Ring Outdoor Cam Plus Review (2025)

The Outdoor Cam Plus comes in black or white and has a cylindrical shape similar to the 1080p Ring Outdoor Cam ($79.99), but is marginally larger. By the numbers, it measures 5.0 by 2.6 by 2.6 inches (HWD) compared with 4.9 by 2.3 by 2.3 inches for the Outdoor Cam.

We reviewed the AC-powered version of the Outdoor Cam Plus, but Ring also offers a battery-powered model for the same price. The AC power adapter is weather-resistant and has a 17-foot cable.

You can place the camera on a flat surface or mount it to a ceiling, wall, beam, or soffit using the included mounting hardware. A round based beneath the camera has a hinge that lets you tilt it forward and backward and swivel it 360 degrees.

For wall mounting, you simply unscrew the base from the bottom of the camera, and screw it into the threaded hole on the back of the device. The base twists off to reveal a battery compartment, should you decide to switch to battery power at some point. Battery packs can be purchased separately for $34.99 each.

(Credit: John R. Delaney)

Along with the camera assembly, the front of the Outdoor Cam Plus houses a microphone, a status LED, a PIR (passive infrared) motion sensor, an ambient light sensor, and a speaker. A dual-band Wi-Fi radio (2.4GHz and 5GHz) provides connectivity, and a siren wards off intruders if needed. Around back is a USB-C power port for use with the included AC power adapter or with an optional solar panel (sold separately for $59.99).

The Outdoor Cam Plus will record video when motion is detected, but as with other Ring cameras, you have to subscribe to a Ring Home plan to access the recordings and to unlock certain features. The $4.99 per month/$49.99 per year Basic plan gives you 180 days of video history; package, person, and vehicle alerts; and video previews for a single camera. The $9.99 per month/$99.99 per year Standard plan offers the same coverage for all of your Ring cameras and adds extended live view (for up to 30 minutes of continuous viewing at a time), multi-cam live views (to monitor up to four live feeds on one screen), live picture-in-picture views (so you can continue watching your camera feed while using other apps), and daily event summaries (a scrollable feed of recorded motion events).

For $19.99 per month/$199.99 per year, the Ring Home Premium plan gives you everything from the Standard plan. It adds Smart Video Search (a beta AI search tool for your recorded motion event footage), 24/7 recording, extended warranties, and a handful of features for the Ring Alarm Security System, including professional monitoring.

For comparison, the TP-Link Tapo Wire-Free MagCam supports both cloud and local storage. The camera stores video locally on a microSD card (up to 512GB), or you can subscribe to a Tapo Care Premium plan (starting at $3.49 per month or $34.99 per year) for 30 days of cloud storage for event-triggered video clips plus other perks like rich notifications and Smart Sort video tagging.

The Outdoor Cam Plus uses the same Ring mobile app (free for Android and iOS) as other devices from the brand, and appears on the dashboard screen in its own panel, which displays the name of the camera and the last captured image. Tap that to open a device screen with a video panel and a scrollable timeline of events. You can view the video in full-screen mode by turning your phone to landscape orientation. Tap the Live button to view real-time video with buttons on the screen for two-way talk and muting the speaker.

(Credit: Ring/PCMag)

At the bottom of the device screen are buttons labeled Controls, Replies, Siren, and More. Controls opens a quick settings screen where you can activate the camera’s siren and control the lighting on other Ring devices, like the Floodlight Cam. Replies lets you play a prerecorded message for visitors, Sireb activates the built-in siren, and More enables or disables the picture-in-picture feature.

To access the camera’s settings, tap the gear icon in the upper right corner of the app. Buttons at the top of this page let you enable and disable motion detection and alerts, control the siren, and access the camera's live feed. The bottom portion of the screen contains buttons labeled Alerts Snooze (to disable alerts for 30 minutes to 12 hours), Event History, Linked Devices (to have other Ring devices react to motion), Mode Settings (to configure Disarmed, Home, Away modes), Motion Settings, and Smart Responses (to have the camera automatically play a message when motion is detected while set to Away mode). The device settings menu allows you to configure notifications, privacy preferences, power management options, snapshot capture (to see what happens between motion events), and video resolution.

Installing the Outdoor Cam Plus is fast and easy. To get started, you must download the Ring app and create an account if you don't already have one. At the bottom of the dashboard screen, I tapped Set Up a Device > Security Cameras, and used my phone’s camera to scan the QR code on the back of the Outdoor Cam Plus. The app immediately recognized the Outdoor Cam Plus, so I tapped Continue, selected Outdoors for my setup location, and selected Electrical Socket as my power source. I followed the instructions to power up the device, confirmed it was on, and gave it a name. The camera automatically connected to my phone’s Wi-Fi network and my Alexa account (which I had previously linked with the Ring app).

(Credit: John R. Delaney)

Next, the app asks if you want to view an installation tutorial or skip it. I skipped the tutorial, took the camera outside to my backyard, attached it to my deck railing, and plugged it into a nearby GFCI outlet to complete the installation.

The Outdoor Cam Plus delivered solid 2K video in testing. Daytime colors showed good saturation, and image detail was sharp. Nighttime color video was also sharp, but the colors lacked the pop of daytime video, which isn't uncommon for smart outdoor security cameras.

Motion alerts arrived instantly and were correctly identified, and the siren was adequately loud. My Alexa voice commands to stream video to an Amazon Echo Show smart display worked perfectly, and my Alexa routine to have a compatible smart bulb turn on when the camera detected motion worked every time.

(Credit: Ring)

With the Ring Outdoor Cam Plus, you get an easy-to-install indoor or outdoor camera that delivers sharp 2K video and decent color night vision. You don’t get a lot of extras with this camera, such as Ring's 3D Motion Detection and Bird's Eye View features, but it gives you the choice of battery, plug-in, or solar power, and works with both 2.4GHz and 5GHz Wi-Fi. It's affordable at $99.99, though you'll need to budget an extra $49.99 a year for a Ring subscription to view your recorded video and unlock certain features. If you'd rather avoid the subscription, the 2K TP-Link Tapo Wire-Free MagCam offers subscription-free local storage, free intelligent alerts, and a built-in spotlight, so it remains our Editors’ Choice winner for outdoor security cameras.