Arlo’s home security cameras have held a distinct advantage over their rivals made by Amazon, Nest and Wyze for a long time, and that advantage has been portability – Arlo’s home security cameras are one of the few to have built-in batteries, allowing them to be positioned anywhere around the home, not just near a power outlet. The company newest line of home security cameras, the Arlo Pro 3 ($200+), is very much still portable, but it delivers some key features and upgrades over its predecessor, Arlo Pro 2 ($180+). It actually shares a surprising amount with the company’s high-end (and more expensive) Ultra line.
The most obvious difference is the Pro 3 looks better than any other Arlo home security camera. The company overhauled the design, giving it a fresh new body and completely new magnetic mounting system that makes each Pro 3 easier to mount, but also gives you more flexibility to angle the camera just right. The Pro 3 is also available in black or white models.
As far as upgraded features – there are a lot. Compared to the Pro 2, the Pro 3 has a new and improved image sensor that allows it to capture twice the resolution (2K instead of the Pro 2’s 1080p) with HDR and a significantly wider field of view (160-degrees instead of the Pro 2’s 130-degree field of view). The Pro 3 has a new motion sensor that enables a new spotlight feature: when the camera detects motion, the camera’s built-in light will turn on and you’ll get a push notification on your phone (It should be noted that you can select, via the Arlo app, a specific area within the frame for the camera to hone in on, as well as select a schedule to turn on/off this spotlight feature so it’s not going on at all hours of the day.)
The Pro 3 has improved night vision that the company claims can capture nighttime images in color, theoretically making it easier for you to decipher what exactly is happening at night. The Pro 3 has, for the first time, a new siren feature; you can set it up so that, at certain times, when the Pro 3 detects motion it will trigger a loud and annoying alarm. The camera also supposedly has an improved microphone and speaker system, making even easier for users to have two-way conversations with whomever their camera is facing. Each camera also has a 6-month battery life, identical to the Pro 2.
Like all Arlo’s other cameras, the Pro 3 is compatible with pretty much every major smart ecosystem. It works with Amazon’s Alexa, Google Assistant and Apple’s HomeKit. And like the Pro 2, the Pro 3 is weatherproof (IP65), so you can set it up either outside or inside. (As long as there’s a Wi-Fi connection, these cameras will work.) The other neat thing is that if you already have any of Arlo’s smart security cameras, anything from a Pro 2 or an Ultra, you can buy one Pro 3 and seamlessly integrate it into your existing system.
It should be noted that the Pro 3 is priced between the company’s Pro 2 and the Ultra lines of security cameras. The high-end Alro Ultra has pretty much all of the same features as the Pro 3, including a built-in spotlight and alarm, and delivers a better image (up to 4K resolution) with a wider field of view (180-degree). On the downside, the Ultra is decently more expensive. An Ultra two-camera starter kit costs $599, with every additional camera costing an extra $299. The Pro 3 two-camera starter kit costs $499, with every additional camera costing an extra $199.
