Name: Blink Home Monitor
Rating: 4.31339 (51461 reviews)

User Reviews for Blink Home Monitor

4.31 out of 5

51.5K Ratings

3 years ago, meghannrae

Exactly What We Wanted

First, I see a ton of not so great reviews. I knew exactly what I was getting when we purchased multiple cameras for our home indoor/outdoor and the doorbell. The price point for this system and what it has to offer is amazing for what you get. It’s not a top notch system by any means, but it doesn’t the job and the video quality is great in my opinion. If you want something seamless without any learning curve and high dollar user friendly, then you should look into more expensive systems that give you that. We utilize the indoor blink mini for a toddler room, a indoor blink camera for a nursery camera, 3 outdoor cameras, and the blink doorbell. We also have the plus yearly subscription. The system automatically arms every night and turns off in the morning with a schedule I set. And I can easily arm the system while we are away from our home. The talk feature through he app is great, way better than I expected honestly. Yes you have to replace batteries in battery operated cameras, batteries are not in short supply at my home therefore this does not bother us. The image quality on the app and the overall live stream is perfect for what we need. I also have great things to say about the motion detection notifications that come to my phone and my husbands phone.

2 years ago, Lyedge

Slow and buggy

Update 6/2/22: an automatic SW update a couple days ago seemed to have vastly improved some of the situations I described below. So I feel obliged to update my review as well. Most notably, the USB access without the cloud subscription is working flawlessly for a couple days now. Before, it will record for only a second, or shows no picture at all, or fail to let me access the recording, everyday. Now, it’s reliable and reasonably quick to let me review all the recordings. And the SW just seems much less buggy going from one use to another. So, together with the great hardware, I now consider this a good product worth recommending. — End update. It takes quite a long time between the motion trigger (which is only seconds after actual motion ) and the ability to see with the camera, either through real-time view or waiting for the recording to be ready for view. It feels like half a min to a minute, so most likely I’ll miss whatever triggered the camera unless it’s somebody ringing the doorbell. After the initial cloud access expired, I’m supposed to be able to use my local drive and view the clips the same way. But it was even slower, and so far with only 30% success rate, some attempts causing the system to fault out in different ways. In today’s world, this is unacceptably buggy, for a software of this complexity. And it makes the whole product sub-par, even though I think the cameras and their installation are great.

4 years ago, Meadow Ct

Just use your Common Sense

I have my four cameras. I have two in the front of the house and two in the rear. They are great! Just use Common sense in your expectations. For the price they can’t be beat. I read the reviews and the negative reviews either reflect a lack of understanding or higher expectations. The two cameras in the front pick up anyone approaching the front door. The second camera follows anyone walking up the side walk to the front door. The one camera in the rear shows a large area in the yard. The 4th camera I use to monitor varmints who eat my plants. I can move these cameras pretty much anywhere I wish within 100 feet of the house. When there is too much activity from the wind blowing a bush within camera range, I can turn it off. The night vision is great. It is not in color. I watch deer, raccoons, groundhogs very clearly. They are so sensitive that it will pick up movement when something or someone it at the outer edge of the camera range. I certainly expect to replace my lithium batteries before the two year expectation but that is a small price to pay for all the features the cameras provide. Many issues can be resolved by owning a good modem/router. Now, I plan to purchase a mini for inside my home.

2 years ago, Mincrafter278

Needs Some Work

The first few days when I had this it worked very well using the ringer and letting my Alexa announce that there is someone here now the app is very awful and it need some working on. Whenever there is motion detected on the gate and I click to see you can never know if you’re really gone see what’s happening or you’ll just be on an infinite loading screen and miss on whatever was happening outside of your door. The only time you get to actually see thought the camera is when someone is ringing the doorbell or when there is motion detected why can’t we see whats happening outside whenever we feel like it? If it’s because of the battery dying too quickly we’ll thats my problem that’s why you give warnings ahead of time. The worse part is that videos end too quickly when they don’t have to, I got a video of a delivery man ringing my door bell and then 2 seconds later the video cut off now I can’t see where he left my package due to the video cutting off when it didn’t need to, I know I left the record time to the Max amount of time it lets me and I turned “end video early” OFF so I don’t see any reason why my recordings end early whenever it feels like it. The motion sensor is very odd when it comes to recording, somehow it is able to detect a small cat walking on the floor Feet away from my door but sometimes it can’t even detect a person walking towards my door until they’ve already reached it.

2 months ago, Mia & Brian

Great app but a few bugs

I love the blink app and my blink devices. It took a while to get the right router settings for them but now that it’s configured properly, everything works great. I have the doorbell and the floodlight camera. A few things that still bother me and why I have 4 instead of 5 stars: 1. Toggling the motion sensor in the app for the floodlight camera on the Home Screen on the device itself doesn’t actually work, even when toggled off (using … > Motion Detection toggle) it still gets activated by motion. I had to go to … > Device Settings > Motion Settings > Motion Detection which just seems like a bug in the app that should be fixed. 2. The app becomes unresponsive to any other input while it’s trying to resolve a particular request. For example, you tap on a notification and that app opens trying to load whatever notification thingy you tapped on and sometimes this takes a long time. E.g., a doorbell motion notification. If you get impatient and try to do anything else in the app it doesn’t really work, presumably because it is still trying to fulfill the initial request. App should be programmed to either a) load requests faster, or, b) give the user an option to abandon the slow-loading request, or c) just abandon the slow loading request as soon as something else is requested.

