Petcube Cam 360 Is Not Worth the Monthly Subscription
Home security cameras are not in short supply; Almost every smart technology brand makes them. Pet cameras are a little harder to find. They can usually detect barking, distinguish your pets from people and monitor them as they move, and some will even hand out treats. There are good reasons to use cameras at home when you have a pet, whether it’s for the safety of your pet or the safety of something you left on the kitchen counter. Distributing pet videos throughout your home can be expensive, but if you’re looking for a reliable, no-frills indoor camera, the Petcube Cam 360 will do the trick. But if you want pet camera features, I’d recommend going elsewhere.
Petcube’s only product is pet cameras. There are five models , and all of them are generally more affordable than their competitors with a similar feature set. For example, the Petcube Bites 2 Lite offers a number of features similar to the Eufy N140 , but costs $100 less than the Eufy model (FYI, we reviewed and liked the Eufy N140, but did not test the Petcube Bites 2). . We tested the cheapest model, the Petcube Cam 360 , which retails for $41.99.
Petcube Cam 360 is small and maneuverable.
Like most security cameras, Petcube is not designed to be hidden. It is miniature, but requires access to power. Since it can rotate 360 degrees, you can place it in the center of the room, but otherwise, you’ll be better off placing it in a corner to get maximum access to the space. Unlike cameras designed to be mounted on a wall or ceiling, the Petcube seems to work best when mounted on a shelf, which is where it sits in my house. Not even as large as the coffee cups it sat next to, Petcube uses two different axes in its design to achieve up and down, as well as left and right movement. The entire unit rotates on the base, and the lens is mounted on a second rotating mechanism that moves up and down. Despite the fact that the case is plastic, it looks solid.
Easy installation and easy to navigate app.
Physical installation was as easy as unboxing; there are no parts that can be put together. Find the plug and simply install the camera where you need it. After pairing with the Petcube app , which was quick and worked on the first try, you can get a panoramic view of any room the camera is in through your phone. The Petcube app is simple and easy to navigate. There are advertisements from companies that seemed cheap but were easy to ignore. Like most of its competitors, Petcube lets you decide whether you want to receive audio and motion notifications and how sensitive you want them to be. Petcube has two-way audio on camera, so you can ask your dog to throw the baguette he just stole off the counter while you watch him from a dinner party across town.
Basic pet camera features require an expensive paid plan.
The way pet cameras work is simple: they will notify you if they sense movement or barking; you can watch a recording of this session or tune in to the livestream and perhaps interact with your pet. Each brand has a different method for determining whether an activity is human or pet, and it’s reasonable to expect them to do this with less than 100% accuracy. The thing is, Petcube only promises this if you take advantage of their protection plan, which costs $7.95 per month. Most home security camera plans cost $3-$10 per month for multiple cameras with many more features. Without a plan, Petcube simply senses sound and activity without understanding where it’s coming from, meaning you get a lot of notifications about activity that has nothing to do with the pet. In fact, it was Petcube’s poor implementation of this AI recognition feature that made me appreciate how well this feature worked on the Eufy N140. After several days of trying to adjust the sensitivity, I turned these features off altogether. It turned out that Euphie, who was two rooms away from me, still continued to bark when I was not at home.
More importantly, Petcube will also not record clips without this subscription. While you can save pictures you take while operating the camera, and even save videos while you watch your pet in the app, I’d say the main function of any pet camera is that the camera catches things while you not there. The dog is barking, so the pet camera picks up the recording, notifies you, and you check the recording to find out why.
Excellent video and responsiveness promise
With Petcube Cam 360, you can always play live video quickly and reliably. This is an important feature, and most cameras I’ve tested, both for people and pets, don’t do this feature very well. When using other cameras, it may take up to 30 seconds for live video to go online; In this regard, the Eufy N140 is especially temperamental. But every time I launched the Petcube app, it connected quickly and never gave me any network disconnect issues. The video quality itself is also amazing for such a small and inexpensive camera. Night vision doesn’t disappoint either. The excellent responsiveness continues in the joystick functionality. In the new world of pan and tilt cameras, most require a few extra keystrokes to bring up the joystick, and the action usually has a lot of lag and can be sticky, leading to over-correction. Petcube immediately calls up the joystick and the controls seem to operate in near real time.
There are other great features that Petcube misses out that Eufy has, such as an end-of-day diary about your pet, since it doesn’t record clips without a paid plan. Your camera comes with a two-week free trial so you can see what you’re missing, but I still think the plan is priced too high.
The Petcube Cam 360 is a great mini pan/tilt camera, but it lacks a pet camera.
If anything, the Petcube Cam 360 would convince me to try a larger or more expensive model in their line based on the video quality and responsiveness of the 360. Combined with some of the features of a more detailed product, Petcube could be a great alternative to other brands. On its own, the Petcube Cam 360 is best as a mini pan/tilt camera, much like the Blink mini pan/tilt camera , with better video quality and responsiveness. I don’t expect it to record clips or detect noise; it’s just a camera that I use to quickly look around a room and check that something is simmering on the stove, or maybe check to see if a plant is alive while I’m out of town. But as a home camera, I wasn’t particularly impressed with it.