Google is wagering that artificial intelligence will make its smart home security camera subscription fees worthwhile. The concept is that AI can provide notifications that mimic a human informing you about what they’ve observed outside. Rather than sifting through hours of video footage to find out what occurred, AI can give you a concise summary of the day’s events. This sounds appealing, doesn’t it?
I think it sounds fantastic. If you’ve already read my review of the Nest Cam Outdoor (wired, 2nd gen), you’ll find that my experience was rather disappointing. The notifications from Google’s Gemini AI chatbot frequently misidentified my pets and provided strange and inaccurate descriptions of events in the recorded footage. The daily summaries of my family’s activities made it seem like our home was inundated with people and animals. Overall, this did not justify the high cost of the cloud storage service associated with Google Home Premium (formerly Nest Aware). Without these subscriptions, the Nest Cam Outdoor fails to offer enough value compared to other, more capable options that don’t rely as heavily on cloud services.
How does the Google Nest Doorbell (wired, 3rd gen) compare?
While the AI features remain flawed in the same manner, it could still be a worthwhile option based on how integrated you are into the Google Home ecosystem. However, if you don’t utilize Google Home extensively, it would be better to explore other options.
Google Nest Doorbell (wired, 3rd gen)
Despite the unreliable AI summaries and costly subscription, the Nest Doorbell performs well if you’re heavily invested in the Google Home ecosystem.
Pros
- Clear
- wide field of view Seamless compatibility with Google Home speakers and displays
- Attractive design
- Quick notifications
Cons
- Inconsistent AI notifications
- AI summaries are useless Costly equipment and subscription fees
- No local storage
The Nest Doorbell is possibly the most aesthetically appealing video doorbell available today. Its sleek, elongated design features rounded ends that snugly encase the camera and the LED-illuminated doorbell button. The overall appearance reflects the soft, harmonious symmetry found in other Google Nest cameras. Compared to the bulky, rectangular designs of video doorbells from brands like Ring or Eufy, it offers a much more visually pleasing option.
In addition to its attractive design, Google’s third-generation wired doorbell boasts impressive specifications, including a 2K resolution camera sensor with a wide 166-degree diagonal field of view in a square format. It records HDR video at 30 frames per second, offering vibrant colors during the day and black-and-white footage at night using infrared LEDs. The Nest Doorbell is equipped with a microphone and speaker for two-way audio. For connectivity, it supports both 2.4GHz and 5GHz Wi-Fi as well as Bluetooth Low Energy. Its fast Wi-Fi and continuous operation ensure that the live feed loads almost instantaneously in the Google Home app.
The installation process is simple, provided you have the necessary doorbell wiring near your door. The Nest Doorbell includes a mounting plate and an additional angled adapter for directing the camera towards individuals at your door. Google also supplies wire extenders if required, and the setup is facilitated by the Google Home app, which offers guidance throughout the installation.
Connecting the Nest Doorbell to the Google Home app is straightforward, as this device is designed solely for compatibility with Google Home. However, be aware that setup necessitates a QR code that is found in the packaging. If you misplace this code, you’ll need to disassemble your physical installation to access the QR code located on the back of the doorbell.
Once installed, it operates similarly to other video doorbells. You’ll receive alerts when someone rings the button or when the Nest Doorbell identifies specific objects—like people, pets, and vehicles—that you’ve chosen to be notified about. However, if you want the notifications to include a detailed preview of what activated the recording, along with package detection, you’ll need a subscription. This may seem a bit unfair, but I suppose that producing thumbnail images and utilizing machine learning for package recognition isn’t cheap.
Although there are some omissions, Google offers more complimentary features with the Nest Doorbell compared to the Nest Cam Outdoor. For example, it can connect with both mechanical and digital chimes. If you don’t have a working chime (like I don’t), you can use Google’s smart speakers or displays instead. These devices can be set up to announce when someone presses your doorbell, and with the Google Nest Hub or Hub Max, you can even start streaming the live camera feed. Through the display, you can communicate with the visitor or, if you prefer not to engage, you can select an automated response, such as instructing a delivery person to leave the package at your door.
During testing, my second-generation Nest Hub promptly indicated when someone pressed the button, and communicating with them was relatively straightforward. The only drawback was the Nest Hub’s interface, which felt quite slow by 2025 standards. Nevertheless, the integration is impressive. I just wish I could get it to work with the Google TV-enabled OLED TV in my basement.