2 years ago, savagepete

After the free trial things change

Blink cameras come with a free trial of their cloud backup service. For some systems the cloud service is not required and videos can be saved with the HUB’s memory port by using a USB drive. So, I thought I would see how things change after the free trial expires and find out what’s different. Today I went out in front of our cameras to see how they perform and here’s what I found. First of all I noticed that the cameras respond differently. How? The camera on the front of our house stopped detecting movement in the driveway and near the house and, instead, detects every car that drives by - even though those zones are deactivated. The notifications for movement detection are often very delayed or non-existent. The list of videos no longer has an orange dot next to the new videos that haven’t been watched yet so you can’t tell which ones are new and yet-to-be watched. The talk button still works but the sound doesn’t come out of the speaker for a minute or two - so the majorly delayed two-way communication makes that feature virtually unusable. Checking the live-view results in a spinning curser as the system struggles to produce the video. Overall the system is very slow to respond and sometimes doesn’t react at all. So, yes, the cloud service isn’t required but my analysis shows that, without the service, performance is greatly reduced and sometimes the cameras just don’t respond at all. ☹️

1 year ago, RonG69

Seems to be leas reliable over time

Seem to have camera issues after a year or so. The things I wish this had - faster switch between camera views - as it has to wait for server to release the camera before going to another- a way to filter. By date- and when in edit /delete mode of the recordings, a way to select all of a date at the header, or even the click and drag to select multiple at one time like the iPhone allows for other things (like mail selecting). It would save more time cleaning up the server. The directional camera bases seem to be crap here too- they won’t go low enough to catch the room, then they also won’t set proper- seems to think that either straight up or straight down is default home (which is absurd) I do like the Minis being able to record longer when viewing or view without recording longer - but the app starts crashing after a little looking around …maybe the tech people can fix all this and help me keep my cameras online as they seem to go out often one or another (I have 3 modules and 15 cameras) so this can be a tedious huge daily repair event—- and that View multiple camera at same time stuff- doesn’t work for me- newest blink cameras and iPhone 14 pro max. Not even on my tablet or my Pc does it work… not sure what’s up here—

3 years ago, bluelew

Could be great, but buggy

I bought 4 outdoor cameras because they were wireless and easy to setup and install. I didn’t want to go through the headache of hiring a professional to hardwire everything. So from that perspective, great idea. Problem is I find this system full of issues. Overall, it’s not dependable. Capturing thumbnails sometimes works, but most often doesn’t. The latency of live view is terrible, probably 10-15 seconds, and that’s if it works. My cameras are within 20feet of my router, and my sync module is literally next to the router so the latency can’t be because of my network which is a 300MB download. Sometimes the motion sensor will trigger but the camera won’t turn on in time And completely miss the action. Live stream audio cuts out frequently. Etc etc etc. When it works, it’s great. But there’s constant issues. I find that it doesn’t work more often than it works. Even night mode is patchy, image quality is great on one camera, but terrible of the other two. I also think the App is behind others like SimpliSafe. I’ll keep playing around with it, but it doesn’t always work and that’s annoying. Oh, and this is pretty annoying, but the whole system is sort of useless unless you sign up for their cloud service which will cost you $100 / year if you have more than one device. Whereas SimpliSafe still allows you to review and store video clips without their cloud service.

4 months ago, Crag303

latest update 30

This latest update Version 30, Seems to be even worse than the last update. I just updated because my Blink is telling me I have 39 clips from last night, I do, where are they are they holding them hostage? And it’s not this phone because I checked my other iPhone and it’s saying the exact same 39 clips but they don’t seem to exist. So I check for updates oh goody and update, So I updated not only does it still tell me I have these 39 nonexisting clips but the whole app froze up and I can’t do anything with it without closing it hopefully and trying again. Can’t we please go back to a version similar to 6.1 where it was very user friendly and very few taps were needed. For those of you out there who are not from the early grandfathered days, you used to be able to just simply tap on your photo snapshot and you could see your camera manually and top it off not only one tap to see camera but you could save that clip and now that you have to pay for your cloud saving but they won’t allow you to save manually viewed clips, and One tap on that same snapshot you could turn the camera off and on and not have to go into settings and do 1000 taps just to turn the camera off and on or for any other simple change. They really butchered this app and just are making the cameras useless and as user unfriendly as possible. thank God I have an old phone that has 6.1 on where I can delete clips so easily compared to today

5 years ago, sWhiteJr

One of the better wireless camera implementations but...

I’ve had the blink system for about a year. I’ve been happy with the video quality, and the ease of use. The app is easy to quickly use, and the cameras have survived outside in the elements for a year. Claims of a 2 year battery life seem exaggerated at best, however. The o YL way you’re getting 2 years of battery life is if you have your cameras basically disarmed for a majority of the hours in the day, which kind of defeats the purpose of a security camera system. But I bought it expecting that, and I am not disappointed. Batteries last about 6 months, give or take. Would I like 2 years between battery changes? Of course, but six months is still impressive. As for the app; it’s good! My one request would be that they move the ability to schedule arm and disarm times for each individual camera, rather than the system as a whole. I have cameras in front of my house, and one in my backyard. When my kids are playing out back they’re constantly triggering the backyard camera, which drives the battery life into the ground. I’d like to be able to disarm that one at a scheduled time, while leaving the front cameras armed. I know I could do it manually, but that sort of defeats the purpose. I’d be willing to give the app 5 stars if that feature was added.

1 year ago, Jdaddyispimp

Had Arlo. Now I’m over invested in this.

My first issue that really bugs me is that if you accidentally touch the name of a camera on the Home Screen it prompts you to change the name. This should only be in the settings of the camera not on the Home Screen where you press the arm and disarm button. If they could fix that it would be great. Second issue I have is the cameras don’t give you a battery indicator other than good . No percentage or anything. Having Arlo prior which I feel is far superior, had a lot better user interface. I do like these cameras and the unlimited amount you can have for the annual service fee. But they need to work out some flaws in the app. The name change thing being the biggest woe. I also wish you could play live view on more than one camera at a time like Arlo did. Never posted this I think after first getting these. 🤷🏻‍♂️ Now I’m absolutely certain they need to fix where the arm and disarm area is or make the camera name change just in the settings, not on the main page directly next to your second cameras name…! Like let’s be serious. Once you set the name of your cameras do you really want to change the name of said camera on the fly on your home page and not in your settings of said camera. Just fix the issue and I’m fine with this setup for the cost.

