Reolink cameras fill an important gap in between casual but easy to use security systems like Ring, eufy, and Nest and complicated wired systems that are typically installed by professionals. With a Reolink NVR camera system you get wired performance, easy setup, user friendly PC and phone apps, person vehicle and pet detection, redundant backup recordings, and local control all at an extremely competitive upfront price with no subscriptions, which is why I think Reolink systems are the best choice for most people looking for a step up from battery powered security cameras.
In this video I’m going to test and compare every wired camera that Reolink currently makes, rank them on a tier list based on value, performance, and usefulness, and help you pick out the right number and type of cameras for your Reolink system. As always there are no sponsored reviews on this channel, Reolink has no idea I’m making this video, and I bought these cameras on Amazon with my own money.
Duo Panoramic Cameras
Starting out with my favorite type of camera, the Duo series that have two cameras and stiches together their images to make one large 180 degree panoramic view without the distortion you’d typically get with a fisheye lens.
Reolink currently sells three variations of this camera: the Duo 2, Duo Floodlight, and Duo 3, and the most obvious difference between them is that the Duo 3 has a significantly smaller vertical field of view making a long skinny image with a 32:9 aspect ratio, while the Duo 2 and Duo Floodlight have a taller 24:9 aspect ratio.
The Duo 3 has a total of 16 megapixels of resolution versus 8 on the Duo 2 and Floodlight, but in my testing, there wasn’t a significant difference in clarity during the day for stationary testing at 10, 25, or 50 feet, and during the running test the Duo 3 was over sharpened and didn’t provide any extra detail over the lower resolution cameras.
The same was mostly true at night, and all the cameras expectedly performed worse than they did during the daytime, but there wasn’t a significant difference between the 8 and 16 megapixel images.
The Duo 2 and Duo Floodlight have basically the exact same camera performance and I’m putting both in A Tier and you can decide whether you need the extra security lighting from the Duo Flood, but it is a really good deal for just $23 more, especially considering you get to add two cameras and bright LED security lighting using just a single ethernet cable instead of needing to pay an electrician to wire up mains voltage.
And I think every camera system should have between two and four Duos to act as your main overview cameras and the only downside of the Duo series is that the Reolink PC app doesn’t let you stretch the Duo over two camera spaces like you can in the NVR’s live view.
However, I was a lot less impressed with the Duo 3 and I’m going to put it down in D Tier because compared to the Duo 2 it has a higher price for less vertical field of view, and doubling the resolution means higher bandwidth requirements and larger file sizes without any significant increase in video clarity, and it’s the only camera I’ve ever seen lag behind in the live view using the Reolink PC app, probably due to that crazy high 16-megapixel resolution.
Pan, Tilt, and Zoom Cameras
Moving on to Reolink’s six pan, tilt and zoom cameras. Panning means the camera can move from left to right, tilting means it can go up and down, and zoom means that the camera has a motorized varifocal lens with optical zoom, not just digital.
Starting with the most expensive, the $296 RLC-823S2 is a huge traditional looking 8 megapixel PTZ camera with auto tracking and 16x optical zoom.
And for me the 823S2 just doesn’t make a lot of sense, and compared to PTZ cameras from other brands, Reolink still struggles with focus hunting at the end of zoom changes, so realistically if you want to zoom in on something important happening, even using a preset you’re going to miss a few seconds of useful footage while the camera auto focuses and there’s no option to set manual focus for each preset point, so combining that with the high price tag, narrow field of view when zoomed all the way out, and large size, I think the 823S2 is a D Tier camera.
For $90 less at $205 you can get the RLC-823A which trades out the 16x zoom for 5x zoom and has a wider field of view but loses the auto-tracking functionality and still has big time focus hunting problems when changing the zoom level, so it goes into D Tier also.
Then for $143 is the Reolink Trackmix which solves the focus hunting issues of the 823 series by using dual sensors, the main wide angle view has a 2.8 mm lens, and the secondary zoomed view uses an 8 mm lens, both with fixed focus. The Trackmix also has the most well implemented auto tracking system I’ve ever seen and lets you choose between digital only tracking which is much less off putting in a residential space or pan and tilt tracking which is an excellent deterrent, especially at night when combined with the white supplemental LEDs.
