Who goes there? With its latest video doorbell, Ring is enlisting Alexa+ to greet your visitors, instruct delivery personnel on where to leave packages, and even give personalized welcomes to people it recognizes.
Amazon announced the new “Alexa+ Greetings” feature at its big fall event in New York City today, where it showed off a series of new Ring cameras–including four that can capture video in 4K, a first for Ring– along with yet another AI-powered feature that can help find wayward pets.
The new Ring cameras include the Ring Wired Doorbell Pro ($249.99), the Spotlight Cam Pro ($249.99), the Floodlight Cam Pro ($279.99), and the Outdoor Cam Pro ($199.99). Those four cameras boast an AI-enhanced video technology called Ring Retinal Vision 4K, which boosts video quality though a two-week calibration process while also offering 10x zoom and “enhanced” low-light performance, Ring says.
Also new are the Wired Video Doorbells Plus ($179.99) and the Indoor Cam Plus ($59.99), both of which offer Ring Retinal 2K resolution.
Finally, Ring is debuting three power-over-ethernet (PoE) models, including the Wired Doorbell Elite ($499.99) and variants of the previously mentioned Spotlight Cam Pro and Outdoor Cam Pro ($349.98 and $299.98, respectively).
Ben Patterson/Foundry
To be clear, Alexa’s ability to greet visitors isn’t all that new–the original Alexa Greetings feature debuted in 2021–but that older feature relied on canned responses programmed onto your Ring doorbell. With Alexa+ Greetings, it’s the AI-enhanced version of Alexa that’s speaking to those ringing your Ring doorbell, meaning it’s able to converse back and forth with visitors as it figures out who they are and what they need.
Coupled with Alexa+ Greetings is Familiar Faces, a Ring feature that allows your doorbell to recognize friends, loved ones, and frequent visitors for more customized greetings, as well as allowing Alexa+ to offer more detailed notifications or filter out alerts based on who it sees. Ring is playing catch-up as far as “familiar faces”-type functionality goes, as Google Nest Cam owners with Nest Aware have been using the feature for several years.
Ring also announced another new AI-powered feature at Amazon’s New York City event on Tuesday: Search Party, which Ring is calling a “community feature” that helps pet owners track down missing furry friends.
Starting first with dogs and slated to add cats and other pets in the coming months, Search Party kicks into gear when a neighbor reports a lost dog via Ring’s Neighbor’s app. When that happens, other local Ring cameras in the area can join the Search Party, with AI helping to locate the wayward pooch. If your Ring camera spots what it believes to be the missing pet, you’ll get an alert with a picture of the dog, which (if you wish) you can forward on to the pet’s owner.
All the new Ring cameras are available for pre-order now, with Search Party expected to arrive in November; Alexa+ Greetings and Familiar Faces will roll out in December.
This story is part of TechHive’s in-depth coverage of the best security cameras.
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Author: Ben Patterson, Senior Writer, TechHive
Ben has been writing about technology and consumer electronics for more than 20 years. A PCWorld contributor since 2014, Ben joined TechHive in 2019, where he has covered everything from smart speakers and soundbars to smart lights and security cameras. Ben's articles have also appeared in PC Magazine, TIME, Wired, CNET, Men's Fitness, Mobile Magazine, and more. Ben holds a master's degree in English literature.
