Hue is best known for its smart lights, but recently the company ventured into home security with its Secure lineup of cameras. Now, parent Signify is releasing its first video doorbell, the Hue Secure, with several unique features it hopes will make it stand out against formidable competition from Nest and Amazon’s Ring.
To start with, the Hue doorbell comes with a 2K fisheye camera, more resolution than Nest and some of Ring’s doorbell products, potentially offering more detailed video. Hue is also offering a 24-hour video history for free, letting you avoid paying for a subscription if you only want to keep a day’s worth of clips. In addition, the camera can work with Google Home and Samsung SmartThings, along with Hue’s own app. It won’t be compatible with Apple Home at launch, but will be updated to work with it later. Signify will also add Matter support sometime this fall.
Along with 2.4GHz and 5GHz Wi-Fi compatibility, the Hue Secure video doorbell come with a Zigbee radio. That lets it pair with Hue lights, so you can set it up to automatically turn on other Hue lights (inside your foyer or outside the door, for instance) when someone approaches the front door. However, if you want a chime to compliment the Hue Secure by providing sound alerts when the doorbell rings, you’ll need to buy the $60 Hue Smart Chime that’s sold separately — as the new doorbell doesn’t work with any third-party chimes for now.
Hue’s Security video doorbell arrives in October in North America, Europe and the UK for $170 (£140). Signify will also release a new 2K wired camera in Europe that’s an update to the original Hue security cameras. That model will cost €180 or €200 with a stand, with no word yet on US availability.
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