Best Video Doorbells of 2026

A video doorbell is the single most useful smart home device you can buy. It answers the door when you're not home, deters porch pirates, captures evidence of suspicious activity, and lets you check on deliveries from your phone. After testing five leading video doorbells over two months, here are our picks for every budget and ecosystem.

34% of burglars enter through the front door — making it the single most common entry point. A video doorbell serves as both a deterrent and a first line of defense, alerting you the moment someone approaches your entrance.

Quick Picks

• Best Overall: Ring Battery Doorbell Pro — Head-to-toe video, radar motion detection, best ecosystem
• Best for Google Homes: Google Nest Doorbell — Native Google integration with on-device AI
• Best Wire-Free: Arlo Essential Wireless — 2K resolution, wide field of view, no wiring needed
• Best No Subscription: Eufy S330 — Local storage, no monthly fees, dual cameras
• Best Budget: Reolink Doorbell WiFi — 2K+ for under $100 with free local storage

Ring Battery Doorbell Pro — Our Top Pick

The Ring Battery Doorbell Pro's killer feature is its radar-powered Bird's Eye View. Using actual radar (not just camera motion detection), it tracks visitor movement on an overhead map of your property. You can see exactly where someone walked — did they approach from the street, the sidewalk, or cut through your yard? This provides context that regular motion detection simply can't match.

The head-to-toe video is also a meaningful upgrade over standard doorbells. Most video doorbells show you from the chest up — great for faces, but useless for seeing packages at your feet or someone crouching at your door. Ring's taller 1:1 aspect ratio captures the full picture, which proved valuable during our testing for monitoring deliveries.

Color pre-roll is another standout. The doorbell captures 4 seconds of color video before the motion event starts, so you can see what triggered the alert — not just the aftermath. This feature caught a porch pirate scouting our test home's packages in a drive-by before they even approached the door.

Google Nest Doorbell (Battery) — Best for Google Homes

The Nest Doorbell's on-device AI is its standout feature. Smart detection (person, package, animal, vehicle, and familiar face recognition) is processed on the doorbell itself rather than in the cloud, which means faster alerts and it works even when your internet is slow. Alerts arrive on your phone within 1-2 seconds of detection — the fastest of any doorbell we tested.

For Google Home households, the integration is superb. "Hey Google, show me the front door" displays the live feed on any Nest Hub. Visitor announcements play through Google speakers. And the Nest app consolidates your doorbell with any Nest cameras and thermostats in one clean interface.

The main weakness is battery life. In our testing with a busy front walkway (20-30 motion events per day), the battery lasted just 6 weeks. Less busy locations will get 2-3 months. If battery life is a priority, choose Ring or Arlo instead.

Arlo Essential Wireless — Best Video Quality

If you prioritize video quality above all else, Arlo's 2K HDR sensor is the best in the category. It resolves more detail than Ring's 1536p and significantly more than Nest's 960p. In side-by-side testing, Arlo was the only doorbell that could read text on a delivery label from 6 feet away.

The 180° diagonal field of view is also the widest we tested, capturing more of your porch and approach area. This is particularly useful for wider porches or if your doorbell is mounted off-center.

Eufy S330 Video Doorbell — Best No-Subscription Option

Eufy's value proposition is straightforward: never pay a monthly fee. All footage is stored locally on the included HomeBase 3, with 16GB of built-in storage (expandable via microSD). Over three years, the zero-subscription model saves you $144-$288 compared to Ring or Arlo — which more than offsets the slightly higher upfront cost.

The dual-camera system is clever. The main camera captures the standard doorbell view, while a second downward-facing lens watches packages at your feet. When a package is detected, you get a specific "package delivered" notification with a dedicated camera view. This feature worked accurately in our testing, correctly identifying boxes, envelopes, and bags about 90% of the time.

Reolink Doorbell WiFi — Best Budget

Reolink is the value play. At $80 with zero monthly fees and 2K+ resolution, it delivers more pixels per dollar than any other doorbell on the market. If you have existing doorbell wiring and don't need fancy smart home integration, Reolink is hard to beat.

Full Comparison Table

Video Doorbell Buying Guide

Wired vs. Battery

Battery doorbells install anywhere in minutes but need recharging every 2-6 months. Wired doorbells require existing doorbell wiring (16-24V AC transformer) but never need charging and can offer continuous recording. If you don't have doorbell wiring, go battery.

Resolution: How Much Do You Need?

1080p is the minimum for useful doorbell footage. 2K is ideal — detailed enough to identify faces and read package labels. Higher resolution means larger file sizes and more bandwidth usage, but the identification benefits are worth it.

Subscription vs. No Subscription

Most doorbells require a subscription for video recording and playback. If monthly fees bother you, Eufy and Reolink store everything locally for free. The trade-off: if someone steals the doorbell (or HomeBase), your footage goes with it. Cloud storage protects against this.