Ring’s Car Camera Is An Impressive Security System, But Average Dash Cam
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Ring’s CarCam combines a security camera, car tracker, and dash cam into a sleek all-in-one gadget. This device provides you with a live video feed of your car’s interior or exterior over the internet. In the event that someone comes near your car or breaks into it, the app will record the incident while immediately sending a notification to your phone. You can click this popup to see what’s going on and use the built-in security light, microphone, and speaker system to help deter thieves remotely in real-time.
As soon as you put your car in drive, the CarCam automatically records your entire trip to the cloud while tracking your vehicle’s location. At just $249, this functionality rivals dash cams twice the price, but includes additional smarts and security features those pricier options lack. I spent two weeks using CarCam as my daily driver. Here’s how it held up in city and highway trips—both during the day and at night.
Car Cam
$249.99
amazon.com
CarCam Is A Small, Easy-To-Install Auto Accessory
Every time I open up my Ring app the "Neighbors" community watch section is flooded with clips of car thieves. Case in point: The screenshot below was taken just earlier today. People are brazenly checking doors and smashing windows to break into vehicles. Car related crime continues to rise across the country. While home security cameras can capture criminals rummaging through center consoles or stripping catalytic converters, they’re often too far away to be effective.
Ring’s CarCam mounts to any windshield and warns you if someone’s casing out your car with motion alerts, but it also actively deters a would-be thief from striking. This accessory works with any car that has an OBD-II port (which can be found on virtually every vehicle manufactured after 1996 with the exception of some Teslas). It connects to the internet via Wi-Fi or through cellular data using Ring’s Protect Go subscription ($6 per month or $60 for the year). The subscription is optional, but I highly recommend it for 24/7 access to a live view, notifications, and GPS location of your car which only works if you have an internet connection. Cellular service is especially helpful when you’re away from home and don’t have access to a Wi-Fi network, as you can keep an eye on your car if it’s parked on the far side of your driveway or at a meter downtown.
The CarCam is unexpectedly small for a dash cam equipped with dual 1080p HD ultra wide angle cameras (interior view is 153 degrees, exterior view 120 degrees), a two-way audio system, and cellular connectivity. At 1.6 by 8.4-inches this gadget looks a lot like a smart TV remote and fits in the palm of your hand. Its slim body slides into the gap where your dashboard meets your windshield and attaches to the glass with a tiny adhesive patch. After sticking the CarCam to the windshield I still had plenty of space to prop up an E-ZPass holder without obstructing my view. The cameras are located on the cube-shaped head at the top of the device. This design decision makes it easy to adjust camera position with a quick squeeze to aim it up or down. It retains a wide range of motion so the CarCam will be able to get an optimal angle in virtually any car.
Most dash cams receive power through the 12V cigarette outlet, but the CarCam plugs directly into your car’s OBD-II port. This provides a constant flow of electricity even when your car is off. I just plugged the end of the included USB-C power cable into the right side of the CarCam and wired it around the steering wheel down to the OBD-II port connector. With some finesse you can hide the excess wire for a neat setup. Luckily my fiancé’s Kia Seltos has a removable fuse box panel directly above the OBD-II port which I used to store the rest of the wire.
All in all, the CarCam is a simple plug-and-play solution even for people who don’t do much wrenching on their vehicles. I had it wired up and online in under ten minutes with half of that time dedicated to waiting around for a firmware update to finish. Once the CarCam is powered up, you connect to it wirelessly through the Ring app and add it with a tap of the "Add Device" button. With everything ready to roll, a live feed of your car’s front and rear pops up on the main menu of the Ring app.
Monitor Your Car At All Times With Dual Live View Cameras and Motion Alerts
CarCam nails its home security system-like features. Its live video view is snappy—I loaded into either the interior or exterior camera of my car in under three seconds on average using a 4G LTE connection. When motion is detected near your car, notifications appear either at the top of the screen if you’re using your phone or on its Lock Screen with a chime. Out of the box CarCam comes with its tracking sensitivity set on the higher end of its adjustable scale (level 6 out of 8). This is the most accurate setting for my home, as it lets me know if someone walks past my car. Any higher on the scale and I get a notification every time a tree branch waves or the sunlight shifts.