Using digital only tracking, the Trackmix will switch between the 8 mm and 2.8 mm views to follow the subject as close as possible, and because it’s a dual lens camera both the main view and tracking view are saved as separate video files, which means the Trackmix solves both of my issues with auto tracking cameras. First, I find auto tracking in the live view to be distracting in my always-on camera monitor, and second, I worry about what is happening in the rest of the camera’s view while it is looking elsewhere.
Combine that with the flexible mounting options, very reasonable price, and the fact that if you’re using a Reolink NVR it counts the Trackmix’s second feed as a bonus channel, so it only occupies one channel of your NVR, and the Trackmix goes into S Tier for me, and is the perfect option to overlap with an overview camera like the Duo and give you a more zoomed in image of anyone who enters more protected areas of your property.
For $40 less you can get the RLC-830A which is basically just the Trackmix without the extra zoom camera, and if you are buying an auto tracking pan and tilt camera specifically for the deterrence factor the 830A still makes people very uncomfortable at night as its spotlight tracks them around, but I would personally recommend spending the $40 extra to get the Trackmix instead, and I’m putting the 830A in B Tier.
At $80 the PoE E1 Outdoor SE is a much smaller form factor 8-megapixel pan and tilt camera with auto tracking and a great mounting system, and if you’re looking for a pan and tilt camera that’s a bit more inconspicuous, this is probably the one for you. Compared to the Trackmix and RLC-830 the E1 feels a bit cheap, so I’d make sure to mount it in a relatively protected location under your roofline, but it does have the same IP65 waterproofing as the other two cameras. Good price, decent features, B Tier.
And last the cheapest camera in this group is the $76 RLC-81PA which is basically their general use RLC-810A, but with motorized panning and auto tracking, and to me this camera serves only one purpose, which is acting as a deterrent as the camera follows them around, and you might ask “why wouldn’t you get it” if it’s only $8 more than the non-panning RLC-810A, but the problem with the 81PA is that it has a fixed roll position, so you might not be able to aim it exactly how you want to, but I’m not mad that it exists and it does have some valid use cases, so C Tier.
And that means that for PTZ cameras the overwhelming best option in my opinion is the Trackmix which is the perfect size, can act as an obvious deterrent, or track without movement, and doesn’t have any focus hunting issues, all for under $150.
General Use Cameras
Next, we’ve got the general use cameras without zoom, and for each you can choose between 5, 8 and 12 megapixels, and from bullet, turret, and dome form factors. When you look at the camera name the first set of numbers is the resolution, 5, 8 or 12, the second is the form factor, 1 for bullet, 2 for turret, and 4 for dome, and the third digit is a little less consistent, but usually has something to do with zoom or whether it has white LEDs, IR LEDs or both.
All of the bullet and turret cameras are functionally identical, while the dome cameras have a wider field of view and white and IR LEDs.
When choosing between the different resolutions, each step up represents about a $20 difference in price, and as far as clarity there’s almost no difference between them, but as the resolution increases so does the horizontal field of view, and any time you can increase field of view without decreasing clarity, that’s a win, and you can see that the dome cameras do have significantly increased field of view compared to their turret and bullet counterparts, but at the cost of clarity.
And in typical Reolink fashion, all of these general use cameras perform extremely well during the day, but movement at night was a mess. So, even though these cameras are the most common that Reolink sells, none of them are particularly good at any one thing, and I’m going to put the 8 megapixel cameras in C Tier based on their price, middle of the road field of view, and good daytime clarity, but the 5 and 12 megapixel cameras are going into D Tier due to the high price of the 12 megapixel and the low field of view of the 5 megapixel.
Color Night Vision CX Cameras
After that are the new CX line up, which are general purpose cameras with much larger image sensors making them suitable to use with color night vision in low light situations. The $72 CX410 is 4 megapixels and the $99 CX810 is 8 megapixels. Comparing the two the CX810 is better in almost all conditions due to its increased resolution, and compared to the much cheaper RLC-820A the CX810 has a wider field of view, slightly higher clarity, and less motion smearing at night but is also $30 more per camera. Overall, I haven’t been impressed with the CX410’s overall clarity and I’m going to put it in C Tier, but I think the CX810 is a significant upgrade and belongs in A Tier.