6 years ago, ZombieKiller2012

Perfect System

Purchased system while awaiting back surgery. Can quickly look outside and see what’s going on. Has limited written instructions but the videos and pictures paint a clear picture. It takes no time at all to set this up with the app. Battery life has been great. Keep in mind that when you increase the camera settings, (image quality, duration of recording, etc) of course the batteries are not going to last two years. Come on folks, don’t give negative feedback because of that! Plus the app monitors battery life, and wireless signal strengths. It will also tell you when a camera has high use and alerts you if the battery is low. I will say, the night vision is amazing! I am really impressed of how bright the image is. The camera sensitivity was set to 6 and it was picking up birds flying by. Adjusted it to 5 and it doesn’t, catch them anymore. The mount that came with it are simple. You can tilt up/down and swivel it left and right. The phone notifications of movement is very timely and the camera settings in the app are great. Setting up the cameras are easy and is not rocket science. I have two cameras now and plan to install more in the future.

1 year ago, And hcienenwkka

Glitchy At Best

These cameras are ok at best. I have fantastic internet and my sync module is within a few feet of my router, but the absolute horrible delay of getting the camera’s to give you a live view or capturing a video when they detect motion is horrible. Typically whatever triggered the camera is out of sight before it actually records. Then, if you tap on a camera and see nothing, you close that camera out and open another you get the beautiful message of “sync module is busy” or some non sense. You can forget talking through the camera for any reason. It’s so delayed and broken it sounds like a third world language. My system disconnects every time the power goes off for obvious reasons and you simply CANNOT IN ANY WAY get the system connected to WiFi again. I enter my WiFi password and the brilliant Blink system tells me it’s incorrect. Reset the internet, still nothing, call the help desk and suffer through 30 minutes of someone speaking broken English and magically they work again. You can walk directly in the view of the camera and not trigger it. I have played with every setting available in the individual camera and nothing. So you have camera’s but they are next to useless. I would recommend avoiding Blink. With Blink, if you paid for time the product actually worked, they would mail you a check.

3 years ago, lovetobelicked

Was a great system.

Got them in July of this year. Had been working great. In the last month only work when we are home. Defeats the purpose. Could be something we done. Have checked everything on them. We have eight of them. Live on an acre. Yesterday we could see a shadow of a man with beard at side of the house. This is while we were home. Never seen were he came from or were he went. Found out later his dog had got loose. He was looking for him. Then another day. Just happened to look out front door. Their was a car sitting in front of house with someone in it. Never seen it pul up or leave. Was there for a good 30 minutes. Now not working when we leave house. Going to call them tomorrow. See if they can help me with the issues. Also one camera that never works long. Have changed batteries twice already. Moved it to different places. This time nothing works to get it connected back. Love the clear day time pictures on it. Have the doorbell. Have not connected it yet. Was going to get the new security lights you put cameras in. So night vision will be better. Like watching the wildlife that comes through the back yard down by the woods. It’s amazing what is running around in your yard at night.

1 month ago, Cyra Niccals

Another Update and Getting Worse

Edit: Version 32.3. Only update I’ve seen with this app in the last several months is the version number changes, nothing else! STILL we can’t change the notification tone. STILL videos lag. STILL A VERY DANGEROUS SYSTEM! Good bye, Blink! You’re garbage system is going to the landfill! Hello new reliable, safer camera system! Edit: Version 32.1. One day after v. 32.0 is released - ONE DAY???? Still no changes made to this garbage system. Edit: Version 32.0 - Nothing new in update??? We waited 3-weeks for no improvements? No changes?? Edit: Version 31.0 - Still garbage! WHEN will the notification alert tone be changed back to the original tone you had for years?????? The volume was adjustable and you could hear it! Apple finally allowed users to change to whatever tone they wanted and YOU changed it to this awful tone that we can’t hear! I am not even going into your other “updates”! This has become a terrible, unsafe and DANGEROUS system! When are your software engineers going bring this back to a reliable system? Edit: Version 30.0 and system is getting worse! Click on a video and brings up live view, that’s when it wants to load; alerts come an hour after the cameras are tripped. Really??? Are the developers even reading these reviews??? Not once has a developer responded to anyone’s review in about a year!

3 years ago, Glo~Worm

Not the worst

I’ve used many brands of cameras in my line of work so I know what’s utter garbage, and what isn’t. These are alright for simple home use. The quality of the video both during the day, and at night are sufficient. You can clearly see the persons face, and that is all that really matters. They have always detected motion well. They were decently priced. I don’t love that they require an email, and a phone number. Pick one. It just feels extra intrusive. No support team needs both on file. I also do not love that the notifications are hit or miss. I have everything set up with my preferences in both my phone settings, and the app settings yet most of the time I do not get any. So that means I have to open the app to see if anything is captured. Which makes the live video mic basically useless. If you want to relay a message verbally via the camera to family when they enter the home you will likely not be notified of its detecting motion. If you want to shout at an intruder that you’re watching them, also useless. That is a fix that is completely on the app end seeing as my notifications work for every other app I use. So overall a decent camera, easy to set up, but crappy on the notification end. If that could be fixed I would say this would be a pretty great system.

3 weeks ago, gonkey dong

Security.

I installed my blink cameras, six of them around the house , battery powered , and the cameras have been functioning beautifully picking up motion outside whenever I have my cameras set on armed, easy to set on or off on the phone. The batteries are still functioning after a year and a half. I have not had to change any or put any new batteries in. I am happy with the cameras, the security, and pay $10 a month through the Blink program to store any motion clips that show up on my cameras. yes I’m very happy and satisfied with the blink cameras and would highly recommend them to anyone that needs security around their home also the cameras can be used inside for motion detecting also. cameras are easy to install just basically screw them into a tree or screw them into some outside wooden area of the house or anywhere you want and just point the camera in the direction that you wanted to check for any potential motion. I had no basic experience of security cameras when I put these up.

1 month ago, authordrsilva

Worst money I’ve ever spent

This thing never works when I need it, which defeats the purpose of having security cameras. Sometimes the whole system will bug out and you can’t access the cameras. Right now I’m getting notifications of someone at my door and I can’t connect to the live feed to check, AND it’s also not saving the videos to my storage device so I can at least see who it is on the recording. So I just have to hope nothing crazy happens until I can go through, disconnect everything, and set it up all over from scratch. It’s also also programmed to be more difficult to use if you don’t subscribe to their $10/mo. cloud plan. For example with cloud subscription you can mass delete all your saved videos, or select multiple to delete at once. With local storage you’re only options are to delete each video one by one, or delete EVERYTHING at once. There’s many other design choices that seem to be there to punish you for not subscribing. I spent $300 on the whole setup. Including $100 for a WiFi extender to make sure I was getting a good connection from the front door to my bedroom. I’ll have to trash this and go to a different company. If anything did ever happen I wouldn’t even have any evidence to show the police.

