While other smart home security manufacturers are slowly adding support for Apple’s HomeKit Secure Video to their existing security cameras, Logitech’s new Circle View will work with—and only with—HomeKit Security Video right out of the gate.
Set to ship this month for $160, the Circle View boasts 1080p resolution and a 180-degree field of view, just like Logitech’s previous security camera, the Circle 2. The new camera also features night vision and two-way audio, while its weatherproof shell has an IP64 rating (which is good for protection against water spray from any direction. You can read more about IP ratings in this story.)
What sets the Logitech Circle View apart, however, is that it’s the first smart security camera we’ve seen to support HomeKit Secure Video—a protocol from Apple that’s designed to protect the privacy of recorded security camera videos—right at launch. Other security cameras that support HomeKit Secure Video added it later as an update.
Instead of uploading videos to the cloud for analysis (to determine, for example, whether the subject of a motion-triggered video event is a person, a pet, or a tree branch), HomeKit Secure Video performs such analysis on a local “home hub” device, such as an iPad, an Apple TV, or a HomePod.
Once security videos have been analyzed, they can be encrypted and uploaded to iCloud, where they can only be accessed by the user who uploaded them. You can also review recorded clips or check your live feed directly from the iOS Home app. To store video clips in iCloud for up to 10 days, you’ll need a 200MB iCloud plan (for one camera) or a 2TB plan (for up to five cameras).
The Logitech Circle 2 security camera was the first security camera to support HomeKit Secure Video, but that support didn’t arrive until more than two years after the camera’s 2017 unveiling. Both the Netatmo Smart Indoor Camera and Anker’s EufyCam 2 also received HomeKit Secure Video updates earlier this year.
Besides its HomeKit Secure Video support, the Logitech Circle View features a metal base that lets you tilt the camera lens, a tethered 10-foot power cable, and support for 2.4GHz Wi-Fi networks.
Logitech didn’t detail the Circle View’s motion detection features, but it’s worth noting that the earlier Circle 2 supported customizable “smart” motion detection zones. We’ve reached out to Logitech to see if that feature made it to the Circle View as well.