Ring’s Outdoor Camera Plus is here and it’s underwhelming
Ring's outdoor security camera gets an upgrade, with sharper video and improved night vision on the cards
Any announcement of a new Ring product is exciting, but my excitement is always tempered a bit by the frustrating fact that Ring products require a subscription to record video clips. That’s the case with the new Ring Outdoor Plus camera, the latest security camera from the company that first popularised the video doorbell.
Although the company insists the camera can be used subscription-free for live view and real-time notifications, the main reason most people buy a security camera like this is to be able to scroll back through time to view events that happened during a break-in, for example. It’s therefore hard not to approach the new doorbell with some skepticism.
The Ring Outdoor Camera Plus is effectively an upgrade for the Ring Stick Up Cam. It looks much the same, with the camera lens housed on the outside of a cylinder atop a stubby mounting arm, and the whole thing can be powered either via battery with the option to add a solar panel, or the mains, with both options costing £100. It’s weather resistant like the Stick Up Cam, too, although there’s no official IP rating.
There are plenty of improvements. The first comes in the form of higher resolution. The new camera captures at 2K where the old one captured 1080p video, enabling you to see fine details such as faces and number plates at much greater distances than before.
The camera also comes with superior “Low-Light Sight” technology, capable of capturing clearer video in dim lighting. What the new camera doesn’t have, however, is a floodlight for truly dark environments.
In fact, as a whole, Ring’s latest offering is a bit of a let down. It increases the price over its 1080p predecessor by £20 and doesn’t offer nearly as much as the best cameras from rival manufacturers such as TP-Link and Eufy.
The Eufy Solocam S220 captures video at the same resolution as the Outdoor Camera Plus, comes with a solar panel built in, is battery powered and IP67 rated. Plus, it’s cheaper at £60 (or £109 for two) and you don’t have to pay a subscription to access recorded video as clips are stored locally on the camera’s internal 8GB of storage.
The Ring Outdoor Camera Plus is available now for pre-order and units will be shipping in the “coming weeks”. We’ll have our review live when we get our hands on one of these cameras, in the meantime, though, take a look at our Best home security cameras page and take a look at the cheaper, more effective alternatives.
