Honestly, pretty sad product if you have to restart it twice a week.
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I also have a nest battery cam which went offline and no amount of power cycle could bring it back. After a few days it just magically decided to come online.
I’d take a solution that doesn’t require me to physically be there any day.
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I have multiples of almost every camera model from Wyze, over 40 cameras, and I rarely to never have to restart mine (I mean, like every other device that exists they restart as part of firmware updates). Having to restart cameras isn’t necessarily about the product/device, but appears to have other local factors involved, including the Router or server’s DHCP or other protocols, various local signal interference, etc. If it was a sad product then everyone would have to be restarting their devices twice a week or whatever. Since that is not the case for a lot of people, including those of us with dozens and dozens of them, it can’t be blamed solely on the device or we’d be having problems too. Since we aren’t, it means there is something else involved. 
Not to say it’s not frustrating for those having problems, it is. But as I said before, if the product or device is working nearly flawlessly without those same problems for lots of other people, one has to start asking what are the potential differences that make it a different experience for someone struggling. It must mostly be something else…how the router runs, the ISP, DNS, signal interference, and dozens of other potential variables worth looking into…but if the device/product is the same between people with GREAT experiences and those with poor experiences, I wouldn’t immediately assume the device is the issue or nobody would have great experiences, and that’s not the case.
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Why are you restarting your units? I have 14 cameras and we’ve never had to reboot them. Weve done an occasional updating of software when needed but that’s all. When the SD card reaches capacity the cameras simply write over the material and it keeps functioning as usual.
The cable connection of my house unfortunately is at the far corner of a room behind the fireplace, so my internet signal is always not that great. I still have to toggle on/off the WiFi on my phone and laptop from time to time.
After upgrading to mesh routers the signal improved somewhat but still my 2 floodlights (both at 2 out of 3 bars) would go offline from time to time. When I read that some people restart their cameras to improve WiFi connection I gave it a try and those floodlights have never given me any trouble since.
It helps to run ethernet from the remote Mesh Access Points back to the primary. I know every house isn’t ideal for that but it’s pretty easy to run if you can get in your attic and are willing to cut a hole in your wall for a jack. Or, you shorten the distance between access points by getting more of them. WiFi degrades pretty hard with too many walls.
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Thanks! I’ll have to take a look to see what’s feasible. I prefer not shelling out more dough for another router.
must be nice to be lucky. they figured the mechanical bugs out after my third pair of cam pan v3s, turns out my cam pan v2 just would stop working with the app after a month or so after having 2 years and needed a reset. However a few months ago, it decided it would stop connecting after a reset and randomly decides to come to life and follows certain people, as if it knew the individuals may have schizophrenia already. haha. Only issues that get better over time but seem to have other areas get each fix is the AI detection… Everything is a vehicle or a person that isnt one. And it doesnt recognize people as something to detect often times. or if just part of a person or vehicle gets on the edge of the view of a cam pan v3, it decides not to follow them since it apparently cant figure out the feet attached to a pair of legs walking thru the top of its line of vision are people about to break in… But I actually said hello to my windchimes today, as I was on my way out to walk my car (the AI says my dog is my car and MUST tell me my car is here every time the camera passes it, despite it not having moved and never fully leaving the cameras view), because apparently the chimes must be people, since every time the wind blows, I get a notification saying just as much. They could at least make it so you can silence notifications for individual cameras, with all the issues with the AI that they cant seem to get right without breaking another aspect of it. Youd think they wouldnt boast or advertise it with how bad it is on all my cameras, esp since its not acutal AI since the Large Language Models like chatGPT arent even real AI, as it hasnt been invented yet. Just a set of preprogrammed rules like any other program that ppl fix, because it doesnt learn on its own or know what it needs to learn. hence the need to send videos to support to fix issues. glad i didnt try the better plan that recognizes people, tbh.
They do. Each cam has a notifications toggle that can be turned off. I have mine automated thru a Google Assistant\Home Voice Command Routine on my Phone to turn off notifications to only select cams (and disarm my HMS) when I come back home so that my vehicle and entry produce no notifications. They turn back on thru Alexa Voice Command Routines when I get inside. I have another Alexa Voice Command Routine that turns off notifications to my Garage and Entry cams when I go out to the workshop to tinker with something and another that turns off the notifications to my yard cams when I am doing yard work.
