Leave a Review YI Home
Great camera, terrible software
UPDATE: I still think this app is the worst that I have on my phone. For something like a security camera, the software is just not fit for purpose. Although recording to SD card was temporarily fixed, it has stopped working again. I refuse to subscribe to the cloud storage service because if they can’t make the SD recording function work, why would I waste money on the cloud service? Again I say, good hardware, terrible software. If I could give a negative number of stars, I would.
The camera is very robust and reliable but the software is just abysmal. Why isn’t there an iPad-specific version? Why is the software so dedicated to portrait orientation when the camera is wide-screen? The playback system is awful, very difficult to find and watch any video after the motion-triggered activity. Also, the annoying nag screen requesting feedback has prompted me to leave this review. I was given this camera by a friend, I wouldn’t waste my money on it. It’s a toy at best, a waste of time at the worst. If you seriously need a security camera, look elsewhere. Typical Chinese product - reasonably cheap hardware, very poor software.Show lessT.V Watcher
Terrible version 5.0 - updated review
The new version 5.0’s UI is horrible. I cannot see video that has been recorded in my local memory card beyond midnight (<24 hours), this is just wrong because this is MY data and MY recordings. Why have you locked away my own property? Additionally, in full screen I can’t scroll through the recording at all. Why did you take away this functionality? It seems like it’s completely less functional for no good reason. We have two Yi cameras in our home, but we will buy others if this is the type of user-unfriendliness that the software is going to force on us.
Update- the company appears to have taken note of the discontent about the new UI and brought back many of the previous features that made it user friendly. Thanks for that. This review updated to 4/5 stars for responsiveness.Show lesslights303
App update has.. FIXED the issues
Update : 5.0.2 fixes the majority of the concerns raised in the review below.
The new update completely changes the cost model of the cameras and pushes you to their subscription service. For years now Yi cameras offered 6 second clips to be uploaded to the cloud and played back for free; it now seems you have to pay for a (rather expensive for what it is) cloud service to view clips before midnight on the day you’re on. SD card playback kind of works once you’ve learned to navigate around the new interface.. but if you try and change the “date” it again pushes you to their subscription page; you have to scroll back through the timeline. Need to view something from a few days ago from your own SD card? be prepared to scroll back a lot with no indication of what day/date you are on… awful! The old app was great and I bet I’ve sold about 30+ cameras for Yi through friends and family over the years through recommendations. It’s already lead to several people asking me why they can’t look back at their alerts from yesterday without being asked to pay more money… I don’t know what to tell them! Please go back to the old app!Show lessJDC85
Developer Response
The issues you’ve reported have been fixed most recent app release. Please update your app. There is no pay wall and missing features are back in the app! Please see the article to find info for new release. https://news.yitechnology.com/news/app-release-news/ If this is still not the case for you, please contact our support team at www.kamihome.com/contactThank you for listening!
Update:
Company’s new release fixed all the issues that both myself and many other customers had with the previous release. I am very pleased with the new app and its functionality. It is also a breath of fresh air to see a company listen to its customers, thank you YI Home. Below is my previous update that has been completely resolved.
You are going to lose a long standing regular customer. This update is horrible. Lost so much functionality. No time and date stamp in the video. No video record feature, loads with the cloud as standard storage and you have to toggle over to SD on every camera every time. I have 9 cameras currently and 4 new outdoor cameras I was going to put up, but now I am looking at sending them back and going with another company. I don’t know how anyone thought this update was a good idea literally just go back to the previous version.Show lessWoody306
Updates create issues with the app
I bought these cameras back in the end of 2017 to watch over my daughter overnight when I moved her to her own room, since her room is pretty far from mine in the house. I never had a problem with keeping the app open all night on a spare phone and being able to see and hear her anytime either I woke up throughout the night or she cried. I continued to use the cameras for this same purpose now with my son, and didn’t have any issues initially, However, the most recent updates to the app now make the app shut down after a while and when I wake up my phone screen is off and the app is closed, or I wake up to hearing my baby screaming wildly, for God only knows how long before I notice, because the app is closed for some unknown reason. I would have given a 5 star review previously, but this glitch is making me consider buying a different brand camera cause I need something that will stay on all night without issues.Show lessKeekeh
Recent revamp cripples functionality
I don’t write many app reviews but this is frustrating. The recent redesign has removed quality features and made the app complicated to use. It now prioritises its subscription features over the core point of the system - security.
I fell in love with these cameras due to the app functionality. Very simple to use, no issues. Well this has changed. Whilst the new app is more visually pleasing, it simply has made my experience worse.
Activity alerts
1) Used to have an easily press-able delete button. This has now been replaced with a small button which if missed clicks a link to buy kami cloud.
2) To complete a clip, there used to be a simple option after the video ended. You can no longer do this as Cloud and SD recordings are now in separate tabs.
3) Activity alerts can’t be deleted by swiping left.
Timeline
1) Timeline used to allow for fine control by showing the time to the second. The new timeline cannot do this.
2) The feature of going back to a particular day is subscription only despite being able to scroll back manually on the SD card.
3) The removal of the timeline bar in landscape mode defeats any objective of reviewing footage.Show lessads1230
Long time customer. Used to be happy but not any more.
I have had a Yi camera for several years now and the camera is great, it’s the software and all the changes over this last few months that has made me change a 5 star rating down to a 1 star rating. The software has changed from allowing users to view a live feed plus 6 second snippets of recorded past feeds for 7 days to just viewing the live feed. Which of course renders the point of having the camera useless since most people don’t just sit and watch the live feed.
They have also disabled the use of using the sd card to play back the 6 second snippet videos when motion is detected. They say they are in the process of pushing an update to allow users this feature again but I still cannot view any prior videos. I get they want you to purchase a cloud subscription but to not tell their customers they are disabling the sd card and make you think there is something wrong with the camera or the sd card is pretty poor customer service. I can view the videos from the sd card on my computer so I know there is nothing wrong with the card but it’s quite inconvenient. Not to mention the point is to be able to view both the live feed and the recorded snippets through the app on whatever device you use.Show lessLitlBit71
WHAT HAPPENED???
The recent update to this app made it basically worthless. They took away all of the functionality that made their app better than others. It now seems like a child has written the current update. They even took away the date and time stamp on the playback, so as you’re watching the footage you have no idea what time it was from. It’s almost laughable. They also took away the ability to scroll through the footage past the same day, and you can’t scroll at all in landscape mode anymore. I know a lot of customers are very upset about this update, and if Yi doesn’t fix these problems ASAP they’re going to lose a lot of business. I will be throwing away all of my cameras and purchasing from another company. I’ve been planning to buy five additional cameras to put around my house, but I certainly won’t be buying from this company if they don’t revert back to the other version that actually worked.Show lessHDUB79
Not worth the update
Do not update it will take away the options of viewing history on your sd card so they force you to pay for their cloud services ... don’t waste your money on this or any camera from YIsmikelakis
New update is horrible.
Video image is a 3rd of the screen now, which makes it difficult to see. Really poor user interface.Jbold2
