Monthly, a fully functioning Ring system might require 50 GB or more of internet bandwidth. Even when the Ring cameras are set at their highest possible settings, they require a significant amount of bandwidth. If you want to make limitations the amount of bandwidth that your Ring technology requires, you may make an effort to do so.
Optimizing Ring Bandwidth Consumption
Currently, ring devices are among the most extensively utilized smart technologies on the market. This company manufactures anything from smart security systems to home lighting. If you had a Ring-enabled home, it would be amazing, but how much internet bandwidth would it absorb?
WiFi-based ring systems account for the vast majority of ring systems. As a result, they will consume valuable “slots” (i.e. bandwidth) on your home WiFi connection, which is not ideal. Depending on how many Ring devices you have and how many of them you have, this might be a significant amount of data.
What Are Ring Smart Home Devices?
Earlier this year, Amazon bought Ring, a smart home security and cognitive technologies company. At the moment, this company is among the top, if not the largest, smart technology firms in the world. Generally speaking, their devices may be split into three categories:
- Cameras and ring doorbells give you an idea of who is knocking on your door before you open the door. These gadgets allow you to transmit high-definition video, receive alerts when there is motion or activity outside your home, and utilize your home as a smart intercom system, among other things.
- The Ring is also a manufacturer of alarm systems. Besides working with their camera systems, these also include freeze and flood sensors, as well as motion detection. – Alternatively, Ring retrofit kits may be purchased to bring your non-Ring alarm system up to date with contemporary technological advances.
- Another Ring technology that may be found in their smart environment is smart lighting, which is a relatively new development. Instead of using ZigBee or Z-Wave for wireless connectivity, Ring devices rely on old-fashioned WiFi as well as a lesser known tech called LoRa for some of their internal communications.
WiFi and smart devices have the potential to become a difficult issues very quickly. Now, let’s take a view at the types of WiFi and bandwidth use that Ring technology clients might anticipate to experience.
What is Bandwidth, Anyway?
According to technical jargon, every computer possesses a variety of different types of available bandwidth. Bandwidth refers to the quantity of data that may be transmitted via a specific route at a given point in time. Consider the concept of bandwidth as a trap for electronic data transmission. However, although a regular restaurant straw has a fairly limited bandwidth, an industrial spillway offers a large number of bandwidth options. The greater the amount of available bandwidth you have to deal with, the longer the computer’s trip will be.
When we’re talking about WiFi bandwidth in our smart home, we’re talking about a limited amount of available bandwidth. For the most part, if your internet provider promises “10 Mbps” connection rates, you should refrain from using more than 10 Mbps of internet capacity – or else, your devices will become more slow and unresponsive.
In the event that you have ever had a large number of individuals playing games, streaming movies, or downloading stuff at the same moment, you have most likely witnessed what happens when bandwidth is overloaded. Everybody’s experience begins to suffer as movies lag behind buffer times and online gaming experiences become unreliable and unreliable. Smart home technology eats a percentage of our home’s WiFi bandwidth, but how much of it is consumed is a matter of debate.
How Much Bandwidth Do Ring Cameras and Doorbells Use?
Let’s start with the largest of the dogs in the backyard yard. When compared to the rest of Ring’s products, Ring cameras and doorbells consume the most data. Most likely, out of all of Ring’s other goods combined, this is the most valuable.
The reason for this is straightforward: they’re transmitting high-definition video from the camera to your connected Ring devices over your WiFi network connection. The initial Ring devices were capable of recording in 720p, while all following models are capable of recording in 1080p (Full HD). In terms of bandwidth use on the internet, full HD video consumes more data than 720p video, although both use much less bandwidth than 4K recording quality.
Each connected device should have a bandwidth of 1 to 2-MB per second, according to Ring’s recommendations. A WiFi network with 5 Ring gadgets will require between 5 and 10 megabits per second in order to function properly. Because it’s such a wide range, it’s always preferable to be on the higher end of the spectrum for extra piece of mind – otherwise, your Netflix binge-watching session may be disrupted! What follows is a question of how much data these cameras are transmitting.
