RTSP newbie

[Skipsmith]

I keep seeing people post about RTSP.

What is it and what would be the use of it?

Do you just connect to the camera via IP address? Just trying to figure out what it is and how I would benefit from it.

[K6CCC]

Real Time Streaming Protocol is a set of standards for streaming video. It is VERY commonly used for cameras and local storage devices (usually called a Network Video Recorder - or NVR). That lets a camera send video to a NVR via Internet Protocol (IP) that locally stores the video. Depending on the camera, that may be either wired or wireless.

For example, I have a Lorex security camera system. The NVR has 18 TB of disk storage and can support up to 32 cameras. Lorex has their own protocol, but the Lorex NVR can support RTSP for other brand cameras. I have two of my Wyze V3 cameras that are running RTSP firmware and are sending video to the Lorex NVR, I have also used a software product called Blue Iris that can receive RTSP and does a similar function as my Lorex NVR except it’s all in software.

The biggest advantage of RTSP is that you can locally store continuous video that you control rather than being dependent on someone elses storage system. Both my Lorex and Blue Iris have far better ability to watch multiple cameras than native Wyze capability.

Years ago Wyze released RTSP firmware for the V2 and V3 cameras, but they did not update it and very openly stated that it was a dead firmware line. After years of requests, Wyze is finally working on bringing RTSP back.

[carverofchoice]

@Skipsmith

Do you just connect to the camera via IP address?

Basically, yes. Often you need to enter the username and password in the URL too.

@carverofchoice

RTSP (Real-Time Streaming Protocol) for Wyze cameras would allow direct access to the camera feed on your local network (typically without any cloud dependency).

How it would be useful:

• Home Security: You would be able to monitor your home from multiple devices without relying solely on the Wyze app.
• Integration with Smart Home Systems: It would enable you to use platforms like Home Assistant to create custom automations (e.g., turning on lights when motion is detected). It would actually allow integration with basically any third-party system, so the possibilities of what you can do with it are endless.
• Local Storage: You could record and save footage directly to your own storage devices.
• Privacy: Streaming footage would not require routing something initially through Wyze’s servers (ie: authentication), enhancing privacy.
• Flexibility: You’d have the freedom to use various media players and software to view the live stream. This seriously makes the use cases for your wyze camera is almost infinite. There are special programs that will do things like track. How much traffic goes in front of your house or on the road, or how often cars pass by your house and when the busiest times are and create heat maps of specific areas in the view of the camera and time of day. Or things that will automatically track license plates, take a snapshot and even run the license plate through a database to see who it’s registered to. People have made some of the coolest custom software to run your camera feed through if you have rtsp.
• Customization: It would give you more control over your camera setup, allowing for tailored solutions to fit specific needs.

I would say the top reasons for wanting it are for people to be able to save their camera feed to a local hard drive on an NAS or computer. And so people can create their own custom AI detections running through their own computer at home For free, instead of relying on cloud detections for a fee. Or to be able to stream an unlimited amount of cameras to their TV or computer in any configuration or group or order they want for free. But there are a lot more possibilities for using rtsp. Those are just the most common uses. Basically, the summary is that it gives you access to a completely local standardized video stream for the camera so you can do whatever you want with it.

A lot of people connect the video stream to custom programs to do their own custom AI detections for literally anything. Someone might track traffic and do heat maps in front of their house to see where and at what times they have the most traffic. Or maybe they want to do custom AI detections to be alerted when a deer is detected but not other animals. Some will just live stream a camera watching a bird nest, or do a custom long time lapse or literally anything with any Kind of video program out there. Your stream is no longer locked into whatever the manufacturer allows.