There has been a recent spate of burglary’s around my area recently, and I’m not going to lie, it has put the wind up me. Every time I leave the house for a long period of time, I feel a sense of tension as to whether everything will be as I left it on my return. The Ooma Butterfleye is a security device which aims to look after your home when you can’t, it is currently only available in the USA however it aims to cross the Atlantic in the future. It can be used with or without a subscription, you will get a good number of features for free including 7-days of Cloud Storage, Instant Video Capture, Live Streaming, Instant alerts (motion, sound, face, anti-tamper), Privacy arm/disarm, On board storage and power and internet outage protection. At $9.99 for 30 days you get Facial recognition, Remote 911 (coming soon, Telo customers only), Automatic arm/disarm, 2-way audio, Scheduled notifications and fixed fee up to 6 cameras, there is a $29.99 package for 90 days which will get you all the above as well as Multi-site automatic arm/disarm and Business analytics (coming soon).

The camera is a compact and glossy piece of kit, it isn’t exactly discrete but doesn’t have the intimidating, invasive design some security cameras have, there is a choice of built-in storage to choose from, 16GB or 32GB and that battery backup helps the Butterfleye to be something you can simply set up and forget about safe in the knowledge that power cuts and internet disconnection won’t affect the device. Packed with features this camera can automatically arm and disarm based on your GPS location, will capture activity 5 seconds before a triggered event, it uses face recognition to get to know who your friends and family are, including the pets, this means you can receive customised alerts to tell you if your kids get home with someone it doesn’t recognise. The 24/7 live-stream from anywhere in the world and the Talk and Listen feature lets you stop anyone who’s up to no good in their tracks simply by saying “I can see you” like some omnipresent security god. The camera records in HD and provides clear images as long as the light conditions are good, there is no night vision function, this is frustrating as it has gone out of its way to eradicate the issue of power loss which has long since been a major flaw with these types of devices but seems to have dropped the ball on this basic necessity. The Ooma Butterfleye is on its way to becoming a great security device, it’s just not quite there yet. However the features it does currently have perform well, we found set up and interaction straight forward, the face recognition and alerts work well, and the image is clear although could use with a wider angle. RRP $199.99

3.8 out of 5

Current Cheapest Price

Pros

Power and internet outage protected

Low cost subscription

24/7 live streaming

Free cloud storage from the past 7 days

Face recognition

Instant alerts (motion, sound, face, anti-tamper)

Videos are uploaded and secured with bank-level AES encryption

Attractive unit

Connect six cameras with unlimited users per account

Cons

Only compatible in the USA

Some features still to come

No night vision