This is an area where your results may differ dramatically from mine. Cameras on rings do not record continually; instead, they record only when motion is detected. Depending on where you set your Ring camera in your home, it may only consume a little amount of electricity.
Several Ring users, on the other hand, have indicated that each of their devices sends several terabytes of data every month, according to their reports. They configured their cameras to transmit high-definition video at the slightest movement by pushing up the “Motion Sensitivity” option to its maximum setting:
Choose the Motion Sensitivity option from inside the Ring application.
However, it is not only about the “Motion Sensitivity” choice that is important. It will record a lot of images even at the lowest motion sensitivity level if your Ring gadget is aimed at an active area (such as a busy street where a lot of people pass by). I upload around 54 GB per month using my Ring Doorbell Pro, which is pointed towards the sidewalk because my house does not have much frontage.
Ring and Philips Hue are two of the devices that I use with my BT HomeHub internet connection.
Of course, my Ring Floodlight Cam (“RingHpCam-cc”), which is targeted towards my backyard and sends up 40 GB of data on a regular basis, is regularly triggered and sends up data. Using ‘just’ 20.8 GB of data per month, my garage camera (“RingCamMini-71”) consumes the least amount of data per month. In other words,
| Device | Motion Sensitivity | How Often It Detects Motion | Monthly Bandwidth (Internet Upload) |
| Ring Doorbell Pro 1 | Low-Medium | 50+ times a day | 54.1 GB |
| Ring Floodlight Cam | Low-Medium | 10+ times a day | 39.6 GB |
| Ring Indoor Cam | Low-Medium | < 5 times a day | 20.8 GB |
I pay a monthly fee for internet bandwidth that I use to connect three of my Ring devices.
In spite of the fact that the Indoor Cam in my garage doesn’t detect much activity, it consumes 20GB of data each month on average. However, the trend continues to be that the more the amount of motion detected, the greater the amount of bandwidth utilized. To clear up bandwidth for your Ring cameras, you’ll have to lower the quality and motion sensitivity of the cameras in order to do so.
Those Ring alarm systems, replete with all of its accessories, seem appealing, don’t they?
How Much Internet Does the Ring Alarm Use?
A base station for the Ring Alarm system that is installed on the wall.
The key to understanding Ring device bandwidth consumption is to recognize that it is entirely dependent on how much performance you require from your Ring system in the first place.
Compared to a hybrid, a high-powered muscle vehicle will consume significantly more fuel. An alarm system designed to offer regular updates and comprehensive data, such as Ring, would require more bandwidth than a standard home security system.
When linked to cameras, users with Ring alarm systems who have a strong demand for detailed information have reported uploading up to 7 terabytes of data every month. This is a significant amount of bandwidth for a device that does not deal with video or audio! The downloading of data from even the most sensitive alarm system would be modest if your alarm system is just connected to Ring’s smoke and motion detectors. Users with less capable PCs have reported consuming far less bandwidth – as little as 1-2 gigabytes per month, according to some reports.
Another consideration is the amount of devices that are connected to your Ring security system. A well-designed home with motion detectors strategically placed will require less bandwidth than sophisticated security that would make a bank vault envious of its own security measures.
What do you think of Ring’s most recent offering, which is smart lighting?
What About Bandwidth Use For Ring’s Smart Lights?
Solar path light rings with intelligent lighting are used to illuminate a path.
A change from the company’s traditional products, the new lighting options from Ring are a welcome addition. Firstly, the Ring Floodlight Cam and the Ring Spotlight Cam are security and illumination cameras, with surveillance being the primary function. However, Ring’s new lighting line does away with the cameras altogether in favor of a more affordable, dedicated lighting system.
