Expert’s Rating
Pros
- Remarkably full featured for a first-generation system
- Can be wired to analog or digital doorbell chimes
- Supports Amazon Alexa, Apple HomePackage, Google Home, and Samsung SmartIssues
- Ecobee has some of the inexpensive safety plans that features skilled monitoring
Cons
- No battery backup for energy outages
- Subscription required to unlock whole function set
- Doesn’t assist Apple’s HomePackage Secure Video
- Ecobee’s house safety ecosystem lacks an out of doors digicam
Our Verdict
The Ecobee Smart Doorbell (wired) is a dependable, easy-to-use, high-end video doorbell. It depends upon hardwired energy, however it may possibly set off a home-owner’s present chimes. As with lots of its opponents, you’ll must pay for a subscription to unlock all its options, however it may be included into a sturdy house safety system with skilled monitoring at a really cheap value.
Price When Reviewed
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Best Pricing Today
Price When Reviewed
$159.99
Best Prices Today: Ecobee Smart Doorbell (wired)
$145.95
$159.99
$159.99
$189.99
If you’re already utilizing certainly one of Ecobee’s good house thermostats or safety programs—otherwise you’re desirous about putting in one—you’ll need to think about the corporate’s first video doorbell. The Ecobee Smart Doorbell Camera (wired) doesn’t simply compete with class leaders Ring, Nest, and Arlo, it additionally brings just a few good concepts of its personal—and it performs particularly nicely inside Ecobee’s bigger good house/house safety ecosystem.
There isn’t any battery-powered model of this product, however its $160 price ticket places it within the candy spot for high-end video doorbells. The unit information in 1080p decision with HDR, capturing a tall (175 levels vertical, 115 levels horizontal) discipline of view with no fisheye distortion. That framing provides you a head-to-toe view of tourists and allows you to see packages dropped flush in opposition to the door. The doorbell delivers a transparent, vivid picture, day or evening.
The Ecobee Smart Doorbell Camera could be built-in right into a complete, self-installed, professionally monitored house safety system.
The upside of being completely reliant on hardwired energy means no downtime when a battery must be recharged. On the opposite hand, you may’t set up this doorbell except you both have already got the infrastructure in place otherwise you’re prepared to run wire to the situation you need to set up it. If you don’t need to do this your self, Ecobee gives skilled set up for an affordable $150 (not together with the facility transformer, if wanted).
Specifications
The Ecobee Smart Doorbell Camera (wired) comes with all the pieces that you must set up it, together with a wedge mount, extension wires on the doorbell finish, an adapter on the chime/transformer finish, wire nuts and screws.
Ecobee
The Ecobee Smart Doorbell boasts IP65 weatherization, which implies it’ll stand as much as mud, rain, and snow, which—as TechHive’s IP code decoder tells us—means it’s impervious to mud and that it may possibly face up to water jets projected from any course. What’s extra, it may possibly function in temperatures from starting from a frigid -13 levels Fahrenheit to a broiling 113 F (-25 to 45 C).
In different phrases, it’s constructed to final with out the remove-recharge-reinstall routine a solely battery-powered doorbell requires. That mentioned, a hybrid wired/battery answer would hold the digicam operational throughout an influence outage. Being a division of Generac, maybe Ecobee would recommend householders spend money on a backup generator to maintain your property safety system powered up.
In any occasion, I’d been utilizing a Ring Battery Doorbell linked to a Ring Alarm base station, and I by no means favored the synthesized digital ring it delivered when a customer rang. It was loud sufficient to be heard all through the home, however I actually most popular my old-school analog chimes, and the Ecobee made it doable to return these to make use of. Ring has different wired fashions that may do that as nicely, however the one I’ve doesn’t.
Installation and setup
The Ecobee Smart Doorbell (wired) match within the slim area subsequent to my door, however I wanted to make use of the supplied extension wires to attach it to my present transfomer.
James Barber/Foundry
The Ecobee Smart Doorbell could be put in flat, with its digicam lens going through straight out, or connected to a wedge that angles its lens by 15 levels to higher seize a view of an individual standing at your door. At my house, there’s a really slim hole between the entrance door body and the brick surrounding it. The Ring doorbell I’d been utilizing wouldn’t match within the area, and whereas the Ecobee and its wedge did match, the angled digicam caught out in order that my storm door wouldn’t totally shut. I ended up eradicating the wedge and the reinstalling Ecobee’s doorbell, and it labored completely in that very cramped area.
That wasn’t the tip of my challenges, nevertheless; Ecobee’s app displayed a “low power” warning after I linked it to my present doorbell transformer, so Ecobee beneficial that I improve to a 24 Volt, 40 VA AC model. The low-power warning continued to indicate up for just a few days after I upgraded the transformer, however it will definitely disappeared.
Despite the low-power warning, Ecobee’s doorbell operated as anticipated throughout my whole assessment interval. I’ve since changed the outlet the unique transformer was plugged into as a result of it confirmed some wear-and-tear. In retrospect, I believe the previous outlet was the true reason behind the low-power warnings, and shopping for a brand new transformer was most likely pointless.
Ecobee’s chime adapter allowed me to attach its Smart Doorbell to my beautiful old-school chime.
