Having some cameras watching over your home or work space can be very beneficial. Unfortunately they can sometimes be expensive and overly complicated to setup and use. But if all you want is a simple camera with some nice features, the Wyze cameras are definitely worth checking out. Today we’re taking a look at the Wyze Cam Pan. Priced at $38, it packs an impressive set of features for such a low price. Check out the video below.
Out of the box
Getting the Wyze Cam Pan out of the box, the packaging feels pretty premium for such a low price. Branding is almost non-existent on the camera giving it a nice clean design. The camera weighs only 1.2 pounds, making it easy to place almost anywhere.
Getting the Cam Pan setup was very simple. Just download the Wyze App, plug in the Cam Pan, hold the setup button on the bottom of the camera for a few seconds and follow the steps in the Wyze app for adding a camera.
Wyze Cam Pan: Video
Once added in the Wyze app, there is quite a bit of customization you can do to the camera’s operation. You can set four waypoints that the camera pans between automatically, turn motion detection on or off, set detection zones, schedules, record time lapses and more. And, if enabled, the Wyze app will send push notifications for detected motion and audio.
Motion Detection
For the most part, the Cam Pan’s motion detection seemed to work well. In general it would consistently track me moving through the room. But it isn’t perfect. Occasionally it would pan too far in the frame and track the window rather than the action was going on when my kids were playing in the room.
To help dial in detection, Wyze has built quite a few adjustable features into their app. You can dial in the sensitivity of motion detection, set detection zones and schedules for notifications. To help alleviate excessive notifications, Wyze has also recently updated their firmware to include person detection. This helps to avoid detecting movement from pets, bugs and shadows, and does a much better job of detecting only humans — if that’s what you want to be notified of.
Viewing footage
There are a couple of ways to access video that is stored. If you want continuous video that you can go back and scrub through, be sure to get a micro SD card — Wyze sells their own, or you can get another brand –and install it into the camera. This is probably another way that Wyze keeps the cost down on the Cam Pan, by not including internal storage but allowing you to add your own if it fits your needs.
The Cam Pan also allows 14-day cloud storage for any recorded events. When motion or sound detection are turned on, the Cam Pan will record a 10-14 second clip that will be stored online for 14 days and can be accessed via the events tab in the Wyze app.
Other Features
- 110° per second rotation speed
- 360° horizontal view and 93° vertical view
- 1080p
- Night mode
- Switch between SD and HD for more storage space or higher quality
Another feature that might appeal to some is the ability for the Cam Pan to work with both Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa. I was easily able to install the Wyze Alexa skill and view the feed from the Echo Show 5. If you want to see more about the Show 5, check out our recent hands-on review.
Looking around on Amazon, there are a lot of ways to customize your Cam Pan as well. Everything custom wall mounts, protective covers to silicon skins let you tweak the Cam Pan to fit your needs.
Conclusion
Overall, I’ve been pleasantly impressed with the quality of the Wyze Cam Pan for the price. Packaging, design, physical features and app features are all pretty spot on, especially for $38 on Amazon. And with dedication from Wyze adding significant features to their cameras through firmware updates, the Pan Cam should only get better.
Buy the Wyze Cam Pan on Amazon
FTC: gadgetnewsonline is reader supported, we may earn income on affiliate links
Subscribe to the gadgetnewsonline YouTube Channel for all of the latest videos, reviews, and more!
