Floodlights serve dual purposes; they simultaneously illuminate an area, say, your driveway so you can see where you’re going to take out the trash at night, but they also serve as a pseudo security measure casting a spotlight on unwanted visitors in the night. The best outdoor floodlights now have cameras included to see and record who is wandering around your home when the sun goes down. The Blink Wired Floodlight Camera takes it a step further with additional security features like a security siren and two-way audio.
I installed the Blink Wired Floodlight Camera at my house to see if the wired floodlight would not only produce more light than my back-porch lighting (spoiler alert, it does, by a long shot) and to see how well the camera and the additional security features worked.
Although Blink is arguably one of the most recognizable names when it comes to home security, having Amazon’s backing certainly helps — competitors such as the eufy, Arlo and Wyze are also upping the game when it comes to outdoor home security.
Blink Wired Floodlight Camera: At a Glance
Blink Wired Floodlight Camera
Pros
- Bright floodlight
- Color night vision
- Siren
Cons
- Installation can be tricky if starting from scratch
- Requires subscription for video recordings
Key Specs
- Video Resolution: 1080p HD Video
- Lighting: 2600 Lumens
- Siren: 105 Decibels
Blink Wired Floodlight Camera Design and Installation: Easy if Existing Wiring is There
I replaced my existing back porch light with the Blink Wired Floodlight Camera. Since it was already equipped with existing wiring and electrical box, the installation was quite easy. The floodlight comes with a convenient package of all the screws needed to install the light, obviously, I already installed the floodlight before I took the picture (the packaging was much more photogenic before).
After turning off the power to that area of the house, and removing the existing lighting, all that was really needed was screwing in the base to the electrical box, and connecting the wires, which was as easy as white to white, black to black, and wrapping the ground wire to the ground screw on the base and tightening the screw.
Of course, the app guided me through the whole installation, which is great if you are completely new to the process. After that, I put the floodlight camera on the base (the floodlight comes installed whole and ready to go), fastened it to the base with the correct screw, and followed the app’s prompts to connect the camera to my home network. The installation was easy peasy and took all but 20 minutes to complete.
Blink Wired Floodlight Camera Features: Intruders Beware
The combination of the 2600 lumens light and siren will certainly scare away anyone that shouldn’t be lurking around your home. Set to medium brightness, I was surprised how bright it got, so much so that I quickly turned it off at night as I was afraid it shined too brightly into my neighbor’s windows.
Of course, if the light was installed above your garage, you most likely wouldn’t need to worry about that, and angling the lights downward helps. All that being said, any intruder would have no place to hide when the big bright floodlights turn on.
Here’s the thing about the siren: it’s plenty loud. I walked across the street (about 50 feet or so) and turned it on and could hear it clearly. But the siren can only be turned on manually. Meaning, it can’t be triggered by motion. I get the idea why that’s the case — you wouldn’t want a siren waking up your neighbors because their outdoor cat moseyed on by, but having the option for it to be automated would be nice. Either way, again, if an intruder was coming forth and you turned the siren on, there’s no doubt it would scare them away.
Along with the inability to automate the siren, another feature I found missing was activity zones. You can’t choose specific areas you don’t want the camera’s motion sensor to detect. You can turn down the motion sensor sensitivity, but it’s not the same thing, and I’ve found that activity zones always work better than sensitivity adjusters for security cameras.
For instance, I got a notification when I went across the street to test the siren. And that’s with the setting set to five on a scale from one to ten. I mean, look how tiny and far away I am in the picture!
Recordings are stored in the clip tab of the app, but you’ll need a subscription to the Blink Plus Plan to save recordings. I recently had a trial activated while testing the Blink Pan and Tilt Mount Cam and now that the trial has expired, I can no longer access the clips. The Blink Basic Plan starts at $3 and the Plus Plan starts at $10 a month or $100 a year.
Although, it’s worth noting that you can have the ability to save clips locally by purchasing the option Blink Sync Module. It allows you to save clips directly to a flash drive, which effectively turns the Blink Wired Floodlight Camera into a security camera without a subscription.
Blink Wired Floodlight Camera Performance: Good, but not Great
Even though it’s not a straight, or albeit, fair comparison, when you look side-by-side at the eufyCam 3 footage compared to the Blink Floodlight footage, it’s clear that the eufyCam 3 wins that battle (for reference, the eufy Cam3 is hundreds of dollars more expensive). That being said, there’s nothing necessarily wrong with the Blink footage, which is 1080p resolution. It’s simply not as sharp when compared to the other security cameras currently installed on my back porch.
At night, with the assistance of the super bright 2600 lumen spotlight, you get the added bonus of color night vision as you can see my brown pup cruising around for his bedtime potty. I found the combination of the camera with the spotlight helps to sharpen the night time picture performance and gives you a better idea of what, or who you are looking at.
Our Verdict: Lights The Way for Cheap
At the time of this writing, you can pick up the Blink Wired Floodlight Camera for around $100. When you consider how bright the floodlights get, the ability to record, and the extra features, it’s tough to knock the value it’s offering.
So Should You Buy The Blink Wired Floodlight Camera?
When you consider Eufy’s Floodlight Cam is more than twice as expensive, and the Ring Floodlight Cam Plus is $100 more, there’s no doubt you should buy the Blink Wired Floodlight Cam if you have a tighter budget.
If you don’t have a previously installed light to replace with the Blink Wired Floodlight Cam, the installation will be more intensive and tricky, as it will require running electric wire and cutting an electrical box into your home. But the upside is unlimited power without having to worry about batteries going dead on the floodlight or camera.