Cam Smart Indoor Camera

I have used about 5 different security cameras with HomeKit over the years and over the past few years this one has been the most reliable of all of them. It stays connected without having to be reset even with me playing with my network. The camera quality is acceptable. It does struggle a bit if there is a bright light in the frame. The motion recognition is good. Wish Eve had a better outdoor solution than their current unit.

I know how to configure a network. I know how to troubleshoot tech problems. Despite trying literally everything I could I still get endless connection issues. Don’t even think about relying on this for security. You need something wired. Use this to look at your pets when you’re not home. Edit: I have to lower the rating. All of my other eve products work perfectly besides this. Consider the frustration and anxiety of constantly resetting the camera because of connections issues before purchasing. This is way too expensive to be such a headache. Second Edit: I've updated the firmware, had it on various networks, factory reset it. Still constantly get No Response. It goes online and offline whenever it feels like it. If you have the Eve LED strips, depending on the positioning or the lighting setting, it will also constantly set off the motion detector. I can't believe I paid a premium to be this frustrated. One of the worst things I've ever bought.

So far so good. Girlfriend set up the camera with app, Apple TV, and iCloud in moments, while on the phone. Going to get a second Eve cam since girlfriend has 200GB of iCloud storage, and two doors to her condo. Truly a plug and play experience. The Amazon delivery between 4 and 8 Am is no joke. Dude was ringing me at 5:30. One thing, though, the package had already been opened, and contents removed / replaced. The camera didn't appear damaged and does seem to work so not returning.

Updated 01/05/25: I’m lowering my star rating again. I’m really disappointed in these overall for how much I spent replacing my Nest cameras. Going to two stars total now. They are now going offline almost three times a week for no reason and again are missing recording events completely. I’ve now come to just use these for live streaming only since they are not good for anything else. Will be rethinking my choice when I can recoup some of my investment in these back. I do not recommend. Updated 12/01/2024: I’ve lowered my star rating one star (4 to 3) as I have had the camera in action for a whole month. The cameras tend to go offline once or twice a week for no obvious reason but do come back online. Most importantly they miss motion triggers a lot which means I’m missing recordings of something happening because the cameras tend just didn’t detect anything. This worries me as I might miss an important moment. At least with my Nest cameras I didn’t miss a thing since they were constantly recording. I’m pretty disappointed by this. Original review: I’m really excited to have cameras that support full native HomeKit and HomeKit secure video. No third party app required and no new login account. Best of all I already have iCloud+ so my cameras will store recordings to iCloud with no additional fees! Perfect! Setup was a breeze as is most HomeKit devices. I took down my old Nest cameras, put up the magnetic mounting plate included, and got the camera up there and connected. So let’s talk build quality compared to Nest. Given that these Eve cameras are still around $150 I expected them to be a little on par with my Nest cams. But I was wrong. They are very cheap feeling and the magnetic mounting plate is just a metal disk like one you would buy at Homedepot. Given the housing is plastic and not metal like Nest I do expect them to stay cooler and have better WiFi reception which is a plus. You can almost move the camera angles as you would the Nest cameras. Albeit one specific method, repositioning the lense housing left or right (clockwise or counter clockwise). The eve can’t do this. Not a deal breaker but just good to know. I found the cable it came with wasn’t long enough so I bought 10ft usb a to usb c cables. I’m super happy the cable is not permanently attached like on the Logitech circle view. Kudos for that Eve. Field of view or FOV is really good. A big step up from my previous Nest cameras. I was very pleased to see this. My biggest complaint and con is the night vision. My Nest cameras could light up almost a whole room and a half it seemed. Things were much brighter and it appears this is because the Eve only has four IR LED lights where the Nest had I believe 8. At $150 and in 2024 I expected the Eve cameras to have similar night vision efficacy but sadly it lacks big time here. I think the camera would be better suited at $89 or maybe $100 max. I did invest in these so I will give them a solid go for a while before making any new changes. So far everything is amazing and oh I almost forget the motion sensor in the cameras appears in HomeKit as something to trigger off of which is a huge bonus. Just wish the night vision didn’t suck.

I used to have another brand, and whenever there was a power outage I had to remove it and set it up from scratch. That has not been the case with this camera. Since I installed it, I have had no problems or connection issues.

When this works, it's great. However, if you lose power then the camera doesn't want to connect. And then it becomes nearly impossible to get it to connect back to Apple Home. So.. what do you have to do? Delete it from Apple Home, Reset the camera, only have 2.4 GHz running on your Wi-Fi network, try to re-add to Apple Home... and pray that you can get it to add back to Apple Home. I really like Eve Apple Home products, but this is the most frustrating product they have and I have a hard time recommending it.

Love this security Eve indoor Cam - love the easy to install with apple homekit …so if you love your privacy this is the cam for you. Plus the amazing deal amazon was offering was a win win all around.

I have 4 of these cameras. They worked ok for about a year. One of them I had a really hard time getting it to connect, but eventually it did. Then, after about a year, one by one they all stopped working. I tried everything to get them to work again, but they just won't. Same thing with their doorbell. I have 2 and about the same time, they also stopped working. Really frustrating.

Unreliable and inconsistent performance. 📉 Unable to maintain stable Wi-Fi connections. 📶 Inferior compared to Logitech Circle View. 📷

Camera is easy to set up. Video is reasonably clear, but not super sharp. Sometimes HomeKit misses identifying the type of motion you have it set to watch for and it doesn’t record anything. Home app video review is not very user friendly at all; but that’s on Apple. Big plus is that it can detect motion through windows since it uses image analysis. You can turn off the IR illumination LEDs if necessary. You can’t turn off the mic though. You can tell HomeKit not to record the audio, but the mic is always on and anyone in the home group can listen to the camera audio live. There should be a way to turn off the mic; I had to resort to covering it up with heavy layers of tape.

The camera disconnects all the time, so it’s impossible to watch what it’s streaming as many other people has already mentioned in these reviews (using home kit or the camera’s own app). It’s useless.

After 9 months of use I can say that the camera is not reliable, it misses detections every night and it goes offline every other day. Maybe a good a kid toy

Received as very good, but it was not. 5V DC adaptor was missing. Be aware. Description was wrong. Recommendation: don't buy as used.