Back during the COVID lockdowns of 2020 to 2021, countless people around the world became pet owners. Being stuck indoors lead many to seek companionship in the form of a fluffy puppy or kitten. But when restrictions eased and owners went back to the office full time, many pets who knew nothing other than the comfort of their owner’s constant presence developed separation anxiety. For some pet parents (like me), it had an inverse effect: I developed separation anxiety from my own cat. I’d been contemplating a pet camera so I could spy on my ragdoll and after constantly seeing ads for the Furbo Dog Camera, I thought, “what the hell?”
My cat is the first pet I’ve ever raised on my own (and my first ever feline friend) so the responsibility has felt… gargantuan. You mean to tell me that I am responsible for this life form’s happiness and well-being? While I already have anxious tendencies, my racing thoughts are compounded whenever my cat shows the slightest change in behaviour. Since I’ve spent almost every waking hour with her since we got her back in 2021, I always thought that she’d be the one to exhibit signs of separation anxiety.
As you’ll soon find out, it turns out that I’m the one with the problem here.
Furbo 360 Dog Camera Review
What is it?
Furbo's new 360-degree pet camera.
Price
$319.
Like
High-quality visuals, night vision, effective treat tossing and two-way talk.
No Like
Subscription sends too many inaccurate notifications, slow tracking, no up or down panning.
Furbo Dog Camera: first impressions
Well, everybody, pictured alongside the Furbo 360 Dog Camera is my ragdoll, Pearl. She’s about two years old, very fluffy and is the type of cat that will follow you from room to room, but would prefer you don’t touch her. She guest stars in a lot of my reviews, but today she’s going to be testing the Furbo Dog Camera herself.
The Furbo Dog Camera is a big boy, far heftier than I imagined. It weighs 1.1kg and is about 23cm tall with a width of up to 13.3cm, but I’d expected it to be half the size when it arrived. It’s not a bad thing, but it isn’t exactly the discreet indoor camera I expected.
Released earlier this year, the new and improved Furbo Dog Camera gives you 360-degree HD video streaming quality, so you can track your pet from left to right or zoom in to get a better look at what they’re doing. In contrast, the previous Furbo camera only had a 160-degree wide-angle view of your designated space, which didn’t allow you to track your pet’s movements once it moved out of frame.
This pet camera features two-way talk, so you can comfort your furry friend and hear what they’re doing, it also has a fun treat tossing feature that can be set up in-app.
It’s a relatively simple camera to get started with, requiring you to plug it in, download the Furbo app and connect it to your home’s Wi-Fi system. It took me about five minutes to take care of everything.
What I liked
The camera on the Furbo 360 dog pet cam
If I leave my apartment for a minute to take the bins out, Pearl will cry until I return. I took this as a sign of distress (who wouldn’t?), so I’ve always fretted over how she copes when she’s left completely alone on the occasion that my partner and I are both at work.
The Furbo pet camera sports a 1080p live view and it looks pretty crisp on my phone. If you zoom in, the quality starts to look pretty poor and fuzzy but at least I can see my cat’s little legs stick out when she decides to snooze under the lounge for a change of scenery.
What most impressed me was the night vision – it rocks. You can (regrettably) see a lot of the detail in my living room, from the cherry blossom scratcher to the Sequence board game on the coffee table. It’s an insanely handy feature to have since I can check on Pearl’s zoomies from the comfort of my bed.
It even lets you record footage as it happens or take quick snaps that automatically save to your phone’s gallery. I haven’t captured anything juicy yet, aside from Pearl hearing me rotate the camera and getting up to inspect it.
As it turns out, every time Pearl has the house to herself, she curls up in the same spot on the lounge and sleeps the day away. I made a habit of checking in on her every couple of hours, and she was always in the same spot, all curled up.
I also had to go to a hen’s weekend down the coast recently, and while my partner stayed at home to check in on her, he had a lot of social outings to attend. This gave me plenty of opportunities to check on Pearl, who was probably left all on her ownsome more than usual. Even though I returned to a fully intact apartment, I knew that Pearl was content with napping her day away on the lounge.
The treat projectile
Treat tossing can sound like a gimmick and I wasn’t sure if Pearl would go for it. The cool thing about the Furbo pet camera is that it allows you to adjust the treat size hole through its mobile app depending on whether your paw pal likes an itty bitty biscuit or a chonker. I selected small for my Greenies’ dental treats and loaded her up.
It’s super simple to fill the Furbo with treats and while I was sceptical about the bamboo lid that’s used to secure it, I haven’t had any issues. Pearl isn’t as “food-motivated” as Asha’s cat Boston, so she never tried to attack the camera while I wasn’t home.
I didn’t know what I expected when it shot a treat out at high speed, but Pearl really seemed to dig it. The Furbo makes a little bird call before it ejects the treat and depending on how forcefully you flick the treat in-app, the pet cam will alter its trajectory. But you can customise the treat toss sound to your own voice recording if you prefer.
