The Best Video Doorbells of 2026

If you only read one paragraph, read this: the eufy Video Doorbell E340 is the video doorbell to buy in 2026 if you want person, package, and face detection that keeps working after the return window closes, because none of it sits behind a monthly plan. At $149.99, with no subscription required for any of its AI detection or its 8GB of local storage, it scored highest in our weighting of video quality, motion and package detection, power and install, subscription-free features, and 3-year cost. Its dual camera, one facing the visitor and one facing straight down, also catches packages the single-lens doorbells below miss.

If you live inside Google’s smart home app already and can accept lower-resolution video, the Nest Doorbell (Battery) is the runner-up: its person, package, animal, and vehicle alerts are free too, though you only get 3 hours of clip history unless you add a Google Home Premium plan. Shoppers who want the lowest sticker price should look at the Wyze Video Doorbell Pro, and anyone deep in Alexa routines who is willing to pay a monthly fee for cloud recording can stick with the Ring Battery Doorbell 2K. Every pick below comes from published specs, brand and retailer pages, a Consumer Product Safety Commission recall check, and figures published by named independent testers, not from our own lab; see how we built this list at /how-we-score/.

How we picked

We weighed five criteria: video quality and field of view (25%), motion and package detection (20%), power and install (15%), features that work without a subscription (20%), and 3-year cost of ownership (20%). Every doorbell below scored at least 6.0 out of 10 on that weighted scale; any product that scored lower was left off this list.

We read the current US product and pricing pages at ring.com, store.google.com, eufy.com, and wyze.com, plus Ring’s own subscription page at ring.com/protect-plans. We checked test results published by TechGearLab, which scored all four doorbells as part of its security camera testing program, and by Consumer Reports, which timed alert speed on the Wyze Video Doorbell Pro. We queried the Consumer Product Safety Commission’s SaferProducts.gov recall database for each brand, read the FTC’s May 2023 press release on Ring, the New York Attorney General’s 2025 press release on eufy’s parent company, and CNN’s February 2024 reporting on a Wyze camera mixup. These picks are researched from published data and named third-party sources, not tested in our own lab; the full method is at /how-we-score/. For a wider look at the camera category beyond doorbells, see our /best-security-cameras/ guide, and browse more picks in /smart-home/.

What to look for

• Field of view of at least 145 degrees vertical. That is roughly what it takes to frame a visitor’s face and a package on the ground in the same shot without a second camera. The Ring Battery Doorbell 2K and Wyze Video Doorbell Pro both clear that bar with room to spare, at 140 and 150 degrees vertical.
• Check whether person and package alerts are free before you buy, not after. Read the brand’s own plan comparison page, not just the box copy. Nest and eufy list AI detection as included; Ring and Wyze list it as a paid add-on on their own plan pages.
• Multiply the required plan’s monthly price by 36 to see the real 3-year cost. A $2.99 a month plan adds $107.64 over three years; a $4.99 a month plan adds $179.64. That number changes which doorbell is actually cheapest, even when the sticker prices look close.
• Local storage beats cloud-only storage if you care about outages or breaches. A doorbell with a built-in flash chip, like the eufy E340’s 8GB, keeps your clips if the company’s servers go down or get breached. Cloud-only doorbells, like the Wyze Video Doorbell Pro and Ring Battery Doorbell 2K, do not.
• Battery claims of 3 to 6 months assume light traffic. A doorbell mounted on a busy street or set to detect every passing car drains faster; several eufy E340 owners on Best Buy’s review page report closer to 10 percent battery drain per day at maximum sensitivity, which means weekly charging instead of monthly.
• Look up the brand name in the CPSC’s SaferProducts.gov database before buying a used or discounted doorbell. Ring’s 2020 recall covered an older 2nd generation battery doorbell with a specific screw-related fire hazard; current models are a different product line, but the search takes 30 seconds and costs nothing.

FAQ

Do I need a subscription to use a video doorbell?

It depends on the brand, and the difference is bigger than most shoppers expect. The eufy Video Doorbell E340 and the Nest Doorbell (Battery) both include person and package detection at no monthly cost, according to each brand’s own product and plan pages. The Ring Battery Doorbell 2K requires a Ring Protect Solo plan, $4.99 a month or $49.99 a year per ring.com/protect-plans, just to view or save a recorded clip; without it you get a live view and a push alert but nothing to look back on. The Wyze Video Doorbell Pro similarly gates person, package, vehicle, and pet detection behind a $2.99 a month Cam Plus plan.

Which video doorbell works with no monthly fee at all?

The eufy Video Doorbell E340 is the clearest answer: its human, package, and face-recognition AI, plus 8GB of built-in local storage, all run with no subscription, per eufy’s own product page. The Nest Doorbell (Battery) is close behind, since its person, package, animal, and vehicle alerts are also free, though the free clip history caps at 3 hours with clips up to 3 minutes long before you would need a paid Google Home Premium plan for more.

Has any video doorbell brand had a recall or a security incident?

Yes, and it is worth knowing before you buy. The CPSC recalled about 350,000 units of an older Ring Video Doorbell (2nd Generation) in November 2020 over a fire and burn hazard tied to using the wrong mounting screws; that notice is public at cpsc.gov, and it does not cover the current Battery Doorbell 2K reviewed here. Separately, the FTC announced in May 2023 that Ring paid $5.8 million to settle charges that its employees and contractors had improper access to customers’ camera footage. Eufy’s parent company, Fantasia Trading LLC, paid $450,000 in a 2025 New York Attorney General settlement after an investigation found some eufy video streams were not always encrypted. Wyze disclosed in February 2024 that a caching error briefly showed about 13,000 users thumbnail images from other customers’ cameras, reported by CNN and other outlets. We did not find a published FTC action, CPSC recall, or comparable security disclosure for the Nest Doorbell (Battery) as of this writing.

What does a video doorbell really cost over 3 years?

Add the required subscription, if the doorbell needs one for the features you want, to the sticker price. The eufy Video Doorbell E340 totals $149.99 with no required plan. The Nest Doorbell (Battery) totals $199.99, also with no required plan for its core detection features. The Wyze Video Doorbell Pro totals $189.95 once you add 3 years of the $29.99 a year Cam Plus plan needed for smart detection. The Ring Battery Doorbell 2K totals $249.96 once you add 3 years of the $49.99 a year Ring Protect Solo plan needed to view or save any recording.

How wide a field of view do I actually need?

Wide enough to see a package on the ground without cropping out a visitor’s face, which in practice means at least 140 to 150 degrees vertical for a single-camera doorbell. The Ring Battery Doorbell 2K covers 140 degrees horizontal and vertical (173 degrees diagonal), and the Wyze Video Doorbell Pro covers 150 degrees horizontal and vertical, both per each brand’s own spec page. The eufy E340 solves the same problem differently, with a second downward-facing camera instead of one very wide lens.