Paul Zalewski

You know us. When it comes to video baby monitors that don’t connect to Wi-Fi, we’re not that excited. But sometimes, we can still be surprised.

Now and then, a product comes along that completely surpasses our expectations. In this case, Eureka! It’s the Eufy Spaceview baby monitor.

John spent a lot of time testing the monitor, and you can watch his full review in all of its glory here:

Alternatively, how about you just keep reading? It’s time to get a view from space.

An in-depth Eufy Spaceview baby monitor review

Buckle up. Prepare for launch. This Eufy Spaceview monitor review will cover everything you need to know, from specs to set ups. We’ll even compare it to another surprisingly decent non-Wi-Fi monitor in the Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD (review here). You don’t want to miss this epic showdown.

Heads up: we are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. You can learn more about our policies regarding affiliate links here

The Eufy Spaceview is a non-Wi-Fi monitor. What does that mean?

If you want a video feed of your baby, you can pick between two types of products: Wi-Fi and non-Wi-Fi. The first is a camera that, through your home network, connects directly to a mobile app. The second comes with a ‘parent unit’, essentially a screen dedicated to your monitor. 

Wi-Fi baby monitors like the Nanit Plus and Miku are full of helpful features, especially for newborns and infants. Think detailed sleep information, as well as the ability to check in anywhere from your phone, even while you’re on date night. Those features have made us prefer them in most cases. 

Non-Wi-Fi monitors don’t have that feature. They operate on a radio frequency-based system with limited range, and their features also tend to be less. Good if you’re worried about that scary hacker from the movies. Bad if you’re just looking for the best possible product. Just a note: after much research our viewpoint is that wifi baby monitor hacking just isn’t very prevalent (though, like shark attacks, it’s still a scary concept to think about).

The Eufy falls into the non-Wi-Fi category. Usually, that’s a downgrade from us. But after using it for even a few days, John’s devotion to Wi-Fi products started to waver. Don’t space out on us–you’ll find out why if you keep reading.

Setting up the camera unit

It kind of looks like a bug eye. The aesthetics might not be there, but you get the sense of quality as soon as you get the camera out of the box. That alien head makes you think just a little bit like you’re in outer space.

Beyond the looks, though, the setup is extremely simple. Turn on the camera, turn on the parent unit, and both connect to each other immediately. For the camera itself, you have three placement options:

• Set it on a bookshelf or other raised surface. 
• Mount it to the wall with the attached kit.
• Mount it to the crib with a clamp-looking attachment (included).

Heads-up, though: the box does not come with any type of cord management system or clips. That makes crib mounting only realistic for newborns who can’t test out their NBA wing span yet [AND, SERIOUS WARNING: experts recommend NO CORDS within 3 feet of an baby’s crib — strangulation can and does occur from cords].

Basic specs and features of the Eufy Spaceview monitor

Most of the features on the Spaceview are pretty standard:

• 720p video resolution, which is comparable to most Wi-Fi monitors and helps you see your baby clearly.
• A 5-inch screen on the parent unit, about the size of an iPhone 7 or Samsung Galaxy S7 screen (if you remember those).
• The parent unit has a 15-hour continuous battery run time from full charge. That’s more than most other non-Wi-Fi options and plenty for even the longest sleepers.
• Basic night vision that means you don’t have to keep the light on when your baby goes to sleep.
• Two-way audio communication, allowing you to speak back to your baby. It’s actually pretty crisp.
• Temperature and time display on the parent unit, just in case you’re worried about sleeping patterns or sauna treatments.
• A 3x digital zoom that helps you get up close and personal, and allows you to set up the camera just a little further back.
• Five white noise options, including one to cycle through. It’s important to note here that the white noise will turn off after 30 minutes.

 The bugeye design actually has a purpose, too: it allows you to pan the camera 330 degrees side to side, which is close to a full rotation. Add a 110-degree vertical tilt option, and you keep a good overview of the entire room.

Enough with the basics, though. Three features especially stood out when John put this monitor through the ringer.

1. Voice-Activated Alerts (VOX)

Don’t let the funky acronym fool you: this feature is anything but annoying. When turned on, any noise that exceeds the threshold level set within the menu will activate the parent unit and turn on the screen.

You can turn it on and off in the menu. But probably the best part is that you can set the sensitivity, making sure your monitor doesn’t kick on every time the little one lets our a snore.

2. Sound-Activated Alerts (SOX?)

Alright, we’ll admit it, that acronym is ours. But might as well, right? SOX is VOX, but with sound. Instead of the monitor ‘waking up’ when there’s a noise around the camera, you’ll get an audible alert when it exceeds a threshold you set.

Obviously, this is especially helpful during those nights when you just need some shuteye. You can customize not just the threshold level, but also the alarm volume and alert duration between 10 and 60 seconds. At its loudest for a full minute, trust us: even the deepest sleepers will wake up.

Heads up for both VOX and SOX: while the white noise feature is on, neither of them will work. Fortunately (or is it?) that will only be the case for 30 minutes before the white noise shuts itself off.

3. Detachable Wide Angle Lens

Finally, the Eufy comes with a detachable wide-angle lens that expands your field of view to 110 degrees. It’s essentially double what you’d usually get.

Keeping it attached makes sense for two reasons:

1. You won’t lose it (John would have otherwise)
2. You can see more of the room without having to pan. If your little one is like John’s Calvin, that ensures don’t you don’t lose track of the little night-time explore.