While the default sensitivity is primed to catch would-be criminals, it frequently flags regular people going about their business or other cars as they pass by. I live in a townhouse community so I get a notification every time somebody passes my car to throw out trash or walk their dog. I’m okay with that since I prefer to play things safe. Each time I approached the test vehicle, the CarCam accurately caught me peeking into windows or yanking on handles in bright sunlight and pitch black lighting. More often than not, I was sent an alert when I came within about two feet of the car. Throughout testing there was no discernible delay between the time the camera detects motion to the time the notification hit my phone complete with a picture of what triggered the event.
On days when I left the car parked downtown, my phone would explode with notifications. Pedestrians often came within three feet of the front and right side windows of the car while traffic constantly drove by the left. Sure, you can use a slider to turn down the sensitivity, however I just opted to use the Interior Motion Verification feature whenever I parked in the city. Enabling this option keeps the CarCam focused strictly on motion inside your car. While this means you won’t be privy to potential threats or be notified about bumps or crashes while parked, you know that if you’re alerted then somebody has thrown something into your car or is actively breaking into it. I only use this setting when I park on main streets with plenty of people and traffic cops passing by. If I’m parked on a side street, I just lower the sensitivity. If someone is detected casing out your vehicle the CarCam gives you time to act.
A Deterrent That Smartens Up Your Car With GPS Tracking and Two-Way Communication
CarCam doesn’t just tip you off, it provides you with tools to intervene during a break-in. It has bright LED security lights which you can flash to ward off thieves from a distance. If that fails, CarCam supports two-way talk via a built-in microphone and speakers to let them know police have been notified.
While you (hopefully) won’t often be chatting with a potential robber, I found myself constantly popping into the two-way system to ask my fiancé questions while she drove. Mainly these were life or death things, like whether or not the steak in the fridge was still okay to eat or if she could pick up coffee on the way home. CarCam’s speakers can get plenty loud and its microphone quality is surprisingly full. Its crisp enough that captions I automatically generated from its exported clips often averaged above 90 percent accurate.
Overall its a strong deterrent to thieves and another way to communicate with household members who aren’t answering their phones. However if you feel like the cabin-facing camera is an invasion of privacy, you can flip up the included privacy shutter. This mutes all audio and blocks the interior camera.
One of the features this shutter disables is its most helpful safety feature, Traffic Stop. You can say "Alexa, Record" and the CarCam will capture up to 20 continuous minutes of video while you’re stopped, such as when you get pulled over by police. The CarCam’s cellular service comes in clutch here because it will automatically upload the interaction to the cloud plus update your car’s location, if you permitted CarCam’s GPS capabilities. I recommend enabling the GPS because it constantly tracks your car’s location on a map. I found it handy to have for everyday scenarios like when I lost my car in a massive mall parking lot and used the app to find my way back to it. And in the worst case scenario, if someone actually stole our Kia, not only would we have footage of the crime immediately accessible on the cloud, but the car’s live location as well.
There are two features that are missing at the time of release; Ring smart home integration and pre-configured messages. Ring’s ecosystem can be automated to interact with other devices—for example if your Ring floodlight camera detects motion you can tell all of your other outdoor lights to turn on or even activate connected sprinklers. I would love to tie the CarCam into this level of protection of my home ecosystem while its parked in my driveway. But there’s no home or away mode to set or even an option for it to serve as a trigger for other Ring devices just yet. I also would appreciate being able to have an automated voice automatically let people know that the car is being monitored. This would be helpful while you sleep or are away from your phone.
A Full HD Dash Cam That’s Just Sharp Enough
With that said, the CarCam could definitely use a camera hardware upgrade. The dual HD camera system records your cabin interior and windshield view clearly enough to get the job done. By that, I mean you can see who’s in the wrong in an accident, the shape or color of another vehicle, and road markers. But if you’re trying to identify text of a license plate or the words on a sign, the middle-of-the-road resolution and speed combine to make it damn near impossible.
