Ring Wired Doorbell Pro Review

Editors Note: This product name has changed from Video Doorbell Pro 2. We have updated our original review as of May 18, 2021 to reflect this change. This is the latest version of Ring Wired Doorbell Pro.

Ring’s premium smart doorbell, the Wired Doorbell Pro ($229.99), offers some features you won’t find on the company’s other models, including 3D motion detection and a bird’s eye view that gives you an aerial picture of motion events. It also offers very sharp video and accurate motion detection, and it works with Amazon Alexa voice commands and plenty of third-party smart home devices. That said, it’s one of Ring’s most expensive models, and you’ll need to subscribe to a Ring protection plan to access certain features and watch recorded video. It’s a tough choice if you own other ring devices and want a doorbell with the most advanced features, though the $99.99 Ezviz DB1C is an excellent option for much less money (and our Editors’ Choice award winner).

Ring Wired Doorbell Pro Design, Features and Price

The Ring Wired Doorbell Pro shares a similar design to its predecessor, the Video Doorbell Pro, which we reviewed in 2018. It measures 4.4 by 1.9 by 0.8 inches (HWD) and has a satin nickel cover and a glossy black camera face. The face has a microphone, an ambient light sensor, and a doorbell button bordered by an LED ring that turns blue when the button is pressed. A small speaker is located on the bottom edge.

There are two wire terminals on the back, and below the removable faceplate is a reset button and a QR code for use with initial setup. Wired Doorbell Pro uses dual-band Wi-Fi to connect to your home network and requires a standard 16-24 volt AC power transformer. The box includes the doorbell, a Torx screwdriver to secure the faceplate, mounting screws, an angle wedge adapter, a power cable adapter, a user guide, and a quick start guide.

The camera captures 1536p HDR video and has a 150-degree horizontal and a 150-degree vertical field of view. This gives it a 1:1 aspect ratio that lets you see a head-to-toe picture of whoever is at your door. The camera supports color night vision and pre-roll video that lets you see what happened just before the motion sensor is triggered.

Wired Doorbell Pro also offers Ring’s new 3D motion detection and Bird’s Eye View radar technology, which work together to provide more accurate motion detection and let you see where your home visitors have traveled on your property. Bird’s eye motion events are displayed as points on an aerial map showing the path taken by the viewer. The yellow dots represent the viewer’s current path and will gradually turn red and more transparent before disappearing after a few seconds.

Wired Doorbell Pro works with other Ring doorbells and security cameras, Ring alarm security systems and Ring lighting devices. In addition, it uses the IFTTT applet to communicate with third-party smart devices such as light bulbs, plugs and locks. It doesn’t work with Apple HomeKit or Google Assistant, but it integrates nicely with the Amazon Alexa platform and supports Alexa Greetings, which lets Alexa answer the door for you with a preprogrammed message. You can also watch video streams on an Amazon Echo Show smart display.

Like every other Ring doorbell, the Wired Doorbell Pro requires a Ring Protect subscription to view recorded video and take advantage of features like People Only Mode, Reach Notifications, and Advanced Pre-Roll, which gives you color video of events that occur six seconds before a motion trigger. with sound (regular pre-roll gives you four seconds of black-and-white video with no audio). You also need a subscription to use Alexa Greetings.

The Basic plan gives you 180 days of rolling storage for one camera and costs $4.99 per month or $49.99 per year. The Plus plan costs $10 per month or $100 per year and provides cloud storage for all your Ring cameras.

Wired Doorbell Pro uses the same mobile app (for Android and iOS) as all other Ring devices. It appears in its own panel on the dashboard screen, along with panels for all your installed Ring products At the top of the dashboard are the Disarm, Home, and Away buttons, and below those are buttons that take you to the Neighbors screen where you can view Ring community events, and the History screen that displays a list of motion events and video clips of each event. You can add buttons for other supported devices, including garage door openers, ring lights, and ring alarm systems.

Tap the doorbell panel to view a live stream with buttons for two-way talk, speaker mute and full-screen viewing. Below the video panel is an event timeline that you can scroll through to find an event that occurred at a specific time of day To access the doorbell’s settings screen, tap the gear icon in the top right corner. Here you can enable/disable Ring Alert, Motion Alert, and Motion Detection and change mode settings (disarmed, home, away). You can also link the doorbell to other installed ring devices so that cameras can start recording or turn on lights when motion is detected.

Other options include motion settings that let you adjust sensitivity levels, configure 3D motion range and bird’s eye view settings, and enable people-only mode. Device Settings is where you can configure video, notification and privacy options There’s also a button to configure Smart Responses, where you can enable Alexa Greetings so that Alexa can do things like give directions for a delivery or take a message. You can also use the doorbell to greet and take messages with Ring Quick Reply.

A bumpy installation

Physically installing the Wired Doorbell Pro was relatively easy, but pairing it with the app was problematic in our testing. This is a wired doorbell, so if you are not comfortable working with low-voltage (doorbell) wiring, you may want to have someone do it for you.

I already have the Ring app installed on my phone, but if this is your first Ring device, you’ll need to download the app and create an account. You can watch an installation tutorial in the app or just go ahead and get started.

I started by turning off the breaker circuit that supplies power to my doorbell wire and proceeded to remove my old doorbell. I removed the cover from the wired doorbell pro, connected the two wires to the terminals, attached the base to the siding of my house, and ran the circuit. I opened the app, tapped the three-bar icon in the top left corner, set up a device, and selected Doorbell. Following the on-screen instructions, I used my phone’s camera to scan the doorbell’s QR code and it was recognized immediately. I gave it a name and confirmed it was physically installed and the LED was spinning, but the app was unable to connect to the doorbell.

At this point the app is stuck in a loop that always brings me back to the setup screen. I tried uninstalling the app and resetting the doorbell, but the result was the same every time. I finally called tech support, and after a series of hardware and account verifications I was able to complete the install, but it had to be done manually without scanning the QR code.

Using the Ring Wired Doorbell Pro

Once installed, the Wired Doorbell Pro worked as intended. The camera delivers razor-sharp day and night video, though color night vision isn’t nearly as vibrant as daytime color. Motion detection is very accurate, with no false alerts when set to People Only mode, and the Bird’s Eye View feature works as advertised, guiding visitors to my doorstep. Two-way audio is loud and clear.

The Alexa greeting feature works reasonably well, but you have to ask Alexa to pause to interrupt the greeting when you answer the door in person. Finally, the doorbell responded instantly to my Alexa voice command to display video on the Amazon Echo Show.

The most advanced ring

Like any smart doorbell, the Ring Wired Doorbell Pro lets you see who’s on your doorstep and answer visitors without opening the door, but it’s the only model that offers an aerial view of where visitors have traveled while on your property. The 1536p camera delivered very sharp video in tests with spot-on motion detection, and the doorbell worked well with Alexa voice commands and Alexa greetings. We had some issues pairing the device with the app, but your mileage may vary. If you want the latest in smart doorbell technology, the Wired Doorbell Pro is an excellent choice.

That said, you can save quite a bit with the $99.99 Ezviz DB1C, which offers high-resolution (1536p) video and a wide vertical viewing angle, as well as intelligent alerts, local and cloud video storage, and support for Alexa, Google. Assistant, and IFTTT. And for the same price, you can go wireless with the Ring Video Doorbell Standard, which is much easier to install, but doesn’t offer many advanced features (like pre-roll recording or even dual-band Wi-Fi). That’s what you get with the Wired Doorbell Pro.