The awesome, the wish it were different, and a verdict

The awesome

As you might be able to tell from the review so far, there were quite a few features to like about the Spaceview. Let’s break them down:

• Easy access. Simply being able to see the video with a single click is, admittedly, convenient. App-based Wi-Fi monitors require your phone, so you might need some time to unlock it and open the app when the urge to see your little one strikes. A non-Wi-Fi like the Eufy is much faster and straightforward.
• Audio alerts. Super useful if you want to hear when something’s wrong, but don’t need to hear every noise. On Wi-Fi options like the Nanit or even the Summer Infant, constant background noise can become distracting quickly. Eufy’s audio alerts allow you to turn down background noise but turn up the alarm, and even increase its duration, making it perfect for a good but reassured snooze.
• The parent unit. Yes, it’s an extra device to carry around. But it’s actually pretty slim and lightweight, weighing less than your average smartphone. Fits into your skinny jeans, too.
• Easy setup. You don’t need to login to an account, and you don’t need to pair your camera and parent unit. Just turn them both on, and you’re ready to go. Combine that with the small footprint of the parent unit, and there you go! It’s a great travel option.

The wish it were different

• The bugeye design of the camera. It just doesn’t look that great, especially when you’re adding it to the bookshelf of that perfect newborn nursery.
• The white noise limit. Come on, 30 minutes? Many babies need it all night. If you’re in that boat, you’ll need a separate white noise machine. The fact that turning on white noise eliminates your VOX and sound activated alert options only makes our point.
• No cord management system. With any baby, you need it. When you by the Eufy Spaceview, you’ll have to find it elsewhere.
• No movement alerts. What if your baby is a silent assassin like John’s Calvin, who likes to move around his room at night without much noise? The Eufy lacks a movement detection system like the Pixel Zoom HD, making it more difficult to detect that ninja movement.
• Limited range. It’s at only 460 feet, compared to the unlimited range of Wi-Fi monitors. Even most non-Wi-Fi monitors go further than that.

The verdict

It’s good. It’s so good, in fact, that it’s making us rethink our strong stance on behalf of Wi-Fi baby monitors juuuuuust a little. The pros clearly outweigh the cons, making the Eufy Spaceview a great option if you’re not into all the networking stuff of Wi-Fi alternatives.

The setup is easy. The parent unit is slim and lightweight. The audio monitoring alerts are both intuitive and extremely helpful. It’s tough to go wrong here.

Spaceview pricing, plus a second camera

For all of its quality, the Eufy Spaceview is not cheap–but it’s also not unreasonable. The standard monitor is available on Amazon and the manufacturer’s website for $160. 

Looking to add some rooms to your video setup? Eufy sells a 2-camera monitor set for $240. On its own, every additional camera costs another $100, and you can add up to four total to your system.

For the maximum of four cameras, you’ll pay $440. That’s not cheap, but still far below the $670 of the very comparable Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD with the same number of angles.

Eufy Spaceview vs. Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD: Who wins the non-Wi-Fi battle?

Time for the showdown. You’ve heard about our preference for Wi-Fi monitors ad nauseam, but we’ve now reviewed two Non-Wi-Fi options that we actually quite like. How do they stack up? Let’s find out.

• Technology: Both the Eufy Spaceview and the Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD are non-Wi-Fi baby monitors, using the same technology to connect camera and parent unit. They also both stream in 720p, so no discernible difference there.
• Price: The Eufy Spaceview is the clear winner here. It’s almost $100 cheaper (retailing at $160 compared to the Pixel’s $250), and that price difference only increases as you add more cameras.
• Range: The Pixel Zoom HD takes the cake with an 800-foot range, which is pretty impressive without Wi-Fi. The Eufy Spaceview lags behind at 460 feet.
• Setup: Easy as pie, for both of them. The Spaceview adds a crib-mounting option, while the Summer Infant monitor has a simple cord management system included in the box.
• Parent unit: Both screens and buttons are convenient. But the Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD weighs almost twice as much, and is almost twice as thick. It also has some inconveniently placed button. The Spaceview wins.
• Alerts: VOX is a feature for both, but the Spaceview adds the sound-activated alert system while the Pixel Zoom HD has movement detection. Both are helpful, so which you like better really depends on your baby’s habits.

Put it all together, and we’ll declare the Eufy Spaceview as the narrow winner. The price difference is just too big, and the parent unit is just too slick. Of course, you might have a different view!

Where to next?

Check out all of our baby monitor reviews and finds one that fits you and your family like a glove.

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IMPORTANT NOTE: AS OF MAY 31 2020, COCOON CAM IS ENDING SUPPORT FOR THEIR MOBILE APP. So, probably time to choose another baby monitor, not this one—to check out our top picks for best baby monitor of 2020 here.
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The Cocoon Cam exists in a family of baby monitors that use a combination of wifi, your smartphone or tablet as the ‘parent unit’, and computer vision to provide information about your child. Other examples include the Nanit (our review here) and the Arlo Baby (our review here). At $149, the Cocoon Cam is the most inexpensive of the bunch.

To find out how the Cocoon Cam stacks up against other options, we spent some time testing it ourselves and then shipped it off to a friend of Fathercraft who has a new baby, born prematurely, to test its performance as a monitor for very young infants and premature babies. We’ll be adding information to this review as part of that testing as it arrives. What follows now is a review based on our own testing.

Please note: we received a free Cocoon Cam from the manufacturer as they noticed we reviewed baby monitors and were interested in our review. We do not guarantee positive reviews in exchange for free products, and always disclose free products received. You can read more about our policies here. Also, we are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

A review of the Cocoon Cam Plus Baby Monitor

A few years ago, my brother and his wife came to babysit our daughter Kenzie while we went to a concert. They stayed overnight at our apartment with Kenzie, who was around 18 months old at the time. When we got back and asked how it went, they both remarked on how tired they were. “Yeah, kids can do that to you,” we said. “No, it wasn’t that,” my brother said, “Marian [his wife] was up most of the night because she kept thinking Kenzie might stop breathing. I was up most of the night too because she kept talking to me about it and making me go into Kenzie’s room to check on her.”