That’s all there is to the Nest Doorbell without a subscription. It doesn’t offer local recording, but Google has increased the time that recorded events are stored on its servers from just three hours in the previous version to a still limited six hours. Regardless, this is minimal when compared to the free local storage available with video doorbells from brands like Eufy, Reolink, Blink, and Aqara.
AI works better on the doorbell camera
AI works better on the doorbell camera To access additional features of the Nest Doorbell, you will need to subscribe to a Google Home Premium plan, which costs $10 or $20 per month. This subscription will provide you with increased cloud video storage history—30 days for the $10 plan and 60 days for the $20 plan. The more expensive option also includes an extra 10 days of continuous 24/7 recording that can be searched using Gemini.
The basic Standard tier also provides facial recognition, package detection, and notifications if any of your Google Home devices detect glass breaking or smoke alarms. These features, along with local storage, are already available for free with the Reolink Elite I that I recently evaluated. In fact, the only advantage this subscription offers that many other cameras do not is a feature called “Help me create.” This allows you to set up automations by entering descriptions in a text box within the Google Home app. It worked effectively for creating basic automations; however, one issue I encountered is that if you request something beyond the capabilities of Google Home’s automations, Gemini doesn’t inform you— it simply provides an automation that does not work.
In the near future, the Standard plan will expand to offer widespread access to Gemini on smart speakers. This will incorporate features such as Gemini Live, which allows for interactive voice conversations with Google’s LLM-powered assistant. Currently, it’s advisable to wait before subscribing if you’re looking to use Gemini on your speakers, as this feature is currently limited to select users in early access.
To access the primary AI camera features, such as daily summaries and AI-generated event notifications, you need to subscribe to the $20/month Google Home Premium Advanced plan. I discuss my concerns regarding these features in my review of the Nest Cam Outdoor, but to summarize: Google’s AI system frequently misinterprets the situations it’s observing, mistakenly identifies animals, and its summaries often suggest that I have constant visitors, making it seem like I’m hosting a party every day.
That being said, the system appears to be more precise when it comes to a video doorbell, potentially because the camera is positioned closer to the ground, allowing it to better see what is directly in front of it. Alternatively, it might be due to the more predictable nature of events occurring in front of my house compared to the backyard; it’s not trying to interpret dogs coming and going or people doing yard work or taking out the trash. Although Gemini occasionally mistook my cat for a dog, it accurately identified when most packages were delivered and even recognized one as being from Amazon.
These features are impressive when they function correctly, and as I mentioned in my review of the Nest Cam Outdoor, they represent a significant advancement in home security camera technology. However, Google’s AI descriptions are frequently inaccurate, making it feel like I’m paying $20 a month to test a product that’s still in beta, which isn’t exactly satisfying. Even when the descriptions are not outright wrong, they offer little more than the basic, non-AI labels like “Person,” “Person with Package,” or “Activity or Animal” found in the free version. While AI video search has its appeal, as demonstrated by the Reolink Elite, it’s possible to achieve similar AI search capabilities with an on-device AI model. With local video storage, it seems like Google could have developed a camera with on-device AI search for free but chose not to, likely preferring to make more money through subscription fees instead.
Good buy if you’re all-in on Google Home
The Google Nest Doorbell (wired, 3rd gen) is designed for a particular audience—those who are deeply integrated into the Google Home ecosystem. If your home is equipped with Google Nest speakers and smart displays and you enjoy using Google Gemini, you’ll likely appreciate the Nest Doorbell. Additionally, if you already have a costly Google Home Premium subscription and either lack the Nest Doorbell or only own the first-generation version, getting this new model is an obvious choice.
However, for most users, the Nest Doorbell doesn’t provide significant benefits on its own, and the Google Home Premium subscription feels like a poor value, especially when budgets are tight. It’s challenging to justify spending $20 a month for AI-generated summaries or notifications that offer marginally more insight than the basic “person detected” alerts, especially when I’m trying to cut costs by canceling streaming services. I would prefer to purchase one of the many more affordable video doorbell options that include local video storage and use the money I save to reactivate my Netflix subscription for a few more months.