9 months ago, Jks3111990

Sounds

Update as of 11/14- still a terrible little “blip” sound that is barely audible. Also, since the most recent update I don’t get notifications at all sometimes. The cameras are going off and I am not aware of it all unless I go in and check the app. Then I see all the red notifications and activity. This is extremely concerning because I pay monthly for this service to protect my home, yet I am not aware if something Is happening because I am getting no notifications at all. My settings have not changed, it’s intermittent at best. Very upset because I just purchased more cameras and this is now happening. Since the update to iOS 17 the notification sound is very hard to hear. No longer does it make a louder sound. To start, Blink does not allow the sound to be changed at all to begin with. This is extremely disappointing given I would like to have my own choice in sound for alert notifications. Now, the sound is barely audible. My wife has yet to update her iOS and is still running 16. Hers sounds normal and like it use to. This needs fixed as soon as possible Blink. Some of us depend on hearing those notifications should an issue arise.

5 months ago, neworrob91

Failed when it was needed

Horrible when you need them most. I have all notifications turned on. Someone unplugged all my cameras and did I get a notification they went offline, no. The cameras have a micro usb port, I got tired of replacing batteries and not having the camera in use while charging rechargeable batteries so I plugged my in on a cord. Support says it doesn’t show they went offline on their log. Yet for my privacy they can’t even tho I’m telling them to look at my video log, don’t watch the videos just see how I went from 4 cameras to 1 only showing recordings. Tech feature failure and I’m asking why aren’t my cameras sending notification when they go offline, to get told to reset my phone and reinstall app as like this is my fault. Tech support also tried telling me the micro usb port is for the solar panels, so if I spent all the extra money for the solar panels and someone cut the wire they would go offline and send a notification yet because I don’t have the panels and just plugged In, they get unplugged and that could be a solution to why they failed to send me notification they lost power, aka went offline. Please keep your security with peace of mind, blink and your at fault for product failure 743

2 years ago, Ambie Q

Product degradation for local storage users

Blink has degraded several features for local storage users over time quietly, to the point that I am now shopping for a different brand. I have used Blink for a year and a half now. In the beginning, my setup was great. It never had downtime, I talked to people through the device from across the country and saved the clips, and it just worked. Now, the system does not always pick up motion when it used to, and still worse, the Blink app removed the function for local storage users to save their 'live view' clips. If someone is burglarizing your home, and you hop into a live view to confirm it, you aren't allowed to save the clip you're watching in real time. It's insane. Also, Blink just recently added a fat, unchangeable watermark onto all new clips it records. So not only have I lost various functions and my system is less reliable now, but Blink wants to advertise itself should I ever have the use of this product anyway. They call the watermark "industry standard" when other brands allow their watermarks to toggle off. Don't buy this system or use this app if you think you're going to be self-sufficient with it. They money grabbers at Blink nerfed this into oblivion for that purpose.

5 years ago, Dan_MICH

Works well

Let me start off by saying that I like the system and it works. It has some issues however and here’s why it’s not 5 stars: 1) intermittent sensitivity. The camera on the front of my house will often capture a car driving down the street, but not always the mailman or UPS driver walking up to my door (which is closer to the camera than the street). I don’t understand this, and more importantly it’s not serving it’s purpose if it doesn’t capture people walking up to my house. 2) Notifications are almost non existent. Sometimes I’ll get a notification on my lock screen, sometimes I won’t. There is never a notification on the app icon, not until I open the app and then exit, at which point the number of notifications shows up on the icon. This is annoying, as I’d like that reminder so I know to review my alerts. The biggest selling point of this system for me is the fact that no subscription is required. However, I don’t know if that trade off is worth it if it isn’t going to capture everything it should, or notify me when there is activity.

5 months ago, Charlie Mike Lima

Recent app "upgrade"

The latest changes you’ve made to the blink app are terrible and I am not having a positive experience since the update. Here are my biggest complaints. 1. The video window size has shrunk drastically when using iPad or Mac. I used to see a decent sized viewing window on the right side of the screen and the video clips to choose from were on the left. Now I have a tiny video window at the top of the screen with the video clips below. The majority of the area of the screen is just wasted white space. 2. After viewing a clip and deleting it the old version of the app used to automatically roll to the next clip. Now I have to manually click on the next video. All these extra clicks are annoying and unnecessary. 3. There used to be a storage meter at the top of the screen that showed me the percentage of space I was using in the storage cloud. With the new version of the app this is completely gone. I do see a tiny circle at the bottom left that says cloud storage and I’m not sure it that is supposed to be the new meter or not. There’s no percentage number displayed so I have no idea how much storage I’m using or what’s remaining.

2 years ago, ShawnaMarie

Freezes and crashes my phone when attempting full screen

I’m not sure what update triggered the freezing but anytime I try to view the blink cameras in full screen mode whether pushing the button or rotating my phone, my whole phone freezes and goes black and I can’t use it for at least two minutes until my phone seems to wake back up. Also, it used to be compatible with IFTTT so that when I left my house or came home, the cameras were automatically armed and unarmed. It no longer does that which is very unfortunate as the whole purpose of a security camera system is to be able to monitor your home while you’re away to fix both of these problems, I have completely uninstalled both applications on linked them from one another and reinstalled and re-linked, but the problems still persist. Finally, it would be very nice to be able to view multiple cameras at a single time instead of having to wait for one to stop “monitoring” before moving onto another camera, especially if multiple things are happening at once in multiple locations.

6 months ago, Fogenbaugh

High school programming interns?

Seems like the high school programming interns have really degraded this Blink app. I am a legacy Blink customer with the max number of cameras this app will handle. The latest "updates" have seemed like a downgrade. One of the more recent annoying problems is the "new video" counter on the icon: it is never accurate and always shows more unwatched videos than are actually in the app. Currently my app is showing 13 unwatched videos but they all show that they've been watched when I open the app, and, the number is different on my different Apple devices. I close the Blink apps when they are not in use and have also done hard shutdowns but the counter does not reset or reflect the correct number of unwatched videos. This never used to be a problem before Blink sold out. Another beef I have in the recent "updates" is that iPads have a large screen but the new app version seems to be an adaptation of the small screen version for the phone and does not make good use of the iPad's screen real-estate unless you go to the full screen mode which has to be turned on and off individually for each video. Blink needs to reevaluate and do better for their loyal customers.