The server AI doesn’t see any motion. It only inspects every still frame of the video uploaded (20fps day, 15fps night). It can’t determine object motion from a still frame image. If there is a car in any single frame and you have Vehicle Detection on, it will tag it Vehicle.
It is more likely that the chimes were the motion trigger for the Motion Activated Upload and there is some other stationary object that resembles the general outline of a person to some degree that meets the server AI minimum threshold for positive identification. Finding that object is an art accomplished by closely inspecting the FOV and using the DZ to block out possible suspects one by one over time until the erroneous AI tagging stops.
When I can’t use the zone stuff very easily with the cam pan V3 can I? And the chimes are much too large and everywhere to be able to do that anyway without making it unable to tag vehicles in the driveway. And I can’t block out the area of the driveway that I park in because what if I’m gone and someone else parks there that shouldn’t be there? Didn’t have the problem at first with it tagging my car on every rotation as long as it didn’t move. They should only tag moving vehicles anyway like when they’re pulling in or pulling out and things like that like they used to but no now they broke something when they fixed something else. They even knew I was having issues with it calling my dog a vehicle and all sorts of other craziness and they probably just think that I hate them which I’m slowly beginning to I’ll take it back if they rectified their mistake of what they just sent me which is a big middle finger to me as far as I’m concerned unless they had nothing to do with it and it was an honest mistake but I don’t see how it could be considering not long before I received this they had taken down a comment regarding that camera even though I wasn’t even talking about it and misread the title of that part of the forum and I guess they just thought it would be funny. At least the person who’s in charge of AI. Because that’s the only person that I continuously have an issue with cuz is the worst recognition algorithm that I have seen on any camera stuff ever in the last 15 yrs And my production model of the floodlight Pro, I shouldn’t have to do jumping jacks occasionally right under the sensor and then wait 5 to 10 seconds for it to come on… But like a deer running through the yard Beyond where it should be sensing makes it come on and it comes on by itself sometimes with no notification. And of course dear galloping through must be vehicles too so I’m going to go ride a deer now
Indeed. A PTZ cam brings added complications when the DZ can only be set for one specific FOV Home Position and does not adapt to a new FOV Waypoint or full range Pan Scan \ Track Motion range of movement. One of the inherent limitations of a PTZ cam.
In this use case, in an outdoor application with a high degree of ancillary environmental movement, a static FOV fixed cam is the better choice for installation.
It appears that the chimes need to be relocated. You chose to place a Cam with an FOV that has high movement frequency. The single most important decision made for a security cam before tuning any of the settings on the cam is where it is placed. Placement and FOV is 80% or more of it’s effectiveness. Poorly placed cams get poor results.
I have this exact situation. I have PanV3 that is trained on where I park my work vehicle outdoors. The Vehicle Detection is off, Person Detection is on… I then have one V3 and another PanV3 trained on the driveway and entrance to my driveway, but not where I park. These have Vehicle and Person Detections on. Should a vehicle pull into my driveway, I am notified by 2 cams before that vehicle makes it to where I park my work vehicle. Cam placement and FOV determines how effective they will be under the limitations the cams have.
Wyze cams have never operated this way. They have always tagged all objects detected regardless of movement. The fact that it didn’t tag your vehicle initially indicates it wasn’t working at all before.
Wyze doesn’t Moderate this forum. It is Moderated by a team of Community Volunteers who themselves are experienced users of a large majority of Wyze devices. They will only moderate a post if it violates the stated Community Guidelines. When this does happen, if you feel it was in error or not warranted, you do have the opportunity to Direct Message the Moderator Team to discuss the issue.
I’m glad you mentioned the Floodlight Pro. I have two of them. We have discussed your settings on the FLP in other threads. Tuning the Floodlight Pro is a completely different experience because of it’s onboard AI and feature settings that will only activate the lights when a specific AI object is recognized by the onboard AI.
