Alert me when person at the door

January 6, 2025 2:17 PM

I am looking for a doorbell camera or something like it that can alert me to a person who needs help to get into the house at night, but who might not remember to push an actual doorbell button. I think that there are devices that would make my phone beep to wake me up if there was a human-shaped thing near the door?

For *reasons* a person in my household needs to take a dog out in the backyard on a leash and come back in at night sometimes. I don't want this person to be left outside all night if they can't remember how to get the door to work. The door is not wired for a doorbell. When I looked at reviews for a battery operated Ring brand doorbell, it appeared that it required extra fees in the form of a subscription for it to differentiate between a person and leaves blowing in the wind. I suppose that it knowing the difference between a person and a deer would be impossible? I'd like it to have a way to define a short range so as to not alert me to the neighbors. I don't want to have recordings kept.

posted by SandiBeech to Technology (17 answers total)

I have an Arlo doorbell, but I think most doorbell cameras do this, that they will send an alert if they detect motion. The Arlo doorbell is smart enough to tell whether the motion is a person, an animal, a vehicle, or just mystery motion. I can select which notifications I get, so my doorbell is set to alert me only when it detects a person or animal (I like to see when the neighborhood cats visit). You can also set regions to detect in, so it's not looking at your whole yard, just the area standing directly in front of the door.

We have a Ring we use for security at another location so we have all the alerts turned on for reasons, but I believe it can be selective as well.

But, I think you're going to have to pay a fee for the notification service no matter what doorbell you get.
posted by AzraelBrown at 2:52 PM on January 6

We have the Google Nest doorbell which sends motion alerts through the Google Home app, which tells me if the motion is a person (or a person with a package). We don't pay the subscription fee which gives you 30 days history vs the 4-hour record with the free tier.
posted by TwoWordReview at 3:03 PM on January 6 [2 favorites]

+1 to Google Nest doorbell, which also has a face recognition feature that will (most of the time successfully) tell you who it is. It allows you to adjust the range of view so to limit the observable area to a specific area.
posted by nandaro at 3:10 PM on January 6

Taking this a different direction, what about a pressure-sensing mat or a wireless door chime?
posted by teremala at 3:26 PM on January 6 [3 favorites]

I use Alfred camera, an app on a smart phone. I have an old phone I use as the camera. Or, you can buy a camera. I get alerts whenever there is a person within certain parameters.
posted by JohnnyGunn at 3:28 PM on January 6

Taking this a different direction, what about a pressure-sensing mat or a wireless door chime?

From a privacy POV, either of these would be much better.
posted by praemunire at 5:19 PM on January 6 [1 favorite]

My apologies for going further afield, but maybe something in the dog leash that would cause a bell to ring? Or in the dog collar? (Imperfect if the person loses the dog and wants to come in.)
posted by clew at 5:32 PM on January 6

The video doorbells will absolutely do this but they will also go off when a person leaves the house via that door which could be a major nuisance.
posted by miscbuff at 9:00 PM on January 6

teremala: Taking this a different direction, what about a pressure-sensing mat

That would also alert on a person going out, but combined with a sensor on the door that deactivates the mat for a minute or so when the door is opened that alert would be suppressed. Even better would be having an alert only if the person would be standing on the mat for longer than the average time needed to open the door. Probably suppresses a lot of false alerts too from random animals heavy enough to trigger the mat.

or a wireless door chime?

Way more frugal than a battery-operated video cam, which will have run out of juice the night it's actually needed.
posted by Stoneshop at 1:16 AM on January 7

or a wireless door chime?

The question is to alert the asker about someone who "might not remember to push an actual doorbell button."
posted by EndsOfInvention at 2:26 AM on January 7

A door chime goes off when the door is opened, like a retailer might have to alert them to incoming customers. It or a mat would indeed be triggered upon exit, but that didn't seem like the worst thing since then the OP knows the person may need help in the near future. Either could likely have their receiver unplugged during the day or be on an outlet timer.
posted by teremala at 3:34 AM on January 7

My Inexpensive Wyze cam sends a message to my tablet when it detects a movement. The message makes a DING on my device,, but it's only a ding, and only once, and easy to sleep through.
posted by SemiSalt at 5:05 AM on January 7

I have one of these, and it would do what you want it to do, and doesn't require a subscription.
posted by General Malaise at 6:09 AM on January 7

If you’re already in the Apple ecosystem, our Logitech Circle View doorbell will do this using Apple HomeKit. It requires an iCloud subscription which costs us $2.99 a month. My partner says the $1/month plan should also work. You might also need a HomePod, HomePodMini or AppleTV to act as the HomeKit hub.
posted by telophase at 7:04 AM on January 7

Also, iCloud keeps our recordings for one week and I don’t know if you can change that. We can also define the space that the Circle doorbell alerts in—we had to do that to stop constant alerts from cars driving by and kids walking home from school. It’s sensitive enough to alert us to the rabbits that hop into our porch occasionally (and identifies them as animals), though leaves blowing in sometimes trigger it.
posted by telophase at 7:08 AM on January 7

The question is to alert the asker about someone who "might not remember to push an actual doorbell button."

I haven't bought one, but I believe some of these have proximity sensors.
posted by praemunire at 7:39 AM on January 7

A door chime goes off when the door is opened,

The current models tend to have either a proximity sensor, or an infrared beam (and a reflector across from it), so fitting one outside the door would do the job the moment a person approaches.
posted by Stoneshop at 9:15 AM on January 7