Execs
- Top quality QHD digital camera
- Good night time imaginative and prescient
- Adjustable highlight
- Helps HomeKit and Matter
Cons
- Aqara app is over-complicated
- It’s important to present your individual energy adaptor
- Cloud storage requires a subscription
Our Verdict
The sturdy design of the G5 Professional is well-suited for outside use, and gives a superb, clear picture with Quad-HD decision by day or by night time. Its help for HomeKit and Matter additionally makes it a superb possibility for Apple customers, with low-cost cloud storage out there through an iCloud+ subscription.
Value When Reviewed
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Greatest Pricing Immediately
In recent times, Aqara has been one of many few producers of safety cameras that also helps HomeKit for Apple gadgets – even when Apple itself appears to have dropped the time period ‘HomeKit’ and now tends to only say {that a} digital camera ‘works with Apple Residence’ (referring to the Residence app in your Apple gadgets).
The G3 and E1 cameras that we’ve reviewed from Aqara (in our spherical up of the Greatest Safety Cameras) are very competitively priced, however they’re each designed for indoor use, so the corporate has prolonged its vary with the brand new Digital camera Hub G5 Professional, which boasts a sturdy design that could be very a lot supposed for all times outside.
There are literally two variations of the G5 Professional out there, they usually additionally provide you with a alternative of colors, with both plain white or a dark-grey that appears similar to Apple’s House Gray. We examined the usual Wi-Fi model of the digital camera, which makes use of a USB-C cable for its energy provide and prices $179.99/£179.99.
The USB-C cable included is 2m lengthy, so that ought to will let you place it on a window sill or on a wall with out an excessive amount of hassle. The digital camera stand is adjustable, permitting you to tilt and swivel the digital camera as required, and there’s a wall-mounting equipment included within the field as effectively. Nevertheless, Aqara solely gives the USB-C cable for charging, with no mains energy adaptor included, so that you’ll have to supply that for your self.
If you wish to transfer the digital camera additional away – or maybe larger up on a wall in order that it overlooks a automotive parking area – then you definately may wish to go for the dearer PoE model (energy over Ethernet). This prices $199.99/£199.99 and makes use of an Ethernet connection to supply each energy provide and a wired community connection.
Each fashions are an identical although, and are bigger than earlier Aqara cameras, because the G5 Professional homes the primary digital camera sensor, together with a PIR sensor (passive infra-red) that gives night time imaginative and prescient, and an adjustable highlight you could activate to scare off intruders.
There’s additionally a built-in speaker and microphone that present two-way audio as effectively. And, because it’s designed for outside use, the G5 Professional has a sturdy IP65 score for resistance to water and mud, and Aqara states that it will probably address temperatures as little as -50f/-30C.
Getting began could be very simple, due to the Aqara Residence app for iOS/Android – though issues do get somewhat extra difficult afterward. As quickly as you join the G5 Professional to an influence provide, the digital camera’s speaker declares that it’s prepared to enter pairing mode, and the app makes use of Bluetooth to connect with the digital camera and set all the pieces up.
The digital camera helps dual-band Wi-Fi utilizing the two.4GHz and 5.0GHz frequency bands, and the app prompts you to pick out your most popular community and enter the Wi-Fi password. For those who maintain your cell system upright, the Aqara app shows a small preview of the dwell video from the digital camera on the prime of the display, with a moderately daunting choice of further controls and settings beneath. For those who flip your system into panorama (huge) mode then the video picture expands to full-screen measurement to present you a greater view.
The digital camera has Quad-HD (2688×1520) decision, which gives a transparent, sharp picture with a viewing angle of 133-degrees. There’s somewhat fish-eye distortion across the edges of the picture, however that doesn’t have an effect on visibility very a lot in any respect, and it’s good to have such a large discipline of view to control issues. The digital camera’s infra-red sensor works effectively too, offering good visibility even in darker circumstances.
To be sincere, we discovered the Aqara app moderately difficult after the preliminary set-up course of, because it spreads a variety of digital camera controls and settings throughout a protracted sequence of menus and sub-menus (and Aqara informed us that they don’t present a handbook for the app both). However, fortunately, Aqara’s HomeKit help gives a extra easy means of controlling the digital camera, and it solely took just a few fast faucets to attach the G5 Professional to the Apple Residence app on my iPhone and different Apple gadgets.
The Apple Residence app presents a simplified set of controls that allow you to document or stream dwell video everytime you go away or arrive house. It even presents to obtain firmware updates for the digital camera through Apple house too, so full marks to Aqara for making the HomeKit integration so clean.
HomeKit integration is available in helpful elsewhere too. Our evaluate digital camera had 8GB of reminiscence that permits it to retailer video straight on the digital camera, and the Aqara app additionally permits you to join the G5 Professional to a NAS drive for storing your recordings on your own home or workplace community.
Aqara additionally presents a subscription service referred to as HomeGuardian that gives on-line storage and different options, costing $4.99 per thirty days or $49.99 per 12 months for a single digital camera, or $9.99 per thirty days or $99.99 per 12 months for an infinite variety of cameras.
However, after all, Apple’s personal iCloud+ subscription service features a function referred to as HomeKit Safe Video that permits you to retailer video from HomeKit-compatible safety cameras, beginning at simply $0.99/£0.99 per thirty days for a single digital camera (see: iCloud+ pricing).
Do you have to purchase Aqara’s Digital camera Hub G5 Professional?
For those who want a sturdy outside digital camera that works effectively with Apple gadgets then the Digital camera Hub G5 Professional is difficult to beat. Its digital camera gives good picture high quality even in low gentle circumstances, and the built-in reminiscence permits you to document and retailer video straight out of the field.
Aqara’s app isn’t essentially the most elegant piece of software program we’ve ever seen, however the digital camera’s help for HomeKit and Matter permits you to simply management the digital camera utilizing the Apple Residence app, in addition to offering a low-cost possibility for cloud storage too.