Article Summary:
Yes, Nest Cam has Night Vision so you can see what’s happening without turning on a light. You can check on your sleeping children or watch what your cat does when the lights are off.
Nest Cam uses infrared light (LEDs) that only the camera's Night Vision picks up. Infrared (IR) light is invisible to the human eye, but you might notice a faint red glow from your Nest Cam when Night Vision is active. Nest Cam uses an IR filter during the day to help keep colors accurate, which is switched off at night to enhance sensitivity and deliver detailed video even in complete darkness. If you are close to your Nest Cam, you may hear a faint click when the filter is switched on and off.
Improvements to Nest Cam's Night Vision
While we were developing Nest Cam, we took all that we had learned from Dropcam's excellent Night Vision and made it even better. We'll also be bringing these improved features to Dropcam Pro and Dropcam HD.
Many cameras offer some kind of night vision, but to get it right we created our own darkroom and analyzed thousands of video clips. This let us optimize our algorithms and solve many common issues found in cameras with night vision, so you'll notice much improved video quality overall. Nest Cam's Night Vision lights the whole room evenly, and it prevents over-exposure of objects that are close while letting you see details in the scene that are further away.
Transitions between Night and Day modes happen even faster when necessary. So when Nest Cam is in Night mode and someone turns on the lights, the view quickly returns to normal. On the other hand, Nest Cam can also hold off switching between Night and Day modes when needed. For instance, at dusk or dawn, when the lighting is marginal, some cameras will flip back and forth between Night and Day modes, making the video too light or too dark. Nest Cam won't.
Nest Cam can also filter out "spot lights." For instance, a typical camera with night vision can be blinded when someone shines a flashlight at it. When something like this happens, Nest Cam probably won't be fooled. It'll stay in Night mode so you can see what a trespasser is up to.
Lastly, we've also improved the framerate in dim lighting. This reduces blurry "ghost trails" that can happen when people, animals or other objects move. You'll see sharper video when something happens.
How to change Night Vision settings
You can easily change Night Vision settings with the Nest app. For most situations, it's best to leave it set to AUTO, so it'll switch between Day and Night modes automatically.
How to control Night Vision with the Nest app
1) Select your Nest Cam.
2) Click or tap on Camera Settings.
3) Click or tap on Night Vision.
4) Toggle the switch to OFF, AUTO, or ALWAYS ON.
What does AUTO mean in the Night Vision setting?
By default, Nest Cam will turn on Night Vision automatically when it gets dark, then switch back to Day mode when it gets light enough.
What does ALWAYS ON mean in Night Vision settings?
When set to ALWAYS ON, Nest Cam will turn on Night Vision until you turn it off. This is useful if you would rather have complete control over when Night Vision is active. If you choose this setting, your camera will use infrared even if there's enough ambient light to use Day mode, so all of your video will be recorded in black and white until you switch Night Vision to AUTO or OFF.