If you’re a parent, you can relate to this story. If you’re about to be a parent and this sounds kinda ridiculous, we can nearly guarantee you’ll have moments like this. I do it from time to time with our youngest daughter, who’s 19 months old as I’m writing this. I did it with Kenzie (though not all night, every night!). I was talking to my dad the other day and he said he used to do it when we were kids.

Making sure your child is still breathing is one of those nearly universal parenting things that only parents (or aunts and uncles who are babysitting a young child) can really relate to. It’s also not a completely unfounded concern – according to the CDC, 3,600 infants died of SUID (Sudden Unexplained Infant Death) and related causes in 2016. However, as we discuss in this article, none of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ recommendations for SIDS and SUID risk reduction involve using a device to monitor your child.

This is exactly what the Cocoon Cam tries to solve. Using a combination of a directly over the crib mounting, an HD camera with night vision, and computer-vision technology with some algorithms designed to detect and analyze breathing rates & patterns, the Cocoon Cam (according to the company’s site) purports to allow you to, “know your baby is sleeping safely so you can get the rest you deserve.” And does this without the use of wearables (other baby monitors may include a component worn by your baby while she’s sleeping).

This is quite a promise. It also, for us, raised questions like: will this thing produce false alarms that freak you out? Does the act of measuring your child’s breathing make you more worried, not less?

Let’s dig in. We’ll start with how the Cocoon Cam works, how it’s installed and set up, discuss the individual components of the Cocoon Cam, and then discuss the awesome, the wish it were different, and provide our final verdict.

What, exactly, is a Cocoon Cam?

The company behind Cocoon Cam is based in Silicon Valley, and proud of it. They tout a team of PhDs & parents behind the product, working to use the top minds in tech to improve the baby monitor. (Interestingly, iBaby labs, another company whose monitors we’ve reviewed, uses nearly the exact same Silicon Valley marketing language.) Like nearly every baby monitor founding story we’ve read, theirs starts with a parent who was frustrated by the lack of good baby monitors out there. Having used many baby monitors ourselves, we can definitely relate – there are a lot of bad ones out there. (You can find all of our baby monitor reviews here.)

The Cocoon Cam Plus, like every video monitor, consists of the Child Unit (camera + microphone + speaker), a Parent Unit (in this case, your smartphone or tablet + a free app), plus some mounting hardware for the Child Unit.

Note: in 2018, the Cocoon Cam got an upgrade and is now called the Cocoon Cam Plus (or Cocoon Cam +). We reviewed this newer model.

Here’s everything that came in the box:

Let’s discuss each of these pieces of equipment individually.

The camera (child unit)

The Cocoon Cam’s child unit features a 720p HD camera, a microphone to detect crying or other noises from your child, a speaker that allows you to communicate with your child through the monitor, and the wifi gear necessary to transmit and receive signals from the parent unit via wifi.

Camera positioning

The Cocoon Cam is designed to be mounted directly above your child’s crib to provide a bird’s eye view of what’s going on in there. As we discussed in our Nanit review, we’ve really come to appreciate this vs the traditional ‘put it on a nearby table/dresser’ view we were used to with older monitors. It allows an unobstructed view of your child without crib bars in the way and avoids the blind spots that’ve frustrated us with other monitors we’ve used. In addition to providing a better view, this positioning is also necessary for Cocoon Cam’s breathing monitoring feature to function (the camera will still work not mounted in this way, you just won’t get breathing monitoring).

Image quality

At 720p, the Cocoon Cam’s camera isn’t as high-resolution as others we’ve tested – you can find 1080p on a number of different monitors these days, and we suspect it’s only a matter of time before someone comes out with a 4K monitor. The real question is, does this matter? Do you really need to see your child in pixel-perfect perfection? And, perhaps most importantly in our experience – how’s the night vision? (Your child will – and should – sleep in the dark a lot of the time, so night vision quality can be more important than how high-res a camera is.

So you can judge for yourself, here are screenshots from the Cocoon Cam app.

What do we think? We’ve seen better. But, we wouldn’t call Cocoon Cam’s image quality or night vision bad, and we’d reiterate that we don’t believe image quality to be the end-all in baby monitors.

Audio quality

Audio quality from the Cocoon Cam is just ok, based on our testing. It just sounds a bit off, and we experienced a bit of an echo. Again, we’ve heard way better audio quality in other monitors we’ve tested like the Nanit. Audio sensitivity, on the other hand, was quite good – the microphone seemed able to pick up even quiet noises Ruby made, even when a fan was on in her room for white noise. Like all wifi-based monitors, there was a half-second delay between actual sounds and sounds through the app, but this isn’t enough to be meaningful.

A note about background audio. Like all monitors that use a smartphone or tablet as a parent unit, the Cocoon Cam is reliant on your device to provide audio, even when the app isn’t open. This can be a problem if you forget to open the app, or if a monitor doesn’t have a good way to provide background audio. Fortunately, background audio seems to happen automatically and function well with the Cocoon Cam as long as you remember to turn on audio, which is off by default. Assuming you do, and assuming your device is turned on, with the sound up, no other apps are competing for background audio, and the device is kept nearby, you’ll be able to hear your child’s sounds.

Sound quality

The Cocoon Cam also has a speaker that allows you to talk to your child by un-muting the microphone on your app and speaking into your phone’s microphone. In practice, both of us here at Fathercraft have found success in calming kids through a monitor this way. The Cocoon Cam’s speaker & two-way communication works fine. If you sing to your child through it, you aren’t going to sound like you’re in a concert hall, but that’s ok.

Real-time breathing monitoring

As it’s the central feature of the Cocoon Cam, we were quite curious to see how well the real-time breathing monitoring feature would perform. And, during our testing, it seemed to perform quite well.