But, what I wanted to point out is that the FLP is the first Wyze Cam that will “ignore” a stationary AI object… somewhat. Using your car as an example: If you have Vehicle, Person, and Pet Detection enabled for AI Event uploading AND for Floodlight Activation with basic Motion Detection uploads on, if any one of those single objects is detected moving within the frame, it will activate the lights and tag any one of those three, or all three, be it stationary or not. However, if your wind chimes create motion, or a tree waving, or leaves blowing, etc, and it is not identified as one of the AI objects within the percentage of accuracy set within the Firmware, the upload will still happen but the stationary AI objects will not be tagged. It takes another moving AI object to be tagged in order for it to tag a stationary AI object.
Completely normal when you have the sensitivity set to 100. The FLP onboard AI cannot operate effectively when it is being overloaded with motion event input. The FLP sensitivity is calibrated completely different than a standard Wyze Cam. It is incredibly sensitive if tuned properly.
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They do have quality issues for sure but other than changing your account without taking the cameras off the account I have not seen any reason to throw in the trash. But we do get what we pay for and this company is the cheep devices. Good very good cameras go for much higher retail price. We all got exactly what we paid for.
Wish I read your post before I bought 5 cameras and the doorbell pro. Products are terrible and support is awful.
For those who want to spend more money on “higher quality” cameras, I would advise you to spend that money on a better router first.
On my not-so-great WiFi network, I get pretty much 100% event video uploads on my Wyze cameras, including V2s.
I spent money expecting a better experience with a Google battery cam but so far my experience with uploads are more like 50-50. Sure its sound quality and AI detection is better, but it’s useless since I can’t see half the videos captured. It’s my backup camera now.
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Mine too after i click on their stupid upgrade now all solid yellow. I should tell my community to stop their products from china
How many Staffers are responding to the posts they don’t like? Too many have the sound of Corp Communications. Can you perfect junk? Talk about firmware that bricks that inexpensive camera. Make better products and you won’t have support boards replete with customers that DON’T love your products or company.
I think this is a misunderstanding. Wyze employees respond to people a lot even for things “they don’t like.” I have seen them in Discord, Reddit, Facebook, and even here. It’s not really about whether or not they like a post, but more about if they can make a difference, particularly if they can help in ways other users or volunteers can’t, or when they happened to check in before someone else answered it. They also respect allowing people to vent (within the guidelines…as long as they’re not abusive or attacking another user) such as was the point of this thread. Someone who has already thrown their products away and tells others to stay away, well, let’s face it, there is no reason for them to join in the conversation. The person doesn’t want help, they’ve already made a decision, and coming into the thread usually just means the person will get aggressive and confrontational and in some ways the employee would just be provoking that instead of helping. Rarely does any good come from it, and it’s often unwanted. Often, a similar thing is probably true for any somewhat aggressive post in general. Rarely is there a benefit to joining that conversation, but often a high risk of making things worse, which they don’t want to do. I’m not speaking for Wyze, but the above is pretty standard for lots of businesses in general, and I am just speaking from what I see.
Ah, I think that’s part of the misunderstanding here. This isn’t a support board. The forums are intended for USER TO USER interaction, and not intended as an extension of support. If someone is having an actual support issue, they should contact support by phone, chat or email and that is where they will get direct attention with an employee instead of other users. That’s not to say that there aren’t employees who often look over things or review what’s going on in the user platforms, but the primary intent and objective of the forums is give us users a place to talk to other users, not employees. That’s a misunderstanding. This isn’t a intended as a support board, though many of us users are more than happy to help out fellow users and some of us volunteers do have backchannels to escalate certain important issues when necessary, such as when someone lets us know that a support agent did something incorrect and we need someone else to review that support ticket and go fix it and give that agent coaching or whatever. other than that, the issues are supposed to be referred to support so users can talk to a trained employee that is dedicated to handle support.
Honestly, that’s not been my experience. I am actually a moderator on a few different “forums” on other platforms (other than for Wyze); additionally, in the past I worked customer service for multiple Fortune 500 companies (ie: companies that are so successful they are valued in the billions and make billions per year, which is a decent indication that their products are as objectively “good” as the market can say), and yet I heard all the same things for those companies as I do here or anywhere. I could find message boards/forums packed with complaints for almost any company. It’s impossible to please everyone and there are always lots of people who have negative experiences and opinions on anything. I am in forums for some of Wyze’s competitors, and have products from them, and I can tell you that they all have people saying the same things in all of them. Part of it is human nature.
