Price: $249.99 - $139.99
(as of Jun 29, 2024 00:00:05 UTC – Details)
The Tapo C420 is a versatile Wi-Fi security camera…
Customers say
Customers are satisfied with the quality and ease of use of the security camera. However, some customers have issues with range. They also differ on performance, night vision, motion detection, battery life, and image quality.
AI-generated from the text of customer reviews
Connor C –
Good battery life and great night vision
The C420 system is incredibly easy to use. Once the H200 hub was connected to the router the setup was very straightforward and connecting to my account and the tapo app took only a couple of minutes. I’ve been told by support that they are adding wifi support to the hub, but for now it requires ethernet. This was not personally a big issue as my router is central in my home and had extra ethernet ports, but if someone does not have an extra port this could be a hurdle requiring extra hardware. The cameras themselves were equally easy to set up. I did initially put the batteries in backwards and spent a minute or so wondering why the light was not flashing like the app said it should be, but that was user error. The batteries charged relatively quickly, about an hour each, and seem to be holding a good charge. In the 2 weeks since I’ve turned the cameras on they’ve only dropped about 1%, though I am not actively using all of the detection features.
Access through the app is easy and connecting to the cameras seems to be just as fast on any fast wifi network as on the same network as the cameras. The signal latency is also quite good. I found the picture is only about a second delayed from real time. The detection settings work well and the detection zone drawing tool and privacy zone tools provide a good level of control. The AI detection did notify me when it saw a car in my driveway. Picture quality is very good in the daytime. The image is very clear and detailed.
Picture quality at night was very impressive. With some light in the scene, I did not need to have night mode enabled to see clearly. Multiple times when checking the camera at night I thought the picture was frozen because of how bright it was. It was not frozen.
The range of the wireless cameras is strong. With the hub in a central location in my home, both cameras could be placed anywhere without signal loss. For an average sized home, I don’t think there would be any issue regarding placement.
The media from the camera saves to either the internal storage or Tapo Cloud. There is no FTP or ONVIF support.
Overall, for where this camera is priced, I think it is a good value and would recommend it to someone looking to add some easy and basic cameras to their home.
JC –
Easy setup, well built, and great picture.
As the title says it’s very easy to set these cameras up. Connect the hub to your router, sync the cameras, mount, and done. It’s that simple. Being a TP-Link product, I am not surprised as to how well built they are. Solid construction, sturdy mounts, and completely weather resistant. If that wasn’t enough the picture quality is amazing.
Let’s go a little deeper now, the setup is similar to quality a few others on the market, The hub supplies to internet connection to the cameras. This make setting the cameras up very simple, because all you have to do is sync them with the Hub. The hub has about 30ft range for the most reliable connection to the cameras. In my use, one of my cameras are around 40ft with multiple walls in between, and for the most part I don’t have any issues with it. Out of the box, it’s highly recommended you charge the cameras. I didn’t initially do it, since they were around 50%. Within a few days they were dead and I had to charge them anyway. I didn’t have high hopes at that point. Since charging them, they have been running for about 20 days on battery and currently sitting at 96%, so yea, charge them out of the box.
The Spot lights on the cameras are okay but I found the night vision view to be much better without the need of the spot lights. The hub is also where the SD card would be install, as the cameras detect motion events they, will record to the SD card for local storage, no need to worry about your data being peeked at. There is an option for cloud storage, but I didn’t have a need to use it. The Tapo app itself is well designed and easy to use.
If I had to give any negative marks, the big one would be that the hub HAS to be connected with an ethernet cable. So if your modem and router are in one corner of the house, you may not be able to place the cameras exactly where you want. If the Hub also had a WiFi Option it could be placed more centrally and because it’s small, it wouldn’t be in the way. Centrally locating the hub would give you more flexibility in where you can place the cameras. The Hub also has a nifty doorbell chime you can activate in app. This really doesn’t help much since there’s no button included to be able to trigger it. Even if it was just a basic battery powered button similar to what wireless doorbells use. You can use it in an event that you want a doorbell, but can’t have a camera at the door, in let say an Apt building, or office building. The batteries as great as they are, limit you to how high you can mount the cameras. Eventually you’ll need to remove the battery, or take the camera down to charge it. If there was a wired power option, it would broaden where they can be placed, and would even allow them to be a set and forget it setup.
Even with those cons, I would still highly recommend these cameras to anyone that wants a simple security camera setup and don’t mind the once in a while charging. The cameras show the battery % right in the window of the app, so if you monitor them frequently you’ll never worry about them being dead.
disconcertia –
No NVR support
Generally happy with these cameras (with caveat) and with the Tapo brand. Positives: wide angle, good motion detection and notification, easy-ish set up, good battery life (so far – down to about 85% after about 3 weeks — although there is slight difference in capacity between batteries).
Two negatives for me: 1. There is no NVR recording available. This is because the cameras are actually controlled by a hub which takes a SD card. 2. The cameras talk/record to the hub, but not via WiFi. So the hub has to be in close proximity to both cameras to get good reception. I bought a WiFi extender only to find this out, and had to move the hub that was wired to my router closer to both cameras. Still not get great reception from one camera through a couple of walls.
So far impressed by the battery life (I didn’t have an easy electrical wired option), and the image quality is pretty good.
Timothy I. Quintanilla –
Cons & Pros
Wifi connection to camera and distance is terrible even when reducing to 720p to get to view camera.
Motion detection is great, but recording of motion is terrible
Camera durability in rain is terrible rain drops causes camera to not detection Motion due to rain drops.
Battery on camera is so terrible, if lots of Motion drains the battery it last maybe 3 days max
Live view is terrible as well such a lag and delay
Seems the Good is
Motion detection
Live view with good quality
Diana Cañedo Carrion –
Super fácil de instalar, excelente producto
Elrodri –
la imagen se ve muy bien. las pilas duran meses sin necesidad de recargarlas. son muy eficientes. la app es facil de usar el precio es lo mejor. vale la pena al 100%
Mario –
Importante, no tiene grabación continua, como es a baterÃÂa solo se activa ciertos minutos cuando detecta movimiento, puedes configurar que después de activarse y grabar el clip vuelva a seguir grabando mas clips mientras detecte movimiento pero para ahorrar baterÃÂa no dispone de la grabación continua como los modelos que requieren conexión de corriente.
Es un plus el uso del hub ya que la memoria se mantiene en un lugar mas seguro resguardado en caso de que las instales en el exterior, ademas teniendo ya el hub puedes agregar mas accesorios de la marca de bajo consumo como detectores de movimiento y botones de usos múltiples.
Son super practicas al no necesitar la conexión de corriente las puedes poner y mover sin ningún problema a donde requieras.
Adrienne –
I had an indoor tapo camera so when when looking for an exterior camera I liked the idea of keeping it all in the same app. These were a fair price and actually had an Amazon sale on them. They were tricky to get set up and took quite a bit of trouble shooting but once they were up they are working great. The image is really clear and you can generally hear what’s happening. It seems that the battery is going down about a 2% a week so far.
Things I don’t like:
-the camera at the front of my house keeps notifying me every half hour or so that my stationary car is in the driveway, I want to keep the cameras on when I’m home but the notifications are annoying since there isn’t actually anything happening.
-the camera are a few seconds delayed so once I get the notification someone is already turned around and leaving, not a big deal just something I’ve noticed
– when using the talk function on the camera you cannot hear any audio while you speak, and since their is a delay it makes it very difficult to talk to anyone through it.
All in all I think these are good cameras and I will probably be buying more tapo products. The app is easy to use and so far the products are working well.
Jorge Andrés Romero Zárate –
Buena resolución ! Fácil instalación.