Ring has dramatically cut the price of protecting your front door with the launch of the Ring Video Doorbell Wired for just £49. That’s £40 cheaper than the basic wireless model, and £179 cheaper than the Ring Video Doorbell Pro, which now ships with the plug-in power adaptor.
So, what’s the catch? Judging by the specs not a lot. There’s a 1080p sensor in there. As Ring doesn’t have products with more resolution, the new doorbell has the same resolution as the other products in the line-up.
As the name suggests, this model has to be wired, as there’s no battery. However, while the current wired models, and even those with the option of being wired, such as the Ring Video Doorbell 3 Plus, can ring an existing chime, the new model can not. Is that such a problem? Well, no, as the model can be used with Ring’s wireless chimes (there’s one in the box) and it can even ring your Amazon Echo speakers.
As with all existing models, the Ring Video Doorbell Wired can be answered from Alexa smart speakers and even the Fire TV Cube, as of a recent update. There’s still no Google Assistant support, though.
As a wired product, this new doorbell has customisable motion zones, letting you select the area of the image that you want to monitor. In our experience, activity zones reduce the number of alerts you get far more successfully than the PIR motion sensor controls on Ring’s wireless products.
The only real difference, going on specs alone, between the existing Ring Video Doorbell Pro and the new model is size, with this new model a lot smaller.
We’ll have to wait until we have a review sample to see what the true differences are between products and whether or not the video quality is good enough from the new model. Currently, all things point this being a hard product to beat, even managing to undercut the budget brands. The Ring Video Doorbell Wired will be available from May.
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Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