2 years ago, sp6100

Great camera system

Great camera system. Have had the cameras for a couple years now and have very little issues with them. Love that they’re wireless and take disposable batteries. Easy to mount to exterior surfaces and they can handle the heat and extreme cold of upstate NY. Only have a few things I would like to see added that other cameras systems have already. Would be useful if there is a “mark all as seen” for the events that are recorded. Seeing as you have to clear the notification icon by clicking on each event one at a time. Would also like there to be a option to still record events but not be notified each time. Example being if I have the entire system armed but only want the doorbell notifications to be sent to my phone and not the entire camera system notifications. It would be a nice feature to have added that way I can keep the system recording all events and check in on them when I want/need to, but will always be notified when the doorbell is rang.

6 months ago, Honest_Abe24

Not satisfied. Slow, Won’t load, live feed just closes the app.

Installed somewhere in the timeframe of mid-December 2023. Two outdoor 4 cams with provided battery. One cam no longer is working at all, battery states OK on settings, but on the dashboard has low battery indicator on. These batteries need replacing this often? Also, I do not have them placed in areas of high usage or have video quality higher than standard. The reason for the placement, I am forced to stay within 25-27’ of the sync module? Really limits the purpose and intent of my purchase. Lastly, if it were to be the case I was notified of movement by one of, I mean, the one working cam, if I needed to pull it up for immediate answers, I might as well call the neighbors and ask them if they can see what’s going on. The video rarely loads, never faster than ol joes teleprompter reading pace, and if/when it does load, if anyone could make a clear image of what it was attempting to display they are probably in a pycsh facility and have experience with splotches of art. But if you look real close, your time runs out and you have to start the entire process over again. Super inconvenient, super unreliable, super untrustworthy, and very frustrating as a whole.

6 months ago, Pint Size xx

This is getting to be too much

I had ring before thing and only switched so I could get more cameras cheaper. Mistakes were made with that decision… First off while I personally have no issues with battery like some I do have way too many notifications from headlights ! My ring never had this issue. It’s make it so sometimes I don’t catch movement on one camera that was partially caught on another because one was triggered for headlights then didn’t go off for something real right after, i’m not paying to track how many cars drive down my street every night 😑 secondly there often a delay I’m the recording itself where you play back and it’s stuttered and only catches partially then jumps to 5 seconds later for no reason that I can find. The motion zones have NEVER worked. The distance for motion is spotty and inconsistent between cameras that are exactly the same. And most recently the update that removes previews is my last straw.. so now I have to watch every stupid car to at goes down my street to make sure it’s not something I need to see instead of visually filtering out. I regret the decision more than I can say for switching to blink.

8 months ago, TSully980

Wired floodlights lose audio in “live” view

I purchased 2 wired floodlights, video doorbell and a wireless camera. All these units are outside units. I have installed the 2 floodlights and video doorbell. Had system for a couple of weeks or so and all was good. Was going to purchase another wired floodlight system today but am on hold as of now. Everything worked fine with no complaints and purposely waited to do a review. Glad I did because at this moment I have no audio while in “live” view using the wired floodlights. I have audio through the doorbell while in “live” view though. I’m not going to try to fix it because after researching this issue there isn’t any long term fix. The “fix” only lasts at most a couple of days if you’re lucky. I haven’t come across any other issues for the other products Bilink sells while researching my issues so those units are probably acceptable. But as of now I’m considering returning all this stuff and going with a different brand product. If the products I purchased just did what the the box said they would do my rating would be higher. I’m not going to waste my time and money on a brand that doesn’t deliver.

6 months ago, Zxceert

Recent update

These cameras are worthless now since the most recent Apple required update. The motion notification sound isn’t audible at all. It sounds like a soft plink. I can be wide awake with my phone in my pocket and not hear it. My phone can be in my hand and I can’t hear it, so how am I suppose to hear it when I’m asleep? Blink blames Apple. Apple blames Blink. I’ve spent hours with tech support on both ends and have no resolution. Blink needs to push through an update that corrects this ASAP. Shame on you. Update. So, now there’s a different motion notification after a recent update. I still can’t hear that one unless my volume is on it’s highest setting. I sleep through it, so it’s no good. I’ve purchased separate inexpensive motion detectors for my home. Those blast me out of bed. I keep the cameras on, but my new motion detectors advise as to when to open the blink app. Blink does not. There was a recent update that changed how clips are deleted. Good luck. They delete, but the notification hangs around until the app is reopened. What was wrong with the delete function prior? I still don’t recommend this camera system. I’ll use them until they no longer function. I’m loving my cheap motion detectors.

5 months ago, Jessica Sutton Taylor

Needs Improvement

I find myself replacing batteries in my Blink doorbell camera every 3 months or sooner. Those lithium batteries are not cheap. I even have the camera on the lowest of the low settings. Also, in live view, make it to where I can watch my house nonstop without the message “continue” popping up. The whole purpose of me getting that doorbell camera is so I can continuously watch my house from wherever without being interrupted. Also, my sync module always looses connection to my wifi. I have many devices that are streaming on the same wifi and never lose connection…Also, sometimes I don’t even get motion notifications when my neighbors or someone is by my door. There’s like a 3 seconds delay when viewing the camera as well. I can hear a conversation with my ears from the couch as I’m watching the doorbell camera from the app, and there’s a delay. I don’t like that. It makes me feel unsafe…I have a special needs daughter and I rely on these cameras to protect us at night…Fix these issues and the Blink system would be perfect.