James Barber/Foundry
The wiring for the unique doorbell button was reduce to a precise size, so there was no further wire tucked into the wall. That is sensible. An electrician in 1967 couldn’t have dreamed {that a} home-owner would need to substitute a doorbell button with a magic digicam greater than 50 years down the highway. Anyway, I wanted to make use of the extension wires and wire nuts that Ecobee included within the field to make my connection. The cavity within the wall behind the doorbell was a bit tight with the additional wire and wire nuts stuffed inside, however all the pieces labored as anticipated.
Ecobee’s receiver unit can hook up with your property’s beforehand put in doorbell chime. My mid-century chime field is constructed like a tank and has a splendidly musical tone when the hammer strikes the tone bar. There’s no means I might purchase a unit of this high quality at present at any value, and it’s a welcome distinction to all the opposite digital sounds generated by the fashionable TV, audio, and good house gear in my house.
You may configure the doorbell to ring a chime on an Ecobee Smart Thermostat Premium or an Ecobee SmartCamera. Like Ecobee’s higher-end good thermostats, the Ecobee Smart Doorbell sports activities a dual-band (2.4-/5GHz) Wi-Fi adapter.
Performance
Ecobee’s strategy to customer detection is one other function that differentiates this doorbell from the competitors. The unit’s digicam has a radar sensor that cuts down on false alerts. That means fewer notifications triggered by wind-blown leaves or passing vehicles. Smart Focus mechanically pans and zooms to maintain folks centered within the body, a function that’s often solely seen on costlier fashions.
As with many video doorbells and safety cameras, you’ll want a subscription to get the full worth from an Ecobee Smart Doorbell Camera. But even and not using a sub, Ecobee delivers extra options than most producers do whenever you don’t pay up, together with particular person detection, two-way speak (between the doorbell and the Ecobee app in your smartphone or an Ecobee Smart Thermostat Premium), stay video viewing in your smartphone or that thermostat, and 30 days of video snapshots (not video clips) from a single Ecobee digicam.
Stepping as much as Ecobee’s Smart Security Standard subscription ($5 per 30 days or $50 per 12 months) provides bundle detection, 30 days of video recordings, and wealthy push notifications (all three of these options are for a single Ecobee digicam). You may pair the doorbell digicam with a Yale or August good lock and achieve the flexibility to lock and unlock these locks from inside the Ecobee app, making it simple to open your door for a customer you see on the digicam.
You’ll get a 30-day free trial to Ecobee Smart Security whenever you purchase a Smart Doorbell Cam, however you’ll must pay at the least $5 per 30 days after that to proceed having the ability to retailer video recordings and obtain good alerts.
James Barber
The Ecobee Smart Doorbell Camera may also be built-in right into a complete, self-installed, professionally monitored house safety system by which the fabulous Ecobee Smart Thermostat Premium serves because the central hub. Ecobee makes glorious door/window sensors ($80 for a 2-pack) and occupancy/temperature sensors ($100 for a 2-pack), and the indoor Ecobee SmartCamera is excellent as nicely. Currently lacking from Ecobee’s house safety portfolio: an outside safety digicam—other than this doorbell digicam, that’s.
The top-tier Ecobee Complete subscription is likely one of the least costly skilled monitoring plans in the marketplace at simply $10 per 30 days or $100 per 12 months. You’ll additionally get 30 days of video storage for a vast variety of Ecobee cameras and doorbell cameras. With skilled monitoring, an agent can dispatch the police within the occasion of a break-in or the hearth division in case your Ecobee Smart Thermostat Premium or Ecobee SmartCamera detects the sound of a smoke alarm sounding off. Ecobee’s top-tier plan is a uncommon discount for that stage of service. After a current value enhance, Ring prices at the least $20 a month—$30 a month if you wish to allow all of the options of its Ring Alarm Pro security system.
The Ecobee Smart Doorbell Camera could be built-in with Amazon Alexa, Apple HomePackage, Google Home, and Samsung SmartIssues good house ecosystems. When a customer rings the doorbell, you’ll get an alert in your Amazon Echo, Apple HomePod, or Google good speaker. Unlike Ecobee’s SmartCamera, nevertheless, this doorbell digicam doesn’t assist Apple’s glorious HomePackage Secure Video, which shops encrypted video recordings to an Apple person’s iCloud account.
Should you purchase the Ecobee Smart Doorbell (wired)?
The Ecobee Smart Doorbell Camera (wired) doesn’t seize 2K or 4K video like some opponents, however its picture high quality is strong, and the radar-assisted movement detection is forward of the curve. The Ecobee app is straightforward to grasp and its connections to the doorbell digicam have proved dependable throughout my testing. Two-way communication with guests on the door was clear with virtually zero lag.
The Ring doorbell I changed touts is hi-res (1536 x 1536 pixels) decision, however I haven’t observed a big downgrade in video high quality with the Ecobee’s 1080p decision. That appears greater than enough for this digicam’s functions, however some customers might desire a unit that gives a sharper picture.
It’s an unlucky reality of life that in at present’s good house safety surroundings, you typically want to choose an ecosystem and keep in it. Otherwise, you’ll end up juggling apps in your cellphone to get an entire image of what’s occurring.
The excellent news for Ecobee is that its video doorbell, indoor digicam, good thermostat/house safety hub, and its sensor suite are all glorious. The firm even has a smart light switch. Add in its extremely inexpensive skilled monitoring service plan and you’ve got a 95 % winner. The remaining 5 % deficit comes from Ecobee not having an out of doors safety digicam—or something battery powered (other than its sensors, that’s).