We’d note a couple of things to start:

1. Data is limited (so far). We tested over several nights and naps, but are currently waiting on more real-world testing data (which will be added to this review).
2. You need to manually turn on the breathing monitoring function. We’d assumed that breathing monitoring happened automatically whenever you stuck your child into her crib. In reality, you have to manually turn it on each time (though the app does prompt you to do so when it detects motion in the crib.
3. Breathing monitoring only works when your child is sleeping soundly. If your child is awake and moving, or sleeping restlessly, Cocoon Cam can’t accurately measure breathing, as it needs your child to be still to hone in on her chest/abdomen and ‘see’ the rise and fall, and so the device doesn’t attempt to monitor during these times, instead using motion detection to wait until your child is still.

Once Ruby was sleeping soundly, the breathing monitoring wave (pictured above) began to display, and the purple circle gently contracted an expanded. The wave indicates the rate of respiration, in real time. The purple circle indicates the location where Cocoon Cam is measuring respiration. During testing, her breathing always looked normal and we didn’t get any alerts that it wasn’t working.

Since Ruby was older during testing (>18 months) and now sleeps with a lightweight blanket, we got the opportunity to test whether breathing monitoring worked while she was covered by the blanket – and it seemed to work just fine.

A final note on breathing monitoring – the Cocoon Cam does this monitoring solely based on analyzing the video feed from the camera – no wearable is required. We’re personally a bit squeamish about putting stuff on our kids, so we appreciated its ability to monitor with no wearable.

The Cocoon Cam App (parent unit)

Any monitor relying on a 3rd-party device (likely your smartphone) to be the parent unit is only as good as its app. And this can be the downfall of some monitors (we found the iBaby app to be frustratingly unintuitive). The Cocoon Cam App is quite good. Inside the app you’ll find:

The app home screen & monitor’s live feed. When you open the Cocoon Cam App, you’ll see the app’s home screen, which is where the live feed from the monitor is displayed. There’s a fair amount going on here, so let’s take a look at the individual features:

1. The menu icon allows you to access other parts of the app.
2. The LIVE indicator reassures you that the app is, in fact, streaming a real-time view from your child’s crib.
3. The sound level indicates how loud the sounds being picked up by the monitor are. In the above screenshot, you’ll see there is some baseline sound, which is coming from the fan we were using for white noise. If your child were to start crying, you’d see the green bar spike up.
4. The live video feed is beneath everything else by default, but by tapping on it you’ll make all of the buttons disappear for an uninterrupted picture like in the screenshots above.
5. A note on why breathing monitoring isn’t currently working. If your child is moving around, you’ll see a message like this one, indicating that breathing monitoring isn’t currently active and when it will return.
6. The ‘talk to your baby’ button. If you want to talk to your baby, you’ll need to tap on this first (it’s muted by default to prevent you from accidentally waking your child by making some noise while looking at the monitor app.)
7. The activity log shows recent events (your baby waking up, going to sleep, crying, etc.
8. Toggle sound on/off by tapping on this button. As noted above regarding background audio, turning sound on will cause your monitor to play any sounds picked up by the microphone in your child’s room through your phone, even when the app is closed.
9. Turn breathing monitoring on/off by tapping this button (if breathing monitoring is on, it’ll say, “Start Monitoring” instead).
10. Location of movement. These purple circles will jump around while your child is moving, once she settles down, they’ll settle down at the child’s chest/abdomen (there may be only one circle at this time) and grow larger and smaller to indicate breathing.

Swaddle Stories

Swaddle Stories are a time-lapse summary of your child’s night, focusing on when your child is moving around. In practice with Ruby, this looked kinda like you’d expect – a fast motion version of her rolling around in her crib. Swaddle Stories are set to the same upbeat music each time. It’s unclear to me how this is particularly helpful, especially after you’ve seen a few of them and get a feel for what your child does throughout the night.

Activity Log

The Activity Log shows a summary of the time your child went to sleep, when they woke up, etc.

Mounting instructions, My invitations, & My Account

The Cocoon Cam app also features sections for mounting instructions (shows you how to mount the Cocoon Cam with drawings), My Invitations (if you’ve been invited to view other Cocoon Cams), My Account (change email, password, add a camera, invite another caregiver to your Cocoon Cam), and Settings (

Settings

Within settings, you can setup or change your wifi, adjust your notification settings, or turn on ‘low bandwidth mode’, which decreases image quality to save network bandwidth.

Notification settings allow you to adjust the notifications your phone gives you about Cocoon Cam, including whether you see or hear notifications at all, whether you get notifications for Breathing Monitoring, crying, falling asleep, waking up, and swaddle stories.

Notifications

I found Cocoon Cam notifications on my phone to be pretty good, and comparable to other top wifi baby monitors I’ve used. The “fell asleep” and “woke up” notifications seemed pretty accurate, and included a short video of Ruby moving around when waking up.

Since, as noted above, I didn’t find the Swaddle Stories that useful, I turned off this notification as otherwise, I got a notification at a random time in the morning that one was ready to view.

Setting up the Cocoon Cam

To set up the Cocoon Cam, you need to be prepared to do three things you might not expect:

1. connect the monitor directly to your router with an ethernet cable (provided, and temporary)
2. adjust the security settings on your router (if you’ve had your router for a while)
3. drill into your wall behind your child’s crib with drywall screws (possible workaround below)

Unlike other monitors we’ve tested here at Fathercraft, Cocoon Cam needs to be plugged directly into your router during setup. It’s not clear to me why you need to do this. While it wasn’t all that difficult, for me it involved getting an extension cord to plug the Cocoon Cam in, standing on an ottoman trying to see the back of our router, which didn’t want to come away from the wall (in other words, kind of a pain).

The network security thing surprised me, but we have had our router for about 2 years, so maybe this change was justified anyway. Cocoon Cam requires you to be using WPA-2 security for your wifi network, ours was not. I assumed updating this would be some very painful process involving a 30-minute call to Comcast, but it was actually pretty easy – I just logged into our Comcast account, hunted around for some settings (Google was helpful), flipped some virtual switches, and had to update our wifi password (which involved updating passwords on every device we had.)

