I live in a remote area and my Wyze cameras do not pick up any pets unless there is something else the AI recognizes in the frame. That other thing in frame (person, car, etc) does not have to be moving for pet detection - for example it could be a parked car that my dog walked past. They never pick up any wild animals. I’ve reported this numerous times to support and have never gotten a response.
A couple weeks ago my cat was killed in my driveway. My driveway and side of my house look like a crime scene. The poor thing put up one heck of a fight…within 10 feet of 2 cameras in broad daylight. Neither of them picked up a single motion event. I didn’t really want to see the event so much that I need to know what happened and what I need to protect my other pets against.
I talked with support again today and got the typical ‘we’ll call you back’ response. I’ve posted about this problem before and several of you posted videos of animals - racoons, turkeys, and domestic cats / dogs. Do any of your cameras pick up big animals like deer, bobcats, mountain lions or large birds like owls, eagles, or hawks (if they’re on the ground)?
There was a period last winter when my cameras suddenly started recording animals and a couple weeks later it just stopped. All of my firmware is up to date, I’ve gone through settings with support. Do any of you have any suggestions past giving up on Wyze and buying something else that actually works? Does support ever respond?
I’m heavily invested in Wyze products, but I’m not sure this is forgivable.
Completely agree with catcat1386. I’m sorry to hear about the loss of your cat, and STRONGLY recommend having µSD cards in any cameras with them set to continuous recording…
I understand the advice to use high endurance microSD cards with continuous recording, but is this even an option with Cam Outdoor? I don’t have that model, but @kcmudbug tagged this topic with cam-outdoor, so I’m asking for my own curiosity and because I think it’s important to give suggestions that are actually applicable to a fellow user’s devices.
Having said that, I’m another proponent of using continuous recording to microSD in all of my wired Wyze cameras, though I don’t have any experience with their subscriptions and AI-based detections. I’ll take a stab at a couple of the questions that were asked, though:
This is hit or miss, in my experience. I’ve had experiences with Support that gave me the impression that they…
Didn’t actually read and/or comprehend the ticket (my direct questions in Support tickets are often never answered).
Have no real working knowledge of or experience with the products for which they’re ostensibly being paid to provide customer assistance.
On the other hand, I’ve had very positive Support experiences where I felt like my concerns were (mostly) addressed, including a recent warranty replacement for a doorbell during which I was able to work with various Wyze Wizards and document my extensive troubleshooting.
It really does seem to be a roll, though, unfortunately.
That’s really going to depend on your environment and use case, I think. If you can provide reliable power and Wi-Fi signals to the locations where you want to place cameras, then I’m on board with using wired cameras (Cam OG, Cam v4) with high endurance microSD cards set for continuous recording. If you’re looking for something outside the Wyze ecosystem, then I’ve previously mentioned positive experience with Tapo C120, which I think is a strong rival to Wyze Cam v4, and have been impressed with its built-in AI-enhanced detections—including “Pet” (visual) and “Meow” (audio)—that don’t require an ongoing subscription. Even using that non-Wyze camera model, though, I still do continuous recording to a high endurance microSD card.
I can only imagine the sickening feeling you must’ve experienced losing a pet in such a violent manner, and I’m genuinely saddened to learn of your loss.
Good point about the µSD card and the Outdoor cameras. I had not noticed that tag. I assume you are right about it not being able to continuous recording.
However my opinion is that the battery cameras are so crippled in order to preserve battery life that in my opinion makes them almost worthless. You could not give me one.
That is so painful. I cry when my cats die. I’m not ashamed. I love the little meowsers.
There is nothing that can be done for the past, unfortunately.
As for protecting the future, my main suggestions would be to
Never use a battery cam as a critical security monitor. Nearly every company uses PIR or Radar or a combination to capture events on battery cameras, and there are distance and sensitivity limitations, especially with smaller animals. Battery cameras also often enforce event length limitations with a cooldown to preserve the battery life. This naturally leads to missing footage (even if just because the camera takes a second to turn on). This isn’t just a Wyze issue, but an issue with almost EVERY battery cam by every company. So swap out a battery cam with a wired cam for critical security areas, whether you stay with Wyze or switch elsewhere, the issue is more about the battery camera principle than the company. Don’t leave Wyze for another company’s Battery Camera that also uses PIR triggers for battery preservation.
Use a MicroSD card to record continuously as a backup, or convert the video stream to RTSP and record continuously to a harddrive in the house. This ensures that sensitivity limitations don’t interfere with capturing important events. Again, this is an issue with basically all companies that do cloud events, not just Wyze. Always have a way to record continuously. Consider this, whether you stay with Wyze or leave, the principle is the same.
If you keep using battery cameras because you don’t have a choice (no power nearby, etc), here are some ideas:
You can check and try to turn up your sensitivity settings if they aren’t maxed out already.
Also, make sure you don’t have the camera set to only record smart events.
Make sure your detection zones are not too narrow. In a situation like this, if the animals are running fast past the camera, by the time it turns on, they might have passed back out of the detection zone, and the camera then gets told not to record because there aren’t enough pixels changing within the detection zone. Animals running around could cause this issue.
You could make sure your cameras aren’t mounted too high about the ground. the PIR sensor is rated to detect people up to 30 feet away, and pets have a smaller mass/heat, so they would have to be even closer to be detected. So, if you mount it too high, it will already be too far away to detect smaller things like a cat, even if it sometimes gets people. If you mount it a little lower, then it will be closer to the pet and be able to detect it easier and farther away.
In addition to what others have said, I’ll mention that AI detection requires stable internet bandwidth to function properly. When combined with a battery operated cam (which has lots of power saving measures) I almost wonder if the AI is even reliable?
My cameras have picked up most of the animals you’ve mentioned however I am not using AI detections/filters, just standard motion detection with detection zones. If I did use AI detections I would only do it on cams that were also recording 24x7 to SD card, I don’t trust it not to filter out something of interest. And I probably would not use it on cams that I have set for telling me someone is approaching my doors, I’d rather an occasional moth alert than not being alerted to the solar sales guy just because the AI (rightfully) sees him as inhuman.
sense when this is supposed to be a user-to-user support community).
