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Use Wyze instead
Used to be great, but now everything is getting slowly pushed behind a paywall. Vehicle or person detection, watch a longer playback of an alert, and I also used to be able to use the watch multiple cameras to see all my cameras at once until the newest update put that behind a paywall too. Plus, I get a big ad pop up every time I login now trying to convince me to upgrade to their stupid Kami cloud spam.
I would never recommend this product anymore and would definitely go with Wyze instead of this now trash brand.Show lessAnon36463635464
Detection issues - not recommended
I've been using this app and cameras for about 1 1/2 years and it's been ok at best. Recently the developers of the app updated the software to where you need to get their cloud service or, you're constantly getting notifications that someone is present when really no one is there. I've tried to set the sensitivity on low and notification on low and still getting notifications all day. I've tried to minimize the detection area and still no luck. I've tried to turn off detection zone and only keeping detection but still the same. They are pushing the user to buy their Kami Cloud service which is expensive otherwise you will be getting notifications till you just give up and turn everything off and then you only use the cameras for viewing and not for detection which doesn't make sense. I'm going to look for another app and camera system. Very disappointed with the tactics used to force you to buy their service. Not recommended at allShow lessSamjs71
App / Support - Mediocre at best.
I’ve been using this camera and it their plan for quite a while. AND every update just gets worse. Support either hangs up on you. Or Disconnects from Chat. However, if you get lucky enough to troubleshoot they unfortunately just copy paste articles/blogs to reboot the whole system. Even if you already did so. The camera has been rebooted, reset, reconnected. I have 100% internet connection and I’m still having issues. I’m pretty tech savvy, but still listen and cooperate. I keep getting the feeling that they just want me to not report and keep using a camera that’s basically working as if I didn’t pay for a subscription plan!!
The new firmware update kicked off my KamiCloud service and no longer records a days let alone the 7 days worth of footage I’m paying for it only alerts me and shows 10 second video.
I’m very close to switch cameras and services. So much for premium support.Show lessrreallyylilyy
NOT FIT FOR PURPOSE!
So frustrating! Have 3 cameras and despite the app stating it gives motion detection and a few seconds video, this has ceased today. First there were standard images of a lounge from the app and when pressed to review the clip it stated motion detection failed and now there are not even any motion detection alerts OR few seconds clips at all on any of the 3 cameras, despite settings stating very clearly “Motion Detection” on, frequency “High” etc. NOTHING, completely useless, waste of space and money and not fit for purpose!
Nothing helpful to look at resolving the issue, no communication!! Was put automatically onto a short free trial which ended 24 November, didn’t want this and it did nothing and had NO benefits, so would never purchase a plan! Even that was useless and not fit for purpose. Total waste. Extremely annoyed and unhappy. Very unsatisfactory.Show lessCarrocean
Decent camera for the price
It is a great camera for the price point. The images are clean and clear. The ability to save images to an SD card or to a cloud (with a minimal monthly/yearly premium as well) is a great option and one that makes this an attractive camera for many different people's needs. I like that it can pan & zoom and is quite responsive to controls. It starts recording a few seconds prior to the event so that the full event can be seen and/recorded if necessary to save it.
Depending on your plan (we are on the least expensive cloud plan) & we are only be able to retrieve/record the event onto our phone for 7 days. Then it's gone. While you'd figure if some big event like a burglary happened you'd save the data right away but if someone wants/needs documentation of events for long periods then make sure to use an SD Card or save the events immediately or pay for the premium cloud plan. It has lots of options. It has night vision, hd or sd and auto which intelligently switches to the best recording option for the images & the current lighting.
My favorite feature is the time lapse video. It has the ability to create neat time lapse videos on the images it captures. One could have a lot of fun with it. All in all I highly recommend for the minimal cost.Show lesskillingitwithnoritalin
Features go from free to PAID with every update.
