Free video storage: Yes, on up to a 512-gigabyte microSD card (sold separately).
Optional subscription costs: Through a Tapo Care Premium plan, you get 30 days of cloud video storage, starting at $3.49 per month (or $35 per year) for one camera and going up to $12 per month (or $120 per year) for 10 cameras.
The TP-Link Tapo C225 offers a lot of value, given its low $50 price. It’s a motorized pan-and-tilt camera with local video storage on a microSD card (sold separately) and has a laundry list of features: person detection, pet detection, sound detection (for crying babies, glass breaking, dogs barking, cats meowing), color night vision, monitoring zones, motion tracking (where the camera moves to follow the subject it’s recording), a privacy mode that covers the camera, a built-in siren, and voice and app control via Amazon Alexa, Apple Home/Siri, Google Home/Assistant, and Samsung SmartThings.
Are you still with me? In our tests, this wired TP-Link camera receives top scores for video quality and response time, as well as strong scores for data security and smart features. Its only drawback is its lackluster data privacy, but that’s quite common with security cameras.
