Ring Pan-Tilt Indoor Camera review: Teaching a (not-so-old) dog new tricks

Any pet owner will tell you that even the most well-behaved furry friend can turn into a completely different creature when they’re left alone. It’s why so many of us have an indoor camera (or four, in my case) set up at home—to keep an eye on them when you can’t be there yourself. The newly-released Ring Pan-Tilt Indoor Camera markets itself as a pet security camera, thanks to its wide horizontal and vertical coverage that allows you to track your four-legged family member all over the house. But if you’re thinking it looks familiar, there’s a good reason why.

It’s also important to consider that, in order to get the most out of the Ring Pan-Tilt Indoor Camera, you’ll also need to fork out for a Ring Protect Plan which starts at $4.95 per month. You’ll get a 30-day free trial with the camera, which gives you access to cloud storage, person and package alerts, rich notifications, 24-hour event summaries and multi-cam live view. Without the subscription, there’s no way to access recordings—you’ll only be able to see the live view.

If there’s something familiar about the Ring Pan-Tilt Indoor Camera, it’s because it’s essentially a carbon copy of the Ring Indoor Camera (2nd gen) that was released in 2023. It has the same design, the same 1080p resolution, the same physical privacy mask and the same speakers—the only difference is the motorised base that allows for 360-degree horizontal pan and 169-degree vertical tilt.

Setup is just as foolproof as the static model, simply being a matter of plugging the camera in, downloading the Ring app and following the prompts. The only thing you need to be aware of is that it can only connect to 2.4GHz Wi-Fi networks.

Installation-wise, you need only place the camera on a surface and you’re good to go. That said, it does come with mounting hardware should you want more permanent (and pet-proof!) placement.

Even though the Ring Pan-Tilt Indoor Camera only offers HD video resolution, it’s remarkably crisp with true-to-life colours, a wide field of view and decent night vision. The pan and tilt controls are fast to respond to input, the live feed loads quickly and the accompanying Ring app is generally very user-friendly. As you can probably guess, it’s also compatible with Alexa, meaning you can use it for automation or set up an Echo Show to display a live feed of the camera.

As we mentioned earlier, the Ring Pan-Tilt Indoor Camera doesn’t offer any local storage, nor does it come with free cloud storage. Without a Ring Protect Plan, you’re restricted to a live view only. While this is probably enough if you’re only planning on using it to keep an eye on your pets, it does mean you won’t be able to look at video history in the event of an accident or break-in. Fortunately, in addition to the live view, you can still access features like two-way talk and advanced motion detection.

As someone who is incredibly paranoid about data privacy, perhaps my favourite feature of the camera is its physical privacy mask. Because you have to swivel and click it into place, the lens can’t be unblocked through the app—you physically have to swivel it back. Although security camera breaches in which hackers can actually see your video feed are (thankfully) quite rare, they do happen, so having this as an added safeguard is very welcome.

The Ring Pan-Tilt Indoor Camera is certainly an upgrade from its static sibling—in fact, it corrects our main criticism of the regular Indoor Camera, which was that it couldn’t pan or tilt. The camera quality is great, it’s easy to set up and use, and the physical privacy mask adds some extra peace of mind. However, the lack of any free storage is a major downside, as is the fact that you have to pay a monthly fee to unlock all of its features. Still, if you’re a pet parent simply looking for an easy way to check in on your cat or dog, this camera will do the job.