Varifocal Zoom Cameras
Next are the stationary varifocal zoom cameras, the 811A, 833A and 843A, which are useful if you’re trying to get the best possible footage of a specific area like a door or mailbox that’s further away from your mounting location.
The 833A only has 3x optical zoom compared to 5x in the 811A and 843A but all three use identical 1/ 2.8” sensors so the image quality was almost exactly the same during the day, with the exception of the 843A being slightly over sharpened, but the 843A was consistently better than the other two and did a great job resisting smearing in the 25 ft running test, making it a really versatile camera for close up identification in the most secure areas of your property. A Tier for the 843A, which is also the most expensive of the three, and B Tier for the 811A with its slightly worse image quality, but 5x zoom and also B Tier 833A with less zoom, but more affordable pricing.
And that means that for general use cameras, the CX810 and RLC-843A are the top performers and it’s a good idea to mix your color night vision cameras with IR night vision to get the most information, so if you’re planning on running your Duo 2 overview cameras in IR mode then you should consider the CX810, but if you will use your Duo 2 in color mode then the RLC-843A is better and has the advantage of 5x optical zoom to dial in the exact field of view that you need for your mounting location.
Miscellaneous Cameras and Doorbells
And that leaves three more cameras that all fall into the miscellaneous category. The first is the RLC-81MA which only costs $79 and has the same setup as the Trackmix with one 2.8 mm focal length lens and a bonus stream with an 8 mm focal length lens, but without motorized pan and tilt and without auto tracking. The 81MA’s main camera is comparable to the RLC-840A and like the 840A it includes both white and IR LEDs and has two way talk, but it costs $10 less and has the bonus zoomed in view making it an incredible value as is, but if Reolink updated the firmware to add digital only auto tracking like the Trackmix or allow for different picture and exposure settings on the two lenses I think the 81MA would be Reolink’s best camera but even without that it’s still useful for covering doorways where it’s helpful to have an extra zoomed in view. A Tier for the 81MA even as is.
Then you’ve the 360 degree fisheye Reolink FE-P which is indoor only and meant to be mounted on a ceiling, and for what it is, it works extremely well and the NVR and PC app allow you to dewarp it with a bunch of different options including Quadview which lets you focus on four separate areas of the room, and recordings also let you dewarp in whatever method you want. Very specific use case, but it does work well, B Tier.
And last is the Reolink PoE Doorbell, which at around $78 is one of the cheapest and absolutely the best performing video doorbell on the market. However, due to the PoE requirement I don’t think many people will end up using this version, and will get the WiFi version instead since it can be powered by your existing doorbell wiring and it works just as well as the PoE version, so the PoE version goes in A Tier, but if I were ranking the WiFi version it would go into S Tier, and basically the only weakness of the Reolink doorbells are that they have their own wireless chime and can’t ring your existing chime.
Final Rankings and Perfect Reolink System
So what does the perfect Reolink system look like? I personally would pair their RLN8-410 NVR with between two and four Duo 2’s to act as my overview cameras and cover my entire property’s detection and observation zones, then I’d use a combination of Trackmix and 81MA to cover any entry points, 843A to cover any areas like a mailbox or detached garage that need zoom, and CX810 to cover any spaces where the 180 degree footage from the Duos doesn’t overlap.
As a mentioned before there are no sponsored reviews on this channel, but I do have links down in the description for all the cameras I tested in this video and as always, I appreciate when you use those links since as an Amazon affiliate I do earn a small commission on the sale at no cost to you.
I’d also like to thank all of my awesome patrons over at Patreon for your continued support, and next month I’ll be giving away some of the cameras from this video to my patrons so if you’re interested in that make sure to check out the links below. If you enjoyed this video, please consider subscribing to my YouTube channel and as always, thanks for watching The Hook Up.