3 years ago, icantthinkofagoodnameeither

So so

It’s actually better than I thought it would be for the price... a couple things I find silly.... Unless I’m missing it and I may be so hopefully if I am someone can correct me.. with such an important app with such an important notification that’s so different from your phones other notifications there should be a built in function where the app makes a different noise than other apps since iPhone doesn’t seem to do that on its own (I know, not blinks problem, but many people will be using iOS to Navigate) I find myself ignoring the notifications thinking they are social things. Whoops. Also wish more than one person can view live at once. Especially if paying for premium planning. I don’t understand why pay all the money for literally absolutely no reason whatsoever. I keep trying to justify the reason for the subscription and it makes really no sense other than they kind of bully you into it making more sense if you have more than one camera which almost everyone who buys one does.

12 months ago, Reviewer Reaper

App never works! EVER! It’s been months.

App was good, cameras worked great during free trial and as soon as we paid for the year plan nothing works not even the motion detection, the audio, nothing. I can be standing right in front of the camera and nothing. As for the app and it’s functionality it’s absolutely stressing and horrible when you pay for a subscription and you can’t even load the thumbnail or live video. I’m currently possibly looking at getting evicted because my cameras haven’t been working. ( we use them to check on our dog whom has separation anxiety) and it’s stressful not being able to check on him and calm him down when barking when we are not home and facing being homeless because of this app and cameras not working when we need them too is getting out of hand I’m paying for a service that I haven’t been able to load in to view for the past few months. Don’t get blink , go with an actual home security system. If your getting this to keep an eye on your pets don’t waste your time or money. In conclusion Im throwing the cameras away and deleting the app, its not worth the stress. Thanks blink for absolutely nothing and taking my money.

2 years ago, Momsreview4678

The app needs a lot of work

My last set up was with Nest and I needed a few more cameras and purchased Blink because of the price (it's appropriately priced). The camera set up is a breeze and no hardwiring needed. The downside to that is the lack functions it offers. There is no live feed without a request made in the app and that request takes at least 30 seconds and the feed lasts only 60 seconds. I use the cameras to watch my kids and dogs when I'm in a different room and I can't with these cameras. The notifications are incessant. I want it to record motion even when I'm home but it let's me know anytime the wind blows or someone is in the home. I know we're home. You can only snooze for 4 hours max and you can't clear all so in like 2 days, I have 688 alerts that are just hanging out. The night vision isn't very good either. But it's like half the price of Nest and almost instant set up. It does great sensing motion and recording. Best is able to differentiate between wind and a person so that's a drawback. Biggest draw back is not being able to use it like a baby monitor. I'm keeping the Nest just for that.

2 years ago, Firebug4444

Inability to select a group of clips to delete

The fact that you can’t select a certain clips you want to delete and then delete at one time makes it almost unusable. Wind makes tons of videos and my husband was working in the yard which produced tons of clips that I need to delete. Mind you I should have turned it off while he was outside working, but I didn’t so now I have to delete individually hundreds of clips by swiping and then hitting the delete button. For each clip!!! It would also be great to have a timer of when you disarm for a reason like yard work or something that it alerts you to turn them back on so you don’t forget. I don’t Know why the wind turned them on as there was no movement in front to prompt it just the sound of wind. Please make the upgrade immediately to select the clips in a group and THEN hit the delete button. I don’t have 20 min or more to individually delete the clips nor do I want ti spend my time doing this. Overall I like the use of the app and blink their are just a few MUST HAVE things that need to be updated and then some nice to haves

3 years ago, Pico d cat

Terrible design flaw in update

PLEASE FIX ASAP. Yikes! The recent update puts the delete button right where the share/save button used to be. Anyone who has been regularly saving videos is set up to accidentally delete instead of save. Also, the share button is now positioned right next to the delete button, and so is very easy to accidentally tap, especially on a iPhone vs iPad. Do the software designers actually use the app? [Edited: the April 2021 update speeds up the save to file function; it only takes a few seconds to save each video to file now. Thanks!!! —> It *WAS* a slow and annoying process, having to save one video at a time - taking about 1/2 minute each save.] By moving the share/delete buttons the save process is slowed down by (1) needing to break the habit of quickly tapping where the share button used to be, and (2) having to be very careful to make sure you don’t tap the delete button by accident since they’re so close together. Yes, there is a pop-up “do you want to delete” verification when you tape delete, but it’s easy to accidentally tap “yes”. One glaring lack in functionality is the ability to add a camera/date/time stamp to saved video clips. The data is all there, and is used as the filename when saved as a file. 1. Please move the share and delete buttons back to their previous locations. ASAP. 2. Please FINALLY add a feature to save multiple clips at once. 3. Please add an optional camera/date/time stamp to saved videos.

8 months ago, RPJVAdm

App has bugs and lag

It’s a decent app, it could be worse. It is not the most user friendly regarding the connection speed as there is a annoying lag when trying to view live or view a motion alert was received on the phone. Also, it would be nice to be able to create separate login credentials for other family members, such as a spouse, other relatives or friends in rare cases. I mention this because if anyone else wants to be able to see the camera, they use my access and have the ability to change settings or arm or disarm the camera which poses a security risk. Being able to send them a view only access would be very helpful. Also, my notification settings keep turning to off even though I’ve made sure I have not, nor had anyone else, changed the settings in my app. This could be a bug, but it’s annoying as you don’t realize they are off until some time passes without getting a notification for motion and you just think to yourself “that’s weird.”

6 months ago, DaymondS

Can’t at night with floodlights on & local storage doesn’t automatically free space

Canera: blonk floodlight camera You can see everything 24/7 with decent quality but as soon as the floodlight turns on during the night, everything will turn dark; you can only see like 3 feet infront of camera that is lit up the most but other than that, you can’t even see your driveway or anything any further than ur door step. The problem with it i think is the contrast and the exposure settings and where the camera is focusing which the app doesn’t give us any control over. Btw, this happens wether you have night vision ON or OFF, in fact, night vision has no effects. Night vision actually makes it worse to see at night even with lights off. If you turn off night vision, it solves the issue as long as the floodlight is off. Once floodlights turn on, everything farther than 2-3 feet turns dark. Another problem with it is that the local storage doesn’t automatically empty itself once it fills up. There isn’t even a setting where you can schedule a clips deletion. You have to manually delete the clips to free up storage.