While each individual light makes use of LoRa technology to link to a central Ring Bridge, it is the Ring Bridge that makes use of WiFi to allow administration of each light via the Ring app. Each light you choose to add to your system will require a percentage of the WiFi bandwidth available to you at the time. The good news is that these lights do not transmit terabytes of data every time the wind blows across their vicinity. Using this method, you may position lights wherever you want them, along with more data-intensive cameras in strategic locations.
In actuality, because each bulb makes use of LoRa technology and the Ring Bridge is the sole WiFi-based point of connection, the Ring Smart Lighting system is not taxing on your network’s resources. A claim made on Ring’s help pages is that it uses just 1-2 megabits per second of total bandwidth.
Consider the scenario in which you already have a large number of Ring devices and need to free up some WiFi bandwidth in your smart home.
How to Free Up Some Internet Bandwidth in Your Smart Home?
If you want to save some bandwidth while also improving your movie night experience, here are five quick hacks you can do right away.
Diversify Your Smart Home
Not everything requires the use of a WiFi network. Z-Wave and ZigBee are two wireless technologies that can be used as alternatives to WiFi-enabled devices. You could easily replace the Ring technology with Hue or another WiFi-enabled device if you don’t want to use the Ring technology. Philips Hue products, which include smart lights and smart plugs, are connected to a ZigBee Hub. As a consequence, Hue devices utilize far less internet traffic than other WiFi-connected smart gadgets, including:
When many smart Hue lights are connected to one another and to the Bridge, they form a mesh network.
While this adds a degree of complexity to the process of operating your smart home, it is also more pleasurable to have a diverse collection of devices.
Clean Up Your WiFi Usage
There are a plethora of devices competing for available bandwidth these days. Everyone and everything, from smart toasters to gaming consoles, wants a piece of the WiFi pie.
It’s possible that you’ll be using equipment that you’re unfamiliar with. Your bandwidth may be used by obsolete printers, gaming systems, or even a neighbor who has successfully guessed your WiFi password and is using your network. What are our choices for dealing with this situation?
The first step is to reset your router and change the password for your WiFi connection. Unwelcome WiFi guests will be asked to leave immediately! Then look for devices that aren’t in use or that may be utilized with a wired connection, such as an Ethernet connection. Old gaming systems may be switched off, and that home printer can only be used over wired connections in order to preserve bandwidth.
Assuming you can find the IP address of the admin panel in your router’s guide (which you should), it’s worth investigating whether your router has an admin panel/console that displays the internet usage of each connected device.
Boost Your Signal
While it’s conceivable that your Ring devices are complaining about a terrible WiFi network, it’s also possible that the problem isn’t related to a lack of bandwidth, but rather that your WiFi signal is weaker in some locations than others. This might be due to the size of your home, the power of your router, or even simple obstructions such as thick walls. To get around this restriction, you can boost the power of your WiFi connection as described above.
Repeaters and WiFi boosters are practically the same thing when it comes to functionality. They expand the range of your WiFi signal to include new areas of your home, allowing devices that are further away from the router to connect to it. Allow yourself to be inspired by the diverse selection of gadgets in this category as you search for the perfect one for your household.
Change Lanes on the WiFi Highway
Did you know that your WiFi signal is broadcast across a number of different channels? Despite the fact that the vast majority of devices are set to channel 1 or channel 6, there are also some non-overlapping channels to choose from.
You can use certain tools or programs to assess which channel has the least amount of traffic and then switch to that channel based on that determination. To put it another way, switching to the unoccupied lane on the highway is comparable to this. Nothing except broad roadways and high speeds await you.
You’ll be able to change the WiFi channel from the router’s administrative panel if you have one.
Update Your Router
The age of the router is another issue to take into consideration. A dated and slow router, similar to a PC from 10 years ago, would struggle to keep up with today’s standards of performance.
Make sure to replace your physical router every few years, or nearly as frequently as you update your laptop or PC, and to maintain your router’s software up to date by accessing the admin panel from your computer’s desktop.
