Blink Mini Continuous Live View Hack

Reddit and its partners use cookies and similar technologies to provide you with a better experience.

By accepting all cookies, you agree to our use of cookies to deliver and maintain our services and site, improve the quality of Reddit, personalize Reddit content and advertising, and measure the effectiveness of advertising.

By rejecting non-essential cookies, Reddit may still use certain cookies to ensure the proper functionality of our platform.

For more information, please see our Cookie Notice and our Privacy Policy .

Get the Reddit app

Scan this QR code to download the app now
Or check it out in the app stores
r/blinkcameras
r/blinkcameras

Blink is small, battery-powered and truly wire-free, so it’s simple to place and move within any environment. Create a system that covers your entryways and windows, monitors the garage, or keeps a watchful eye over the kids’ rooms (or even the cookie jar). – "I use Blink to see if the cats got into my garden" – jeweynougat, 25th April 2023.

Members Online
by [deleted] •

Let’s end this local storage debacle once and for all on the new Blink Outdoor Cameras.

Update I spoke to the blink supervisor after he escalated the issue. He said that effective Jan 1st local storage will allow the camera to save directly to the USB drive. Clips will be shown in the app. When you click a clip to watch it, your clip will upload to the cloud and then download to your phone, and then be removed .. the cloud is acting as a "proxy" only . and this doesn’t require a subscription.

So the bottom line is that right now Blink doesn’t even have this built and is saying it’s coming January 1st. There is also no way to manage a cloud subscription currently. I’ve never see anything like this.

All the verbiage talking about syncing your USB drive and watching them on the computer is talking about how it is present day. So Blink is currently doing two things – talking about present day functionality, and "future" functionality which doesn’t exist yet. I don’t know how you can market a product claiming it does something that it doesn’t.

I am hoping they keep their word.

I bought these cameras on prime day after heavily researching the local storage information. On the listing it says you can use local storage and cloud in the same way and the only difference is where it’s stored.

I am currently testing it and the "Play" screen where you play your clips works even without my USB plugged in. I hunted in the app to see how to change the cloud storage settings and it is non existent.

The bottom line is there are pretty serious games being played by Blink right now and it’s not cool at all.

My current belief is that what they are saying on the amazon listing is not true, and even on the box its says "record and store video clips to the blink sync module 2 in your home and view them in your blink app from anywhere. No monthly fees required. USB flash drive required (sold separately)."

I am waiting to talk to a supervisor at blink b/c so far the person i talked to said "local storage" isn’t even available yet .. so they have no idea what they are talking about.

The most deceitful part is the fact they hide cloud storage subscription information, there is no way to adjust it or even see your plan anywhere – online or in the app.

wanting to make money on cloud storage is fine, but i have a BIG problem when they lie to you, so you purchase the item, hook it up, have it for the rest of the year then find out you have to pay. that is 100% unacceptable and possibly class-actionable.

Edit: I’m also looking at this from a technical perspective. It seems as if the "Cloud" is hardcoded as an option for your clip storage, i can’t currently choose my source to store my clips – which is how it should be.

The only option available under "local storage" to enable/disable "clip backup" which "Performs a once-daily backup of clips generated by the eligible cameras on this system to the USB storage device"

From a technical standpoint the question then becomes "where are the videos saved before they are backed up" and that "In-between" source seems as if it is the cloud – that’s actually what I’m waiting for a supervisor at blink to confirm with me.

Because if that is the case then with no option for me to choose where my clips are saved means that the packaging box and the listing is a flat out lie.

This also means I’ll probably have to make a YT video about this b/c i think many ppl would be infuriated by this, especially should then wait another 2 months only to find how they have no option but to pay for cloud storage and are outside the return policy.

Edit #2: i just talked w a supervisor he is escalating the issue. They are insinuating that this is all so new that all the features haven’t been developed yet. And that “if it says it on the box that it will be able to do it”

So he’s basically saying that the current local storage functionality is only to backup cloud clips, and that he “thinks” in the future this will change.

That’s all well and good except i have 30 days to return this.

So I’m waiting on an official statement from them. Consumers need some kind of assurance that this will 100% function as stated on the box. Otherwise we are all buying a product which is blatantly lying about its local storage functionality.