3 years ago, WardOSU

Short Lived Live Stream

Background need: I have a need to watch my elderly, handicapped FIL who likes to try to stand up without required assistance. I have been using old iPads’ FaceTime to watch and communicate with him (while I’m working in another part of the house, or outside doing yard work). I need to keep a constant eye and/or ear on him so to interrupt any potential fall situation he tries to put himself into. Ownership : I just set up my account, app, and camera today. Camera = indoor Mini First response in meeting my need: disappointed - Live sound & stream last less than a couple of minutes, then there is a short lived prompt to continue. If you miss it, then you have to restart the stream. I need it to be a continuous feed, until I manually end it. The Mini is corded for its power, so power saving is not of a concern. Features: The motion sensor works well Notifications come through quickly - for my need, my FIL could be on the ground by the time I get the alert and get the stream moving again, so while they are nice, the process of getting from alert to live stream is too slow. Audio - 2 way is nice & appears to be clear enough for me to be heard coming from the camera. Important to note: the video and sound have about a 2 second delay. Likely, if you are reading this in the App Store then the purchase is already made. To the app developers: please consider including a continuous live stream option, especially for corded powered cameras.

6 months ago, Peaches424242

Recent update is awful / less functional / buggy

We’ve been using Blink since it first came out and always praised its excellence… until the recent update. The new layout is terrible - it’s slow and less intuitive. It feels cumbersome and often freezes or fails to play videos. Watched videos now say unwatched. It’s functionally much harder to delete videos and maneuver in the app now. Notifications have stopped working. This is frustrating. Additionally, after most recent update we lost years of footage we wanted saved and customer service has been unhelpful. Many recent videos show blank when clicked. We’ve tried uninstalling and reinstalling, but the problems persist. Please consider reverting to the old layout, as it functioned MUCH better. Is there a way customers can roll back to before the recent update? This update has taken Blink from a 5 Star App to a 1 Star App. Additionally, implementing an Alpha Test group with actual Blink users could help identify issues like these before future updates are launched. It feels like these updates were made by a team that does not regularly use the system.

4 months ago, RickF80

Questionable changes

We’ve had our Blink system for years, 10+. The hardware and the app are generally good. Some changes have been helpful, though sometimes requiring new equipment. Recently the app changed in a couple of unhelpful ways. If viewing in full screen made you can no longer swipe to move to the next video. It’s necessary to back out of full screen and select from the video list. Also, the motion sensor selector on the cameras page is now a menu. It used to be possible to turn off motion sensors with one touch. Now, you open the menu, select disable motion and then it backs out of the menu. 2 touches, but negative progress. When working around the house, I would disable motion sensors where working leaving the rest armed, so in my case frequently used. A new bug is that when selecting a video to view, the audio plays but the video is blank. After swiping the app closed and reopening, it works again. Perhaps another update will improve the unfortunate changes.

3 years ago, hansG44

Force update makes device obsolete

First , I complained that the latest force update required a iOS version that can not be implemented, rendering cameras virtually obsolete, because my iPad is old and can’t be upgraded - so the customer service/ developer response was : “appreciate your feed back...recent app updates provide security...my team..will like to discuss Blink system requirements in further detail...” THIS MUST BE an AI response, right?! or someone who has a very dark sense of humor and uncaring attitude ! I understand that the system - NOW -requires an update and iOS that is compatible BUT THAT was not the case when I bought the system, and what you have done is worse than any security flaw exploit would have done -now the cameras are worthless. since, I can not use them with out buying a new iPad that cost 10 the price of cameras. Do you get that?! Is it to difficult to understand the economics of the problem. Why do you respond with inappropriate comments that assume customers “are stupid or ignorant about technology?” Or are you saying that your engineerings are going to violate iOS copyright and hack and old IPad to make it compatible.. (sarcasm).. Yeah, I do not think so!!

3 years ago, Tdunn43

Decent all around, app has room for improvements

I spent a lot of time researching different camera systems before finally purchasing a 5 set of these cameras. They have met my expectations from what I had read were the pros and cons of this camera system. My biggest gripe with the app currently is that there isn’t a way to refresh the camera views all simultaneously. When I open the app to check on everything, (my 5 cameras,) I should be able to see a live view of all cameras instead of clicking on each camera to refresh the feed. There is even a pull down “refresh” feature when you are on the camera view page but I haven’t actually seen that do anything. This is how I think the camera refresh function should work but it does not. All in all not a huge deal, but something I think of every time I use the app. When I’m at work or on the go and want to quickly check on things at home, it makes the process longer than it needs to be.

2 years ago, Snn5

No badges

The app is OK with limited functionality for somethings compared to full version subscription services like ring and nest. I can’t really complain about these cameras because of their price point and typical durability. But this app is another issue. I have not gotten icon badges at all ever since day one. I get banners and sounds and other things like that but no matter what I do I cannot get badges. And this wouldn’t be a big issue but sometimes you swipe away multiple notification banners that are persistent or in this case, even setting the banners to persistent is not working because they are stuck on temporary. Added to the wonky Ness of the notification screen on the iPhone itself, where sometimes there’s no active notifications but there are past notifications and sometimes even when you swipe back up you don’t see those missed notifications, this is where the problem with not having badges comes in. But I’ve been dealing with this for over two years and multiple tickets later I still don’t have a fix for it.

2 months ago, AngryGoogler99999999999

Useless Clip Search Function

The app does not allow you to search your video clips by day or date. If your camera is set up in a location where you get a lot of motion alerts, and you need to see some thing from like four days ago, good luck trying to find a video that shows you what you want to see. You will have to scroll through hundreds upon hundreds of clip notifications just to get to the actual day that you’re interested in. It’s so completely useless. Also, if one of your cameras goes off-line, the app does not give you any information about why the camera is not responding. There’s no way to tell if it just lost its Internet connection or if it’s unplugged or if somebody ripped it off the wall. You will just have to wonder until you manage to get to your location and actually lay your hands on the camera. There is no way to power cycle the camera from your phone, there is no way to reset the Internet connection…. this app is only good if your cameras are running perfectly on their own all the time. There is no option to attempt to address an issue remotely.