To install the Cocoon Cam, due to the birds-eye view discussed above, you’re supposed to mount it exactly 3 feet above the mattress crib mattress, in the center of the long side of the crib. Since most people have their cribs against the wall this way, this isn’t a problem … except for the fact that you’re supposed to drill two holes in the wall, insert drywall anchors and screw the camera in (screws and drywall anchors are provided.)

If you’re handy, or the Cocoon Cam is going to be a long-term fixture in your child’s room, this probably isn’t a dealbreaker. And, to be fair, other birds-eye mount cameras like the Nanit do require screws (but not anchors.) I wasn’t overly keen to put holes in our wall for testing, so [EDITOR’S NOTE – WE DON’T CONDONE THIS, TALK TO COCOON CAM FIRST] we used Command Strips (Amazon link) to put the camera up.

The awesome, the wish it were different, and a verdict

The awesome

Price. As we mentioned at the beginning of this review, Coocoon Cam is just $149, making it the most reasonably priced of the wifi monitors we’ve reviewed.

Simple, intuitive app user experience. When your phone is your parent unit, the app better be easy to use. Compared to other monitors we’ve reviewed, the Cocoon Cam app was nearly on par with the best (Nanit), and far better than the worst (iBaby).

Bird’s eye view. Now that we’ve tried baby monitors with a bird’s eye view mount, we’re not sure we’d ever go back, at least with a young baby. The elimination of blind spots is just too useful.

Sleep/wake alerts. Sometimes, your baby wakes up and is pretty quiet. With a traditional video monitor, you might not know about it until you proactively check or your baby starts squawking or talking. With Cocoon Cam’s wake alerts, you’ll know about it pretty much right away. On the other side of the nap/night, it can be helpful to know when your child actually falls asleep.

The wish it were different

Setup. As described above, the one-two-three punch of needing to connect directly to the router, the potential need to update network security options, and the need to use drywall screws to mount the camera made the setup kinda frustrating.

Audio quality. While functional, audio quality wasn’t great, and produced a tinny echo sometimes during testing.

Height from the crib (for older toddlers). Since Cocoon Cam is only positioned 3 feet from the mattress of the crib, older toddlers may become tall enough to reach up and grab it. Our daughter (19 months, 90+ percentile for height, grabbed it off the wall (again, we were using Command Strips instead of the recommended setup).

The we’re not sure yet

Since this was a quicker review of the Cocoon Cam (more to be added when we have the data), there are a few things we didn’t make our mind up on yet.

Image quality. Above, we discussed the fact that Cocoon Cam’s image isn’t bad, but it’s outpaced by other monitors on the market today. While we don’t think this is a huge deal, and we may have just been biased because we’d tried higher-res monitors first, we’re not sure whether, over the long term, we might’ve craved better resolution & night vision.

Breathing Monitoring. Breathing Monitoring seemed to function well, but we’re not sure whether (again, over the long-term, this feature would prove valuable, or continue to provide the comforting feeling that the monitor was constantly watching over your child. Again, this might be different for very young babies, which is why we’re currently testing the Cocoon Cam with friends of Fathercraft who have a brand new baby.

A verdict

Overall, Cocoon Cam is a very solid monitor at a very reasonable price, with a couple of features that could prove really useful. if you’re not as budget conscious and aren’t all about the breathing monitoring feature, you might consider exploring other monitors in the same category, like the Nanit or the Arlo Baby.

But, if budget or breathing monitoring is at the top of your list, we think you’ll be happy with the Cocoon Cam, as long as you can look past the setup. Which, we suppose, if you’re in it for the long haul with this monitor isn’t the end of the world.

Cocoon Cam + Pricing & Options

The Cocoon Cam Plus currently retails for $149. The app is a free download from the Apple App Store or Android. Unlike some other monitor’s, there’s no subscription fee associated with the Cocoon Cam’s monitoring services.

Where to buy

Cocoon Cam is available on the company’s website, or on Amazon (2-day shipping included for Prime members).

How does it stack up against other monitors?

Cocoon Cam vs Nanit

Having now tested both the Cocoon Cam and the Nanit (you can find our full review here), there are a few important differences to note.

Sleep analysis – Nanit has far more advanced sleep analysis features than the Cocoon Cam.

Breathing monitoring – Nanit does not feature breathing monitoring

Portability – the Nanit makes it easy to unclip your camera and take it with you when traveling, Cocoon Cam Plus literally gets screwed into the wall.

Image & sound quality – the Nanit’s image and sound quality are better than Cocoon Cam’s.

Price – Cocoon Cam is $149, Nanit starts at $279, but you can definitely spend more than that, and there is a subscription service to unlock all of the sleep analysis features of the Nanit.

Cocoon Cam vs Owlet

In addition to the Cocoon Cam, we’ve spent a few days testing the Owlet (Amazon) (and currently are doing more testing). The Cocoon Cam and the Owlet are quite different in what they do. Here are a few key differences.

Owlet is not a video or audio monitor – the Owlet only monitors two things – heart rate an oxygen levels. There’s no video or audio component to it, which can leave many parents feeling like they need to purchase an additional video monitor.

Owlet doesn’t measure respiration rate – Cocoon Cam and Owlet both purport to monitor your baby is doing ok in the crib, they just use different methods.

Cocoon Cam doesn’t measure pulse or oxygen levels – see above.

Owlet is a wearable device, Cocoon Cam doesn’t have a wearable component.

Whew! Ok, that was nearly 4,000 words about the Cocoon Cam. Hopefully, it was helpful. If somehow we didn’t answer your question, we’d love to know – paul[at]fathercraft.com. If you’re curious to hear what our friends testing both Cocoon Cam and Owlet have to say, head to the homepage (fathercraft.com), scroll down and subscribe to our updates – we’ll let you know.