CarCam is at its best on a clear day as both cameras easily handle daytime glare without losing details in highlights. Other dash cams can often lose precious visual information in the sunlight, obscuring objects in splotches of bright white light. Even on days where the sun’s rays beamed through my windshield, the CarCam’s video recordings clearly showed the cars directly in front of me. Both wide-angle cameras capture plenty of each scene with true-to-life colors. With other dash cams, I’ve seen the red on my shirts turn pink or dull. As I drove, vibrant hues like purple in overhangs popped and colors looked true to life in downloaded clips. This accuracy is essential when you’re trying to identify a vehicle’s makes and exact color type, especially in footage captured at high speeds. Even with some dark overcast skies, the CarCam held up with slightly dimmer but still usable videos and stills.
I’m not as impressed by its night footage since the interior camera’s infrared vision blurs important features. Look at my ugly mug below during the daytime and you can make out defining features like a beard, face shape, and even my finger tattoo in some footage. At night I can see a general shape of a person, what type of shirt they’re wearing (T-shirt, tank top, or a hoodie), and if they’re wearing glasses. But I couldn't identify facial hair types, glasses styles, or shirt colors. And flipping to the exterior camera shows a grainy view that’s limited to what you can see in your headlights. On roads where I drove without streetlights of any kind I couldn’t clearly make out passing cars (whether they were a sedan, SUV, or truck) let alone their colors.
To be fair the CarCam’s performance isn’t too far off from other dash cams in its price range. It’s nothing to write home about, but its far from the worst quality I’ve tested. From about five feet behind a car, the exterior camera could clearly make out a license plate when stopped at a traffic light or toll booth. But the minute it pulls away you’re not getting a single letter or digit from the blur. You can see this dip in shot quality below where I passed the same exit sign passed on Route 78 in New Jersey during the day and late at night.
Ring’s cameras are often best in their class with innovative features like outlining the path of a subject on an overhead map or implementing 3D motion detection to cut down false alerts. It’s a bit disappointing that they didn’t really move the needle here with some sort of standout dash cam innovation. With that said I do appreciate the dual simultaneous recording from both interior and exterior cameras as this can prove you weren’t distracted in an accident.
Ring’s App Keeps Your Car’s Cameras and Location A Tap Away
Ring has had over a decade to perfect its software and its organized app layout reflects that. Upon opening the app you’re shown a list of connected devices. To select the CarCam you just click on its live feed which is presented in a rectangular box. Icons along the bottom make it easy to see past events on an expanded timeline, select an activity filter, or export a clip. Whether I’m using the app or the website, I can easily navigate to specific recordings based on time and day (within three clicks on average), and can check in on my car’s live feed with just a tap.
In an emergency, the last thing you want to do is fight with an interface when you need to quickly pull up a clip or check a motion alert. Ring’s streamlined setup ensures you don’t. Gathering clips is as easy as scrolling through a video, placing the marker on the point you need, and hitting the download video or snapshot option for stills. One weird limitation is that you can only export clips in intervals of 20 seconds at a time. That’s plenty enough to grab a point of impact and the moments leading up to it. But if you wanted to download a long trip or grab ten consecutive minutes of driving footage, it would take you hours to download and piece all of the clips together.
The Verdict
Ring’s first steps beyond home security are a success. The streamlined app makes it easy to drop in on my house and car from anywhere with cellular service. Outside of your driveway this lets you keep an eye on the car while you work, shop, or go out to eat. While you can’t integrate CarCam into home automations or export clips longer than 20 seconds, I could see both of these issues being addressed in future updates.
Its camera quality is just average. If you’re looking for the absolute sharpest picture you won’t find it here. For the most part I’m impressed with the first generation of this device. It comes in at half the price of rival dash cams with cellular connectivity without the need for cumbersome extra hardware like a separate mobile hotspot or external battery. I would happily pay a bit more for even better camera hardware on a next generation, but this is currently the ultimate security system for any car.
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