Aqara’s Indoor Safety Digicam E1 is the little sibling to their glorious Digicam Hub G3, aimed toward those that don’t fairly want all of the bells and whistles or the upper worth. However don’t let that idiot you! The pan and tilt E1 is a strong indoor safety digicam with an incredible characteristic set and stable video efficiency in each daylight and nighttime eventualities. I’ve just one minor grievance. We’ll contact on that shortly.
Aqara Digicam E1: Value and availability
The Aqara Indoor Safety Digicam E1 is at the moment out there solely via Amazon.com for $59.99. Though worth drops on this unit don’t occur usually, it was $44.99 in December 2023. On the time of this writing, Amazon is providing a ten% off voucher within the US.
Aqara Digicam E1: Specs and options
Aqara’s Digicam Hub G3 is certainly one of their greatest indoor cameras, however for those who’re invested within the Apple ecosystem, an Aqara hub might not be what you’re after. That’s the place the Indoor Safety Digicam E1 is available in. For $50 much less, you get a lot of what the G3 provides and a few up to date options in a smaller 4-inch tall bundle.
The E1 helps Wi-Fi 6, whereas the Digicam Hub G3 is Wi-Fi 5. The E1 ups the G3’s strong privateness options by including masking zones. You’ll be able to add a black block to your video feed, so these areas are actually blacked out. That’s along with an automatic privateness mode, which lets you set particular occasions when the digicam will pan and level towards a wall or different privacy-focused space. The privateness choices are an incredible characteristic as a result of you will note every thing fairly clearly with this 2K, f/2.0 digicam, which appears to be like nice in good lighting and low-light circumstances.
Linked to Apple HomeKit, the E1 has Safe Video assist for storing incident movies within the cloud. Nevertheless, you may as well file regionally as a result of it has a microSD slot for as much as 512GB of native video storage. That is particularly helpful for those who activate the digicam’s 24-hour recording with timelapse mode. Accessing that slot is straightforward; simply slide the digicam’s tilt lens up, revealing a microSD slot on the backside of it.
One of many options I beloved taking part in with is the 2-way telecom system. There is a speaker and microphone constructed into the E1 so you should utilize it as a telecom to speak to whoever’s on the opposite aspect of the picture. Your youngsters, your important different, your pet, discuss to everybody!
Aqara Digicam E1: Construct and appears
The Digicam E1 feels well-built, despite the fact that it’s primarily plastic. It’s tiny, measuring 4 inches tall by 2.68 inches huge, so it ought to simply match on a bookcase shelf or most different places. It might probably even be mounted to the ceiling, after which you may go into the Aqara Residence app and reorient the video.
The digicam stays out of the best way with an infrared backlight, which you gained’t discover throughout lights out if that is in a bed room. The motor is whisper quiet, so that you’ll doubtless by no means hear it panning.
Aqara Digicam E1: Ease of use
Establishing the Digicam E1 is straightforward, because the Aqara and Apple Residence apps accomplish that with a QR code. You probably have every thing essential, you’ll be up and operating in just some minutes. On this case, having every thing essential would imply you personal an influence adapter as a result of the E1 doesn’t include the brick within the field, simply the USB-C cable.
Establishing the privateness options within the Aqara Residence app is a breeze, and although there’s a little bit of a delay, the handbook pan and tilt options work nicely. It is best to know that after you bind the digicam to HomeKit, or for those who select to forgo Aqara Residence and solely use HK, you lose entry to many privateness options, in addition to handbook pan and tilt management. It would nonetheless monitor people and detect movement, however you gained’t be capable of set these privateness positions and also you lose the flexibility to set as much as three occlusion zones. For the privateness options, you’ll need to set these up in Aqara Residence as scenes first, that are then uncovered to Apple Residence. Then, you may set off them utilizing automation in Apple Residence without having the Aqara Residence app.
One important side of the privateness options is that they’re processed regionally. The E1 has a built-in neural processing unit that allows particular person and sound detection on the gadget.
As I alluded to earlier within the piece, my solely gripe with Aqara’s Indoor Safety Digicam E1 is that the human-tracking automated pan and tilt is finicky. I’ve discovered that placement impacts its means to trace, similar to the Digicam Hub G3. When the digicam is positioned round hip top (I’m 6’ tall), I’ve discovered it a bit gradual to pan with transferring objects, particularly me. Place the digicam larger the place its AI can decide up faces, and your human monitoring improves.
Aqara Digicam E1: Competitors
Pan and tilt choices that assist HomeKit Safe Video are few, however there are two different cameras value testing. We reviewed and preferred Eufy’s Pan 2K which is now the 2K Indoor Cam E220 and proper now its worth can’t be beat at solely $35.99 on Eufy’s website and Amazon.
VOCOlinc Opto HomeKit Indoor Camera can be an choice at a decrease value, out there on their website for $49.99. It additionally has pan and tilt performance however is just operating 1080P video which is ok due to the HKSV limitations when binding 2K cameras just like the E1. HomeKit knocks 2K video all the way down to 1080P in Apple Residence and for video recorded to the cloud.
Aqara Digicam E1: Do you have to purchase it?
You can purchase this if…
- You need pan and tilt at an incredible worth
- The privateness options are important to your use case
- You don’t want the entire Digicam Hub G3 options
You should not purchase this if…
- You might want to mount it on a vertical floor like a wall
Aqara Digicam E1: Verdict
With the Aqara Indoor Safety Digicam E1, you get fairly a little bit of digicam for an incredible worth. Onboard particular person and sound detection and strong privateness options make this an incredible choice to be used circumstances the place what’s on digicam at sure occasions is a priority. Wi-Fi 6 means you’ve got extra dependable reside video feed entry in properties with dozens of different Wi-Fi devices, and 360-degree rotation means you may see virtually every thing.
There aren’t many pan and tilts at this worth level with this characteristic set, so the Digicam E1 needs to be in your shortlist for those who’re after PT performance. Even for those who don’t want the hub however PT is crucial, contemplate trying on the Digicam Hub G3, which has extra dependable monitoring, built-in facial recognition, and an alarm uncovered in HomeKit.
Aqara 2K Indoor Safety Digicam E1
Powerful act to comply with, nevertheless it follows you!
You do not have dozens of pan and tilt cameras which assist HomeKit Safe Video, however of people who do, the Digicam E1 is among the greatest.