Tweet, tweet. This is the noise the Cubo Ai baby monitor makes, via an alert on my phone, when my daughter Ruby is crying.

It’s part of the bird theme that’s going on with a new monitor company called CuboAi. In this Cubo review, we dive into how this monitor stacks up against the rest of the wifi baby monitor crowd.

Let’s dive in.

Please note: Fathercraft is reader supported, meaning, at no cost to you, we may earn a commission if you buy after clicking an affiliate link. Learn more. Also, we received a free Cubo test unit for this review.

In this review, we cover (click a link to jump ahead)

Cubo basics: what is CuboAi?
How to set up and use Cubo
The awesome
The wish it were different
A verdict

What is Cubo Ai?

The Cubo is a video baby monitor that uses wifi to connect the parent unit (your phone) with the child unit (a bird-shaped camera, microphone, and temperature/humidity sensor).

(If you’re curious about wifi monitors and how they differ from traditional monitors, we have more on that here)

The Cubo shares features common to other wifi baby monitors like Nanit, Miku, Lollipop, and more (you can find all of our baby monitor reviews here):

• Unlimited range. If your child unit is connected to wifi and your phone is connected to wifi or cellular, you can connect to your monitor.
• Use your phone as the parent unit. No need to carry around an (often bulky) additional parent unit.
• Strong picture quality. Since you’re using your phone’s display, if the monitor’s got a good camera, you’re going to get a good picture vs often lower-quality displays on traditional monitors.

In addition, Cubo has created a thoughtful list of features, some of which are present in other wifi monitors, some of which are not:

Covered face alerts. Cubo uses computer vision to recognize when your child’s face is covered by a blanket or swaddle. Since a covered face can be extremely dangerous for young babies, this is a really nice safety feature.

Temperature and humidity sensors and alerts. Cubo monitors temp and humidity, you can set your own allowable ranges and have your phone alert you if either falls outside of your desired range.

No visible red light on the child unit. Many baby monitors, in order to improve the monitor’s night vision, have a red light on the monitor that allows the camera to see better in the dark. (Since babies should sleep in the dark, good night vision in a baby monitor is important.) This red light, if too bright, can be distracting for babies and scary for older children.

Safe zones and a ‘fence’ for alerts. You can set a virtual ‘fence’ around your child’s crib that will let you know if she climbs out of her crib when she’s older, or set a ‘danger zone’ (your kitchen, for example) for older babies or toddlers who are crawling or walking around. If your child goes past this fence, the monitor will alert you.

Automatic photo capture and events replay. The Cubo uses its motion detection to automatically capture photos of your child moving about during the night or during naps, and you can watch video replays of your child’s night (Cubo stores 18 hours of video)

And more … Cubo has a bunch more features too—you can capture photos and video, it has a built-in nightlight, comes with a stand (some monitors sell stands separately), allows for bird’s-eye-view mounting, two-way audio, and a wide field of view.

Cubo setup and use

Like all wifi monitors, to set up Cubo you need to first download the app (free from the Apple App Store or Google Play store), and then follow the app’s instructions for connecting the child unit to your home wifi.

The setup guide in the Cubo app was well done and relatively easy—the only challenge was I had to try connecting to wifi a few times before it worked—could’ve been my wifi’s fault as this has happened with other smart devices— and my kids loved the fact that Cubo said hi during the setup process.

Once connected, you can set danger zones, allowable temperature and humidity ranges, and more.

The biggest choice for parents of babies will be where to mount your Cubo. As we’ve discussed with other baby monitor reviews, we strongly prefer a “bird’s eye view” mount, which has your monitor mounted above the crib looking straight down into it. This prevents any blind spots and gives you a great view of what your baby is doing.

Cubo’s stand allows for this type of mounting, and crucially keeps cords contained inside the stand itself, preventing the cord from being grabbed by your baby and possibly wrapped around her neck. (Cords from monitors and all other devices should be positioned at least 3 feet away from your baby’s crib for safety.)

There is no automatic pan or tilt with the Cubo, but you can manually move the camera up and down to find optimal viewing angle.

Once you’re set up, you’ll do everything from the app, which is simple and easy to use. The home screen displays the live feed, automatic photos, your child’s age, and more:

There are two other tabs in the app:

• The Alerts tab shows a history of the camera’s alerts including temperature and humidity warnings, baby cried, motion, etc.
• The Settings tab allows you to adjust settings, get help, pair a new camera, and more.

Our Cubo baby monitor review

Ok, now that we understand what Cubo does and how it works, let’s talk about how well it works.

The awesome

Design—both real world and the app. Cubo is a well-designed product. It looks really nice, kids will love the design as they get older (the same cannot be said for some other baby monitors), and everything from the unboxing to the mobile app is well-designed and intuitive.

It just works. In part because of the design and also because of the product’s engineering, this monitor works quite well. It has strong connectivity, alerts work as designed, and it’s easy to connect quickly and understand what’s going on with your baby.

Image and sound quality. While it’s not the top of the heap when it comes to image quality, Cubo’s image quality is quite solid, and it’s audio quality is quite good. These things paired with low latency and the ability for bird’s eye view mean you can easily see, hear, and understand what’s going on with your baby.

A thoughtful feature list. We appreciated the collection of features that the Cubo baby monitor enables—temperature and humidity, rollover & covered face alerts, and safe/danger zones that allow this monitor to remain useful as your baby turns into a toddler make this monitor well-rounded and useful.

The wish it was different

No built-in white noise. Both of us here at Fathercraft are die-hard white noise believers. All night and during naps. We’ve really appreciated monitors that have built-in white noise because 1) it’s suprisingly hard to find a good white noise machine (though we do like the Hatch Rest+) and 2) it’s another thing you’ve got to plug in and manage wherever your baby is sleeping.

