When it comes to deciding whether to buy a Nest Doorbell or a battery-powered doorbell, there are a few things to consider: How long does the battery actually last, and how can I extend it? This guide will take you through that and hopefully help you extend the life of your Nest doorbell battery.
Nest doorbell activation options
Doorbell from Nest Can Be wired. Doing so will allow you to permanently set the Nest Doorbell in place and forget about the need to charge the battery. Unfortunately, the benefits largely end when the battery is never needed to charge. Even if you use the Nest Doorbell, you won’t get 24/7 recording, unlike the older Nest Hello, which is wired only. If you don’t have the existing doorbell wiring, you can always choose to connect it to a solar panel.
If you choose not to attach your Nest doorbell to your home, you don’t have to worry about charging the battery via USB-C every now and then. Charging is very easy, as the doorbell itself can open from the base and plug somewhere inside your home. Keep in mind that a full charge may take about 4 hours. Likewise, there is no 24/7 recording, mainly because the battery needs to keep running for as long as possible before the doorbell goes inside to charge it. The plus side of this is that the Nest Doorbell can be connected to the apartment quickly and easily.
Nest doorbell battery life
Unfortunately, there is no clear answer no matter what some may think. Overall – quite literally – the Nest Doorbell’s battery is supposed to last about 2.5 months. Of course, that totally depends on you. You’ll also know what to expect with the Nest doorbell battery. The Google Home app gives you an estimated battery life left on the doorbell page.
There are some influencing factors that will determine how much battery a doorbell uses:
- sensitive
- Video quality
- event length
- weather
Each plays a major role in determining your doorbell’s battery life. Choosing a higher sensitivity will constantly wake up your device and cause unnecessary recordings. Higher video quality will drain your battery as well, as the device is broadcasting more information to the cloud. Furthermore, longer event lengths cause longer recordings, which, combined with maximum video quality, will drain your battery as if it wasn’t anyone’s business. Fortunately, these settings are easy to adjust.
What’s not so easy to adjust is the temperature outside – unless you know something I don’t. In cold weather, Nest devices like the Nest Cam and Doorbell are prone to poor battery life and the inability to charge if wired to the doorbell. These conditions can’t really be treated, although it’s something to keep in mind if you notice poor performance of your Nest Doorbell. In the future, Google plans to release a second-generation wired Nest Doorbell that needs no charging at all, to circumvent the perennial problem.
How to Extend the Life of a Nest Doorbell Battery
On the Nest Doorbell, the settings are incredibly easy to adjust and configure. With the Google Home app, you can change each setting mentioned above as many times as you like, so you can get a feel for what really powers the doorbell’s battery.
Personally, the changes I made made a huge difference and brought me closer to the 2.5 month Google promise of the device. Here’s how to find the settings to extend the life of your Nest Doorbell’s battery:
- On your mobile device, head over to Google Home Application.
- Click on nest bell.
- Click on gear settings in the top right.
- He hits video.
Here you will find some of the settings that have already been mentioned, as well as some others that can make a difference in your battery life.
wake-up sensitivity
Wake sensitivity is the amount of movement the camera takes at a certain distance to start recording an event. By default, this setting is set to Average. This means you get a good range where the doorbell recognizes people, cars or animals. For the best battery life, we recommend setting the sensitivity to a little.
I get it. You want to be able to record everything that happens. Well, that’s the thing. As far as the doorbell goes, the main reason to use it revolves around the people coming to your door. At the slightest sensitivity, the Nest doorbell will detect the people right at your door and alert you.
Doorbell from Nest Can They are used as a security device, although Google’s Nest cameras are best suited for this. Leaving the sensitivity of the Nest doorbell at low still allows you to see what’s happening outside your door and dramatically increase battery life, especially if you live on a busy road.
Video quality
By default, the Nest Doorbell has a video quality of 960 x 1280 at 30 frames per second. Now, this may not seem like much, but in practice, there is more than enough need to identify the people at your door. If you want to identify people walking down the street in front of your house, you may want to raise the quality to the maximum, allowing the doorbell to broadcast at maximum quality.
For the longest battery life, set the quality to high. Although it’s not the best it can be, it won’t cost the doorbell to send everything it has over your internet connection. Believe it or not, that’s what sucks power.
Maximum event length
When the Nest Doorbell detects movement, it starts recording and sends it to secure servers, where you can watch it on the Google Home app. Depending on what you have set the event length for, this recording can last up to a full 3 minutes. Setting it to 3 minutes or even just 1 minute per event can take a heavy toll on your battery, depending on how busy your front door is.
Now, this setup is kind of a balancing act. The lowest setting is 10 seconds, which feels very short especially if there is an unknown person near your door. On the other hand, 3 minutes may be too long. Depending on how comfortable you are in the place you should specify the duration of the recording. To me, 30 seconds seems like plenty and won’t ruin the battery.
Keep in mind that every time someone rings the doorbell, the camera will automatically record the full 3 minutes of video and send it to your devices. The same goes for emergency events.
Stop checking your live broadcast
This may be the hardest and most important. When the Nest Doorbell first arrived and was set up, I couldn’t go 5 minutes without checking what was on the other side of my door. Unfortunately, this drained the battery nearly 10 percent full in just two days. As long as you only check the live stream when necessary, the battery should last you a long time.
By changing these settings, you can get a longer battery life of six weeks or more with the Nest Doorbell. Everyone’s experience may be very different – especially in terms of the amount of activity that lives outside your door – but this is a good place to start. Tell us what helped you extend the life of your Nest doorbell battery and if these tips made a difference!
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