When I first got this camera years ago it was great with the exception of it always taking a lot of work to connect back to the Wi-Fi after being disconnected. We were able to record long video and save it to a sd card but that changed after a year or so of owning the camera. The app update stripped away the ability to record more than 12 seconds after motion is triggered then it went down to 6 seconds and if you wanted more you would need to buy into their wildly expensive cloud service. The app itself has so many bugs will send a notification and take you to the video feed that is blacked out. Doesn't pick up lots of motion events and has issues when viewing playback seeing the whole video in full screen unless you rotate your device. In live mode the video resizes into portrait mode to fit the width of the screen just fine. The camera is unreliable and who would over pay for an unreliable product when there are equally priced cameras with more features that are better working on the market. I would stay far away from a company that markets the camera as being sold one way only to put features that were free behind a paywall to make customers feel like th y have no option but to pay. I am now using cameras from the brand Aqara and they have tons of other smart home accessories that can automate your home and best of all no cloud storage, everything is saved on so card for FREE!Show lessMissodessa
It's good, then not so good- updates are the issue
Been using Yi cameras for a few years. Got a Kami to replace the old outdoor Yi that was noisy. So noisy that you could not hear people talking on the recordings. The microphone was too loud. Anyway , the cameras work ok but the app , that's a whole other issue. They have a good app but always seem to break it with the big user interface upgrades. By the time they finally get things working again- they push out another broken UI update and we do this all over again. Still not working right from the last UI update despite several app tweak updates. The goal seems to be to phase out the SD Card user and force the cloud subscription service. That's fine but I'll never put my home security into the "cloud" of an unknown brand (and one that has multiple brands). So if/when that happens, I'm out. Until then - they are very lacking in customer service. Have an issue now that I contacted CS for, got a flip card response and then nothing. I have contacted them several more times and nothing. I can't suggest Yi/Kami anymore. They used to be a much better company before when they were just Yi but now, it's sliding downhill.Show lessToobusy9561
Doorbell cam is unnecessarily useless
I’ve been using these cameras for years, the motorized HD indoor cameras are excellent. The app works excellent. However, I purchased their doorbell camera when it first came out, was so excited as I was waiting for it to become available. It worked fine for about a year. Then one day it randomly lost connection with my network. I couldn’t get it to reconnect. After some internet research I determined the problem is that the camera is a 2.4ghz device and my cell phone is a 5ghz device. My wifi router is dual band so all my devices connect no problem. In order to get the doorbell camera back on my network my cellphone has to be 2.4ghz but there’s no way to get my cellphone on the 2.4ghz frequency. So after a year of use my doorbell camera is now completely useless. Very upsetting. Apparently, the only fix is to set up two separate networks, a 2.4 and a 5ghz, so I can force my cellphone onto the 2.4ghz network - just to pair the device. First, that’s alot of work for someone who doesn’t really understanding IT, and second I’m not reworking my entire network just to accommodate setting up this one device. I bought a dual band router so I didn’t have to worry about this. Seems to me like Yi needs to step up their game and figure out a workaround as lots of customers are having the same issue. I’m strongly considering abandoning all my yi cameras and switching to Ring. What a waste of time and money. Come on, Yi… figure this out!Show lessJensticks
Improved
2022 August. Huge improvements to the app. We can now access our own vids on our sd cards. Other cool improvements.
2022 June. A lot of fake reviews here. Yi and Kami now block your access to the vids on your own SD cards. Another concern is that Yi’s terms allow it to sell your personal videos.
2020 March. When cameras are not connected to internet, motion alerts are not recorded on the sd. Horrible policy.
2019 October. You now can only search your vid clips 7 days from your own sd cards in the cams. We assume this is so they will sell more cloud service, the industry’s most expensive. We are saving up to change out all of the cameras for a better product. We’ve learned alot. Here’s the list of things Yi refuses to allow. -Ftp storage so we can use free cloud storage. -Onvif compatible so we can use any app or NVR. -Sd storage. Our Yi cams have this but Yi deletes our clips after a week to encourage use of their very expensive cloud service. Part of Yi’s ‘profit before ethics’ policy. Yi can sell your personal information.Show lessPw henderson
I prefer Wyze cameras
I picked up several Yi Cameras when they were on sale a few years ago and have been using them since. They started off great but I was disappointed with the app and the time, instability to connect to the cameras. I have 4 cameras spread out across 1800 sq ft. I use a Netgear Orbi mesh system to provide a WiFi signal throughout the house. When I try to connect to some of the cameras, it can take over a minute to load the feed and forget about viewing playback. It will buffer and be unwatchable.
Now, this may or may not have something to do with the WiFi signal the cameras are receiving but I have the same amount of Wyze cameras, connected on the same network and connecting to the cameras takes a second and once connected, the app is very responsive. The only thing I prefer Yi cameras over Wyze is that they’re better cameras to point outside through a window.Show lessAvex Trax