Having said that all that, I do agree that Wyze has recently had some firmware release struggles. I know part of that had to do with critical security measures that were urgent and had to bypass beta testing. That sucks for everyone. I had some cameras go non-responsive too. It is frustrating. I do have some mixed feelings about firmware updates. Wyze does often do a lot of firmware updates, and that makes it more likely to have more bugs come up (as a former professional QA Tester, I could go on and on about how even a small amount of code of like 14 lines of code and 4 total decisions to make, it can take automated tested over NINETEEN YEARS to finally test every single possible outcome to see if there are any bugs, and that’s all before taking into account the different environmental variables, etc… I talked a little more about that in detail with an actual example in this thread:
So, on one hand, I’m sure Wyze would love to get to a MOSTLY stable build of firmware and never touch it again, but they have to sometimes do security updates, which throws a wrench into that, and then they’d have everyone mad at them for never doing new updates and added features. If we look at the wishlist, people are already angry and leaving because they feel their pet request was ignored or at least not prioritized. But as Wyze adds new features and codes, it adds exponentially more complication and room for bugs, and that’s frustrating for us users too.
I said earlier that I have cameras from competitors of Wyze, and one of my biggest complaints for one of them is that they almost NEVER do firmware updates. I have some major bugs I reported years ago, and they just don’t care. They have never added new features and not fixed some major bugs I found and experience. I’d hate for Wyze to switch to doing that business model instead…I like them giving me new features, and fixing found bugs, and doing security updates so often. I love it…but the downside is that it does add potential for more bugs again. I mean, I don’t want them to switch to a model where they get to a semi-stable point and just go stale with never adding new cool stuff…I want them to fix things, and I want them to add things, but it does suck when we have to deal with what comes with that. It’s a tough thing to balance. Users demand they continually add stuff, and users also get upset when they do. In my experience they generally do a reasonable job at resolving everything that is critical and important (again, saying this from my background as a pro QA tester), but it is still frustrating when we do have something go non-responsive during an update like happened to some of us recently. I will say that for me, that situation is pretty rare though. I won’t say the grass is greener somewhere else, because it all depends on what a person’s personal preferences are. There are tradeoffs everywhere, and people complaining about the same or different things everywhere. Everyone should definitely find what fits and suits them though. Not everyone should love or stick with Wyze. I don’t want them to be a monopoly. I want there to be tons of “Wyze Killer” competition out there and companies that all push each other hard. I support people using whichever one suits their particular preferences better.
However, I will say that there are people here who have nearly zero problems with Wyze at all. So, if some people are having nearly a flawless experience, it does beg the question of what is the difference, and maybe Wyze still plays a part, but likely so does something else, like router protocol, or one of any number of other things, such as some of the things I listed in here:
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I certainly don’t work for Wyze. But it irritates me when someone, acting NOT in good faith, trashes a product because either 1) they have an entirely unreasonable expectation of its price-to-performance level, or 2) have no idea what they’re doing but jump directly to blaming anything other than their own lack of knowledge or experience.
Humility is a vastly unappreciated virtue among the chronically indignant.
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I had quite a few Wyze V2 cameras and replaced them with a real PoE security camera system. I have 2 left to replace that monitor a different location. They still have problems.
- The video recording skips when motion or person detection is activated.
- The camera Detection Zone constantly loses its settings.
- The video compression settings seem to have gotten worse with firmware ‘updates’.
- Low light recordings of people are so horrendous you can’t distinguish faces or see any significant detail, especially with any motion.
These problems pretty much render the cameras useless for security.
On the upside they are inexpensive. That’s it
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I purchased Wyze cameras and I wasn’t happy with them. I also purchased a Wyze camplus+ subscription in the past and had nothing but problems until I finally cancelled my subscription. All of my cameras were operating outdoors, and they were absolutely not weatherproof. i’ve had lenses fog up, I’ve had SD cards stop reading until I unpowered the cameras, and all other kinds of annoying issues. I agree with the user who said that these cameras are absolute junk. I couldn’t agree more.