscription services, and it’s a nice feature to have on board. In practice, however, it was difficult to use even in a quiet environment as the speaker output on the camera is limited and the mic’s pickup distance seemed fairly short before audio quality took a nosedive. Even using them indoors for testing, my wife could barely hear me talking to her through the camera, and I could barely make out her replies even with my phone’s volume turned all the way up. Finally, I’m surprised that with the bump in video quality to 2K (and therefore increased bandwidth requirements for a video stream), Arlo elected to go with 2.4Ghz WiFi only. We live on a cul-de-sac without many neighbors, so the WiFi spectrum isn’t all that congested. I have two 3-channel AX-11000 and one 4-channel AX-16000 router in a mesh configuration that covers all three stories of our house and a good portion of our yard in all directions. However, it would easily take 10-to-30 seconds or more before a live camera stream would come up in the app…and one of them was a camera mounted above a doorway that was just 10 feet from the main house router. Still other times the cameras wouldn’t start a live feed and all and I’d just get the little white spinning wheel of hope in the middle of the last still image recorded until it was clear the connection just timed out. Suddenly the lack of local storage became even more problematic because such delayed video streams means that even with a near-instant push notification that motion was detected, I would be unable to see what the heck was going on without leveraging the premium subscription storage services. Even more frustrating was that even after I DID get some livestreams going, the snapshot and recording controls seemed sluggish with easily a 5-10 second or more delay before it was clear that recording had commenced, or an image was snapped and saved. Sadly, my overall experience with the Arlo Essential security cameras was a bit of a letdown—which was even more of a bummer given the stellar video performance. Granted, if I was willing to shell out for the premium services, I might feel a bit differently as some of those features could even offset a few of the connectivity and responsiveness issues we encountered. But based purely on what you get inside the box for the price you will pay at checkout, I can’t say as this camera package represents a very good value.

Easy to install u can’t go wrong Read instructions veryeasy

These cameras are terrible. Needed solar panels to keep them charged. The Arlo solar panels are not even the ones that you need. You need the generic solar panels and have barely worked sinced installed

## Design Unlike other Arlo cameras I’ve used, the 2nd generation of the Arlo Essential cameras don’t have a removable battery. While you can’t simply swap in a fully charged battery for a drained one, the Arlo Essential 2nd gen camera does use a standard USB-C connector, which I do appreciate as some of my Arlo cameras use a proprietary cable that I always need to hunt down when it is time to charge. ## What can this camera do for free and what requires a Arlo Secure subscription? For free, you get: - Live streaming - 2-way talk - Very basic motion detection alerts (no activity zones, no person, vehicle, or package detection) A paid subscription to Arlo Secure gets you: - Cloud recordings - Activity zones - Person, vehicle, and package detection - Animated thumbnail previews included with the motion alert push notifications - 24/7 emergency response Since there is no onboard intelligence on the camera itself, I feel many will find that this camera is annoying when used outside without a subscription, because animals and leaves moving in the wind can trigger the motion detection and can lead to a ton of false positive notifications (and faster battery drain). If you don’t plan on getting a subscription, you’ll likely find that this camera is more ideal for indoor locations or for facing a stationary background outside. ## Does it need a Base Station? This Arlo Essential 2nd generation camera does not require (nor supports) a base station and instead connects directly to your home’s Wi-Fi. It supports the 2.4GHz band only. Most routers broadcast both 2.4GHz and 5GHz networks, so most people should be fine unless they purposely turned off 2.4GHz due to Wi-Fi congestion issues. Unfortunately, if you DO want to connect this camera to a base station, as I did, it is not compatible with existing Arlo base stations! I found this hard to believe, so I chatted with a support rep who did indeed confirm that base stations are not supported on the 2nd generation of Essential cameras (at the time of this review, their support articles were not updated to reflect this fact). So no local recordings can be done with this camera at this time. The rep did mention that this *could* change with a future update, but I was not provided with a timeline of when (or if) that would actually happen. ## Performance The camera has a very sharp and clear vision and night vision works very well. You can also turn on the built-in LED spotlight for color night vision. The camera also has a built-in alarm that you can set to automatically trigger when it detects a motion event, or you can trigger it yourself from the Arlo Secure app if you want to first verify that the motion is alarm-worthy. I’ve been using the camera about a week to monitor the sump pump in my basement and based upon a handful of live streaming sessions, the battery life has only dropped 4%. More active areas with more motion will obviously drain faster. Unfortunately, these cameras are not compatible with HomeKit at this time. Although Arlo has never supported HomeKit Secure Video as far as I know, it was still nice being able to view the cameras in the Apple Home app along with my other HomeKit cameras. ## What is going on with Arlo? I was first drawn to the Arlo system due to the free cloud recordings and the ability to record locally, but I feel like Arlo is dismantling many of these great features to put them behind a paid subscription. Free cloud recordings are gone for new devices (but kudos to Arlo for maintaining it for older devices, though). Now this generation of Essential cameras do not connect to a base station, so no local storage option either. And the Arlo app has been updated with a new “Feed” interface that makes the local recordings even harder to locate (and requires more taps) in the app. I feel there is too much feature fragmentation with the Arlo ecosystem. One would assume that if you buy a camera with the “Arlo” logo on it, that it would work with an existing Arlo system. It’s becoming too much of a hassle to know which camera and base station combination (if it even supports a base station) is needed to achieve a certain goal, such as HomeKit or local recordings. ## Summary While the Arlo Essential 2nd generation cameras provide great video quality and night vision, the ecosystem as a whole seems to be leaning towards a monthly fee rather than one-time purchase. So I would think of these camera as more as a subscription-based service as their local functionality is very limited. Those looking for a local storage solution with no cloud fees will likely want to look for another solution.

Arlo is amongst the biggest and most recognized makers of security products. Most of their devices can be installed in a short time through easy to follow steps. I needed to replace an aging camera from a different manufacturer and did so with Arlo's Essential Camera. This camera, unlike other products, can be used on its own, without a hub and is 100% wireless. The camera itself boasts high definition recording in 2K and color night mode. It contains a rechargeable battery which makes it easy to unhook and charge for a couple of months of use. Make sure to charge the camera overnight to maximize the battery's load. It's worth noting that the camera comes with a Type-C to USB cable and a small wall mount. Once your camera is charged, download the app which will guide you through the setup process. The installation only requires a screwdriver and you can be ready to record in about 15 minutes. The app is a mixed bag. During installation, the camera dropped the signal to the phone a couple of times, which resulted in having to go back to a previous state to "unfreeze" the process. Once the app and the camera are up and running, you will have options to fine tune your experience by setting mode changes, resolution, duration of the recording, make an active grid for the motion sensor and more. Here's a list of the good and not so good: Pros: + Camera feels sturdy and features an interesting way of hiding all screws + The picture quality is good + The motion sensor triggers fast + The light is very bright and acts as a deterrent as well + Installation can be done in about 15 minutes + No need to buy batteries, it has one built-in + App works fine once the setup is over Cons: - Can be hard to aim as the mount doesn't offer a wide angle to rotate the camera - App is not always collaborating during initial setup with the camera After running the system for almost a week, I have already decided to add some more of these cameras to replace the system I have in place. Even though it's not without flaws, I do love the image quality and the convenience offered by the built-in battery and not having the need to use a hub. I recommend this camera, solid device.