3 years ago, tristanjohns94

Cannot connect at all

I purchased this mini device to watch over my family but it didn’t work at all it wouldn’t connect to my WiFi i talked to a person they sent me out a new device which i knew wasn’t going to be the problem solver i connect the new device an still no connection to my internet i have high speed 350mbp speed connection there is no. Reason for this small device to not find or connect to my WiFi ready for the best part... it only connects to personal hotspot i cannot have this run on a personal hotspot all day an night long this is absolutely ridiculous i can’t explain how disappointed i am in blink an the company i relyed on it to protect my family from people harming us an catching every thing i need on footage wind up is i cannot even get it to get a Live Photo notbing the team can do at this point to change my mind no replacement no help u just lost a good review an a. Customer this wasn’t fair that it lost me 1 week of my life that i could of had invested into another camera because they made me wait in The mail for the also broken mini camera

12 months ago, Furthest Left

Slow and clunky

I like it less every day. Do yourself a favor and save money in the long run for a system that doesn’t overcharge for storage subscription. Previous review: My apartment has 100 mps fiber optic internet so it is not the problem. I didn’t expect this system to perform like a quality home DIY system but I didn’t know it was going to take anywhere from half a minute to get a view at who is at the door to 5 minutes to get a picture and sound when you arm the internal camera. If you wait to see who’s at the door, they’ll leave before you answer it. This is pure and simple bad, inefficient coding. The only thing is good for is making sure my dog isn’t worried while we’re gone and disturbing the neighbors with barking. I give it 3 stars because honestly that’s what I bought it for. But was hoping it provided more. I’m sorry I bought the doorbell as I can see who it is much faster through the peep hole. Also, you can’t see who is at the door remotely unless you buy a second subscription. Might be worth it if the quality were better but my doorbell is most likely headed for Goodwill.

3 years ago, mimnj

New update made camera useless.

UPDATE (March 25, 2021): I emailed Blink customer service as the Developer’s Response requested. Blink replied back to that email with (exact quote, word for word): “In case you can't update your iOS to a newer version (some Apple devices are limited by the manufacturer), I am afraid that your only option is to purchase newer device, which can carry ios 12.5 or higher.” So that is their only solution, for me to buy a new iPhone. I foresee a class action lawsuit against Blink on the horizon. So my advice is DO NOT BUY BLINK CAMERAS. Blink does not support their existing customers or stand behind their products. I’ve owned this camera for only 5 months, now it’s a brick unless I shell out $600 for a new iPhone. HORRIBLE CUSTOMER SERVICE! ORIGINAL POST: Worked fine till they updated the app in early March 2021. To view the camera I now must update to a newer version of the app that my phone cannot download because of its older IOS software. Why don’t you allow older iphones the abilty to continue to use the older version of the app. It worked before, now it doesn’t. Now the camera is useless. I was planning on adding additional cameras, but not now.

11 months ago, Halvi

It Could Be Better

Update… It really isn’t worth the money. It never works and is slow. A lot of times cameras stop working and just won’t synch. Tech support always says it’s the batteries or WiFi rather than the actual cause of it being really poor service. Thinking about switching to another system because this doesn’t really offer the security people are looking for. ———————————————————————— I have several cameras and two doorbells along with the yearly service. With the amount of money for the cameras and the yearly cost, I expected better. A lot of times there are notifications but they are not viewable for about 2 minutes. The thumbnails don’t always work and it seems the cameras go out and don’t function like they should even though the Wi-Fi and batteries are fine. Live feed freezes half the time and/or videos don’t record actual footage. Not to mention it doesn’t catch people walking but it catches a cloud across my windshield. It could be better and there is room for improvement. Like I said I expected a lot better than what it’s giving for the price.

1 year ago, mmmmaaaadddddddooooogggg

Glitches bad

I currently have construction crew working on my house and from time to time I like to watch what they are doing live when I’m not home. This system after about 20-30 seconds has a blue button at the button that says “continue?” I click that button, but from then on, the footage is SUPER glitchy. The sound counts out, the video won’t load and then it will kick me out to the home page. So I then click back onto the camera and it is still super glitchy and eventually it will kick me out of the whole app. It does not matter what camera I click on after the first 30 seconds of watching. They are all super glitchy. Also, when you click to video the live feed, it takes like 40 seconds for it to load, even if my phone is on WiFi. I do really like having this system but it’s got some issues. Especially the live feed which I stated already. I did check to see if my app needed to be updated, it is currently up to date.

Description

*Smart Home Security Made Simple* Blink’s affordable smart home security camera systems help you monitor your home directly from your smartphone. With multi-system support and simple setup, you can easily control multiple Blink cameras within one single app! The Blink Home Monitor app will alert you to what matters, day or night, no matter where you are. Just Blink and you’re home. *Be there from anywhere with Blink smart home security * The new wireless smart home security cameras from Blink and Amazon go where wires can’t. Outdoor and Indoor and run for up to two years on the included single set of AA lithium batteries* to help protect what matters most for less. *Blink Outdoor*: weathers the storm so you don’t have to. Outdoor runs for up to two years* on a single set of AA batteries to help you protect your home inside and out — rain or shine — with features like two-way audio, motion detection, and more. Outdoor works with Alexa. *Blink Indoor*: is a wireless, battery-powered security camera that you can place anywhere inside your home. Features like two-way audio and night vision help you stay connected to what’s happening no matter where you are — day or night. Indoor works with Alexa. *Blink Mini*: is mighty — but tiny — which means you can plug it in anywhere inside your home. Starting at $34.99 Mini is a great first step towards keeping your home more secure. Hear, see, and speak right from the Blink Home Monitor app on your phone and get alerts whenever motion is detected. *Works with Alexa* Connect Blink Outdoor, Indoor, or Mini to select Alexa-enabled devices for voice commands at home. You can use your voice to stream live video, play recorded clips, arm and disarm your camera, be alerted to motion, and more. Go hands-free with Alexa! *Enhance Your Smart Home Security* Use the Blink Home Monitor app to check in on what’s happening at home from anywhere at any time. The app connects your home to your phone in HD video so you can see and protect what matters most. With multi-system support, you can use Blink to watch your home, vacation home, or business all at the same time. By using this app, you agree to Amazon’s Conditions of Use (www.amazon.com/conditionsofuse) and Privacy Notice (blinkforhome.com/privacy-policy).