After a quick training session, Pearl knew to run towards the Furbo Dog Camera whenever it made that sound, so she could collect her treat. I haven’t experienced any jamming so far, but Pearl was delighted when, on one occasion, the Furbo decided to reward her by spitting out two treats instead of one.
The two-way audio
Another feature I was convinced was a gimmick was the two-way talk. While I can’t get Pearl to meow on demand (yet), it was pretty funny to see Pearl react to my voice coming out of the camera when she was home alone. This usually prompted her to wake up and gaze at it with confusion and curiosity. I can’t tell if she found it comforting since she usually went right back to sleep after I stopped engaging.
You have the option to adjust the speaker’s volume on a scale from 1 to 100. I noticed that anything until 70 per cent was very quiet, whereas setting it to 100 per cent was loud but very, very echoey. You could hear my baby talk echo about five times before it died off and it picked up on the littlest background noises and projected them through the speaker.
What I didn’t like
The constant notifications
On its own, Furbo has some neat features – barking alerts, treat tossing, two-way talk and night vision – that aren’t restricted by a subscription. If you want an in-depth account of what your pet gets up to during the day, you’ll want to join Furbo Dog Nanny.
But when you own a cat, a lot of these features feel pretty useless. Furbo’s Dog Nanny obviously caters to dogs and offers unique alerts for howling, chewing, running and pottying. How it can detect when your dog goes poopy beats me, but it seems to be insanely smart – if not too sensitive.
Update (12/12/2022): In my original review, I noted that my phone had been bombarded with barking alerts when in reality my cat had been fast asleep every time I checked the livestream.
I initially put this down to the camera being “too sensitive”, but after a chat with the Furbo team, they were concerned my review model may have been defective. I sent back the test unit and received a new one, which I’ve been using for the last week while I’ve been working in the office.
To my delight, the barking alerts had completely died out. I’ve only received notifications when Pearl was “being active”, which was when she decided to trot past the camera to investigate something outside.
I still received many “person alerts” while my partner was home, since I stationed the Furbo camera in an area Pearl frequents. This happened to be the living room, which is a high-traffic area. This meant that every time my partner so much as twitched, I’d get a notification telling me to check a 15-second video of him getting a drink of water.
Initially, I’d chosen to disable these notifications when I encountered this bug, but now I’m happy with the amount of updates. I still wouldn’t recommend leaving your Furbo turned on at all times (nor can I speak to a Furbo Dog Nanny subscription), but just remember to only switch it on when you’re about to head out. Otherwise, you’ll suffer through multiple 15-second videos of yourself scrolling on your phone.
Slow panning and tracking
Right away, I was bothered by how slow it was to pan from left to right. There’s no option to angle it up or down, which made selecting the perfect spot to position the Furbo Dog Camera quite precarious. Do I place it on the ground where it can’t see over the lounge or do I prop it up high but risk not being able to see Pearl if she’s directly under it?
The next issue was the live tracking feature. While good in theory, the Furbo pet camera spent more time staring at a wall than keeping an eye on Pearl. My guess is that the camera locked onto my partner walking back and directed itself to the wall behind it. It’s easy to rectify once you open the app and use the super slow arrows to recentre the camera, but it was disappointing for me.
Lastly, I wouldn’t recommend leaving it on at all times. My partner found the camera “creepy” and didn’t like the feeling of being watched. Even when I wasn’t operating the Furbo from my desk at work, it would track him as he walked around. I respect his desire for privacy, so if it wasn’t for the purposes of this review, I would only turn on the Furbo pet camera if neither of us were going to be home.
According to Furbo, all video footage is saved within Cloud Recordings in-app (regardless of whether you have a subscription or not) but is deleted every 24 hours.
My final thoughts on the Furbo Dog Camera
The Furbo pet camera is heavily intended for anxious dogs, but it still does the job perfectly for cats. The updated 1080p camera, night vision mode, smart notifications, treat tosser and two-way talk eases the stress of both feline and human, while the pet cam’s tracking capabilities need more fine-tuning.
As the one who suffers separation anxiety in this parent/fur child relationship, owning a pet camera has significantly reduced any feelings of unease while at work or when I’m away overnight. Since it allowed me to learn that my cat does not, in fact, waste away with loneliness whenever I leave her, I’m really glad I got one. While the $319 price tag is a little steep, for me, my peace of mind is much more precious.
However, I don’t believe I’ll be leaving my Furbo 360 Dog Camera plugged in 24/7. Don’t get me wrong, I love it (excessive notifications aside), but unless your pet is extra needy or you’re heading on a vacay, your beloved furry child will probably survive a full work day.
Where to buy a Furbo 360 Dog Camera
The recommended retail price for the Furbo Dog Camera is $359 and is currently available from the following retailers:
Amazon ($359) | eBay ($339.95) | Furbo ($219)
This article has been updated since its original publication.