Apple has quietly removed the entire "Doorbell" category from its roster of current and future HomeKit accessories, suggesting that once-promised upgrades by August and Ring are at least in purgatory.
The change appears to have happened sometime this week. Only one item was listed under the category, the August Doorbell Cam.
When Apple introduced the Home app for iOS 10 during WWDC 2016, video doorbell support was prominently demonstrated, hinting that a flood of compatible products might be around the corner. The company indicated that people would be able to watch live feeds, use an intercom, and even unlock their door, all from a Home app notification.
August and Ring soon promised to upgrade their doorbells, but years later neither has delivered software upgrades. The latter even reaffirmed its commitment to upgrading the Ring Pro and Floodlight after its takeover by Amazon, even though Amazon's Alexa is a rival smarthome platform.
It's not clear what hurdles have prevented HomeKit support. One possibility is the heavy encryption Apple demands, since while the platform now supports both software and hardware for that task, it could be that August and Ring have had trouble minimizing lag.
Doorbells are typically expected to deliver audio, video, and other data with as little lag as possible. A long gap could at best make for an awkward social situation, and at worst mean that a criminal gets away without his face on camera.
AppleInsider has contacted Apple regarding the matter.
25 Comments
Apple did the right thing here.
I went with google and their Home as well as Nest line of products. Google didn't just introduce a standard but support it through quality products as well as showing third parties what they can do with the standard. Apple released a standard but rely solely upon third parties to support it. There are barely any products and what is out there just does not work which is what a smart device and accessories needs to do with the general public.
The "lag" excuse is a bunch of bullshit. I use a Logitech Circle 2 and there's less than 1 second of lag.
I think most of these home automation standards will have challenges, although not as bad as the old days when your option was only X10.
Sometimes HomeKit won't be able to see my devices status and just give me a blank reading. This happens with my ecobee and hue lights. I can just imagine that there are some issues with streaming video in HomeKit with security in place that was created outside of the devices native app.
Its also frustrating to see an abundance of Amazon Alexa devices for sale that supposedly work as well as Homekit. I'm not comfortable giving Amazon freedom to enter my house though.
Maybe Apple is going to sell their own devices for video. They still use the iSight name with iPhones.