has left many smart doorbell owners fuming. Without the expensive subscription, the Ring doorbell is next to useless. However, not every smart doorbell demands a monthly fee, such as TP-Link’s Tapo Video Doorbell Camera Kit that I’ve been testing this week.currently. With the Ring subscription costing $50 a year, excluding the cost of the hardware, it’s aggressively priced. But is it as fully featured as a Ring doorbell? Here’s what I’ve found after a week of usage.
Better still, the camera is fitted with a lamp, enabling full color capture at night, instead of the murky infrared footage that my Ring provides. Surprise, surprise, the Amazon Alexa alerts aren’t as rich as they are with Amazon’s own Ring devices. When someone presses a Ring doorbell, it automatically shows you who’s at the door on Alexa devices with screens. The Tapo can only sound audio alerts, and you have to ask Alexa to show you the camera, which can incur a few-second delay, by which time impatient couriers may have gone.