Many smart home accessories still work via a hub. Hubs are often stupid boxes that you put in the meter cupboard, but Aqara makes a smart product out of them. The smart home brand has previously released all kinds of hubs with extra functions, such as the earlier Camera Hub G2H. The new Aqara Camera Hub G3 has some new possibilities. For example, the camera can rotate in 360 degrees and thanks to HomeKit Secure Video you can save the images with iCloud. You will soon read the full review on iCulture.
Aqara Camera Hub G3: rotating camera with HomeKit Secure Video
You can place the Hub G3 security camera anywhere in the house where there is a socket nearby. It's a small white camera with a 2K resolution (2304 x 1296), 100-degree viewing angle and built-in night mode, so you can see in the dark. The camera therefore works with HomeKit Secure Video, with which you can set when the camera should only stream and when images should be recorded. Thanks to this function, the camera recognizes people, animals, vehicles and packages. The images are stored in iCloud+, but do not count towards your storage capacity. iCloud stores the images in 1080p resolution.
The handy thing about the camera is that you can control it remotely by rotating and tilting it. You therefore do not necessarily have to determine the correct position to place the camera. Via the Aqara app you can let it run automatically or run with automations. You can also manually rotate the camera. Due to a limitation in HomeKit, this is not possible via the Home app.
The camera also uses local face and motion detection, so it knows who is in the picture. The camera also recognizes movements you make with your hand, such as a V-shape or an OK sign. You can then link actions to it. This way you can operate the camera without using the app or speech.
Also serves as a Zigbee hub
Like previous hubs, the Camera G3 acts as a Zigbee 3.0 hub for other Aqara accessories. By connecting sensors and buttons to the camera, you can add them to HomeKit. In total you can connect up to 128 devices, although you do need a Zigbee router or repeater for this large number. In addition to support for HomeKit, the camera also works with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant. The camera hub connects via both 2.4GHz and 5GHz Wi-Fi networks. As an extra privacy function, the camera also has a physical cover that you can automatically or manually slide in front of the lens.