No high-speed scrubbing on playback. It’s pretty awesome that Cubo stores 18 hours of video footage, but you can’t scrub through it at high speed while seeing the video feed. So, if you’re looking for something, you’ve got to guess the point in the last 18 hours you’re trying to find and navigate to it. (Though you could use the alerts feed to help you, those are time-stamped.)

A verdict

Overall, I really liked this monitor, much more than I thought I would—for something so new to the market it works well and I didn’t experience bugs or finicky issues like I have when testing some other brand-new-to-market monitors.

The Cubo’s design is both fun and functional, it’s feature list is substantial and full of stuff that’s actually useful, and it’s got very good picture and sound quality. If you’re looking for a solid wifi baby monitor at a quite-reasonable price point, Cubo is a good bet.

It’s time for another warm and sunny baby monitor review! Will the Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD leave you with a comfortable tan or end up burning you?

Alright, enough with the puns. Keep reading for our full opinion of the Summer Infant baby monitor, or kick back and start with our 6-minute video review first:

An In-Depth Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD review

Keep it going with the puns, but don’t let the name fool you: the Summer Infant Pixel Zoom works all-year and probably is best used indoors. It’s a non-Wi-Fi video monitor, which has its ups and downs. But we wanted to know more. So John spent a few months with the baby monitor at home, taking its temperature and hoping for a good forecast.

Did he get it? Let’s find out.

Heads up: Fathercraft also participates in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, which helps us earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

What, exactly, is the Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD?

It’s a pretty good video monitor, actually. The Summer Infant falls into the non-Wi-Fi category of baby monitors, which means that it doesn’t work through the internet. Instead, the parent unit and camera are directly connected to each other via a radio frequency signal.

That makes it more like the Eufy and Infant Optics DXR-8, and less like Wi-Fi options like the Nanit, Miku, and Lollipop. We’ve got reviews of all of those, by the way, and you can find them here.

Full disclosure: generally speaking, we prefer Wi-Fi baby monitors. They don’t require parent video units, which are usually bulky, require charging, and don’t come with great range. But traditional monitors do have their advantages, like a faster and more reliable connection (when you’re in range) and fewer worries about getting hacked—if you’re worried about that sort of thing.

The Infant Pixel Zoom is just one of Summer’s line of video baby monitors and falls about in the middle price-wise. It comes with a full 1-year warranty. Does it hold up to its relatively steep price? Let’s dig in and find out.

Unpacking the box

Well, it starts with lots of manuals. You should probably read at least some of those, because they’re full of great tips about how far to place the monitor from your baby for safety and the best picture, charging time for your parent unit, etc. But that’s just the paperwork. It gets really fun when you get to the electronics.

The camera unit

The camera looks like you would expect—not a lot of fanciness or bells and whistles. It’s mainly white, and you can’t customize the color like you can with a more playful design like the Lollipop. Bonus: you won’t be tempted to eat it.

What you do notice is the way in which the lens can pan and tilt. The camera sits on top of its mount, which can go up and down. The camera head can then rotate left and right, giving you full motion but also some odd camera angles if you’re not careful. But it works well after you get some practice. Kinda like the new parent version of that remote-control car you used to have.

On the inside, the lens delivers a 720p high-def picture that allows you to zoom digitally. It also has an extra light you may never want to use … never. But more on that later.

The parent unit

Next, you’re looking at a 5-inch monitor that can display that 720p picture clearly. It looks a little like a handheld gaming system, although you probably don’t want to start going nuts on those A-B combinations. From the parent unit, you can steer your camera and turn on all those fancy features.

The batteries on the parent unit are rechargeable. You’ll have up to 800 feet of range between the parent and camera unit. Looking to set it down without taking your eyes off that little one? Park the parent unit like your motorcycle and use the kickstand.

The power adapters

More specifically, two power adapters. One is for the camera and should always be attached. The other is to charge your parent unit. 

Heads-up: don’t try to install this gadget right before your baby’s bedtime. Summer Infant recommends a parent unit charge of at least seven hours before you use it for the first time. Does it explode if you don’t follow that recommendation? Do you really want to find out?

Installation options: cord management and wall mount

The last two things in the box are cord management clips and a wall mount. You can set the Pixel Zoom HD on any bookshelf, or use the included anchor to mount it to your wall.

Either way, the simple clips included in the box help you keep those cords out of your little one’s octopus-like reach. They don’t hide the cords, but they do make sure that nothing gets ripped down or broken. We’ll call that a win. [Obligatory safety note: experts recommend all cords be at least 3 feet from your baby’s crib to prevent your baby from grabbing a cord and accidentally wrapping it around her neck.]

Setting up the Summer Infant Pixel Zoom baby monitor

The actual setup? It’s like a summer breeze. You honestly can’t do it wrong. Power up the camera, turn on the monitor, and the two automatically find each other. No passwords, manual, or search required.

You do need to think about the placement of the monitor, though. Summer Infant recommends placing the monitor between six and eight feet away from the crip to focus the picture. That’s quite a lot. If you’re wall mounting, you might not be able to get to that distance. 

Basic Pixel Zoom HD features

Once it’s set up, you get the full opportunity to play with its features. Let’s get some basic ones out of the way before we dive into the exciting stuff:

• Two-way audio, allowing you to talk back to your baby when they just can’t stop babbling.
• White noise and lullaby sound if you just don’t feel like talking back and want to rely on the machines instead.
• A six-times digital zoom that gets you to that snuggly close-up when you need a boost.
• Time and temperature display for your nursery that shows up right on your parent unit.

Ready for the advanced stuff? Alright. We won’t leave you hanging, on the wall or otherwise. Three features are worth digging in with more detail:

1) Sleep Zone Virtual Boundary Box

Think of it as a perimeter within the parent unit. It’s a box on the inside of your screen that tells the monitor to send you a sound alert when your baby moves within the box. It’s a useful feature if you’re worried about too much movement or some baby calisthenics during the night.

