I have a motion sensor by the door and home assistant takes a picture and sends a notification when there is motion, it's not perfect but it works fine for me
this post was submitted on 13 Jul 2024
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Home Assistant is open source home automation that puts local control and privacy first. Powered by a worldwide community of tinkerers and DIY enthusiasts. Perfect to run on a Raspberry Pi or a local server. Available for free at home-assistant.io
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That's an interesting solution. However I don't need this. I basically want a video intercom with whoever's at the door.
I have the Reolink doorbell, among a couple other Reolink cams. It integrates very nicely with HA. I have it set up for essentially what you're looking for, audio/video feed, notifications with an image attached when the bell is rung (also motion detection notification from another cam, but could do the doorbell too), and the ability to have it play quick reply messages, including custom ones.
I believe you can have the two way audio in HA as well, but I haven't explored it. The Reolink app has this functionality if I really need it, but haven't come across an instance where I needed to use it.
You should be able to do all this with just the Reolink integration.
Are you able to have it blocked or limited from the greater internet and just comm with HA or does it need that as well.
Yep, but the method is separate from HA. Could do it two ways, I use Pi-hole so that it's still able to contact the NTP server (could also set the time server to something local through the desktop app, I believe) but block all other external traffic, or you can block external access through your router firewall. I noticed the time would occasionally be inaccurate if I had blocked all internet access.
Either way you can use a VPN or other tunnel service to access while you're away from home. I use WG-tunnel on my phone to auto connect to VPN when I disconnect from my home network, it's quite handy.
Awesome that's good to hear, all my LEDs and stuff I have blocked to everything but HA at my firewall but some devices like my smart vacuum apparently NEED internet access to work at all which I was hoping it didn't. My current doorbell needs it I think but hoping to get a new doorbell and camera when I move next year.
Yep, Reolink cams can be fully local only and still work fine.
@keyez @OminousOrange I've got the reolink doorbell cam too, but just block the WAN at the router, and unblock when I'm out of town, which is pretty rare these days. Seems to function pretty well that way.
I haven’t used it, but scrypted seems pretty cool. Maybe worth an investigation.
Ubiquiti unifi g4 doorbell works great for me with home assistant. But it's a bit of an upgrade as you would need all the supporting hardware as well.
frigate.
Still the best option, huh?
yes.
when the button is pressed, allowing me to watch its audio and video stream live, and speak back to whoever is at the door.
I'm curious.
You want the video and speak back and all, but you don't want the ability to open the door for your visitor? Why not?
Maybe I'll look into electronic locks later, I guess. It's not really a priority.
So what's the use of all the other functions when you cannot (or don't want to?) open the door?
So he can give them instructions like "empty your pockets and place your weapons in the slot on your right, and put on the blindfold and ball gag on your left, and wait for someone to lead you a play room." The video is for blackmail.
Or tell the courier to leave the package in whatever place I ask them to.
This one. Especially if I am not home.
Yup, same here. Sometimes they wouldn’t bother to call, and would just take the package with them if I wouldn’t answer.
As someone else said, it's mainly so I can ask couriers to leave packages in specific places, tell salespersons to go away without getting up, etc.
ask couriers to leave packages in specific places
Around here, they drop the parcel in front of the door and then they run away like thieves.
Sometimes they ring, too. But they don't bother waiting.
They're a lot better than that where I live.