It’s a neat feature. And hey, the sound will also alert you if something enters the boundary area, so it has that going for it.

You don’t have to go along with the default feature, either. If you go into the menu settings on the parent unit, you can customize the area you want to focus on. get up close and personal, or get that wide shot—it’s up to you! You should get ready for plenty of alerts if you set it on wide mode, though.

Once you’ve got the settings right where you want them, you can use a button on top of the parent unit to toggle the feature on and off. Pretty useful.

2) Voice-Activated Screen Wake Up (VOX)

Distinguishing feature number two is simple but sweet. The full name kind of gives it away, but you might not recognize it by its VOX acronym. I’m not yelling, you’re yelling.

Anyways, VOX means that any noise around the camera will turn on the screen so you can see what’s going on even when you’re on power-saver mode. That’s pretty useful if you can’t plug in the parent unit and have to worry about the battery going low. 

We should note here that you’ll hear the sound regardless, so it’s not like you have to worry about missing that little cry without VOX. This just helps you check out what’s going on without hitting a button, which can come in handy during a sleepy midnight wakeup. 

3) Moonlite Night Vision Boost

Finally, let’s talk about what might be the most confusing feature of the whole device. It’s essentially a spotlight right under the camera itself that brightens up the room so the camera can function better.

Here’s how the manufacturer describes Moonlite:

Subtly illuminate your camera’s viewing area for a clearer, temporary, in-color view of baby in the dark.

Here’s how John described the exact same feature after testing it:

I’m not sure why you would want to use this feature other than wanting to wake up your baby, because this light is super bright.

The awesome, the wish it were different, and a verdict

The awesome

• The setup. It’s extremely quick and simple, much easier than a lot of the Wi-Fi alternatives out there. Plug it in, and turn it on. When using it for the first time, you do need to keep the 7-hour charging time in mind.
• The picture quality. Honestly, it’s pretty great. Unlike many other radio frequency units, it’s on par with Wi-Fi monitors like the Nanit and Miku.
• The zoom button. Along with the easily adjustable camera angles, the zoom button on the parent unit helps you adjust to any position and depth you need without having to go through a complicated menu.
• The night vision. It’s actually impressively clear, allowing you to see your little one even in the darkest of nights without a lot of grain. That only makes the Moonlite boost feature more questionable—you just don’t need it.      

The wish it were different

• The white noise volume. White noise is great, but this monitor pretty much blasts it out there. Even on the lowest setting, it might be too loud for sensitive babies (and parents). Plus, you only have three volume settings in total.
• The white noise functionality only stays on for about 20 minutes, and there is no way to change that to all night. Looking to get baby to sleep? Great. Need her to keep sleeping? Not so great.
• The size of the parent unit. It’s pretty big, about as wide as a typical smartphone and twice as thick. That makes carrying it around a little difficult, especially if you’re already carrying that cell phone with you.
• The button placement. Features like the boundary box are great, but they’re positioned on top of the unit. As you pull it out of your pocket, you’ll press them more often than you’d like. Not awful, but it can get annoying.
• The menu system. It’s not very intuitive, and you’ll need some time to familiarize yourself with it. You also can’t customize all that much, from limited volume settings to a limited tilt range, so that could be a little more helpful.
• The price is pretty high at $250. That’s about as much as you’d pay for a top-line smart Wi-Fi monitor, which comes with a lot more features. Can’t help but think removal of that the almost useless Moonlite feature could easily shave some dollars off that price tag.     

The verdict

Here at Fathercraft, we’re pretty tough on traditional monitors because they don’t tend to have the same functionality or picture quality. That wasn’t actually the case here. The Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD might be expensive, but it’s a good option for anyone weary of the Wi-Fi alternatives.

Even the negative items above are not complete show stoppers. They might bother you like they bothered John (and his kids when that light started shining), but they’re no deal breakers. It’s not a perfect monitor, and we still prefer Wi-Fi alternatives, but if you’re worried about getting hacked this is a good one to turn to.

Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD pricing and add-ons

The $249 price tag is pretty much non-negotiable, and it’s identical on both the manufacturer’s website and Amazon. That said, you can get even fancier (and deeper into your wallet).

Looking for those multiple angles (or kids)? Add a Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD extra camera. For the low (read: high) price of $140, you can add a second lens that streams to the same parent unit. You can stream up to 4 total cameras, allowing you to monitor multiple rooms if you’re so inclined.

It’s important to do the math, of course: One main unit plus three extra cameras comes out to $670. That’s a hefty bit of money for a baby monitor.

Comparing the Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD to the Infant Optics DXR-8

We reviewed the Infant Optics DXR-8 last year and weren’t impressed, despite its top-selling Amazon status. Here’s how it compares to the Summer Infant Pixel Zoom HD:

• Technology: both cameras transmit their image via radio signal instead of Wi-Fi. That’s a good thing if your Wi-Fi is unreliable or you’re worried about those hackers.
• Price: The Pixel Zoom, at $250, clocks in almost $100 above the DXR-8 ($165). Both are within the same price range as comparable (but feature-richer) Wi-Fi alternatives.
• Range: the Pixel Zoom HD boasts 800 feet, while the DXR-8 only has 700-feet of ‘unobstructed range’. It seems to drop its signal much faster than its more expensive counterpart.
• Setup: one needs a color-coded battery attachment and a sharp pen to attach it (DXR-8), the other has an integrated battery. Both connect parent and camera units automatically once charged and turned on.
• Picture Quality: We were surprised positively by the 720p resolution of the Pixel Zoom, probably because the 360p resolution (twice as bad, or half as good) or the DXR-8 left much to be desired. Plus, the night vision on the cheaper option was much worse than the Pixel Zoom, even without that weird spotlight.

What should I do now?

Well, you made it to the end of this review. But, if you’re still researching monitors, you can see all of our reviews, our pick for best baby monitor of 2020, and more right over this way. We’ll see you there.