Arlo Pro 3 recording animals even though set to people only

[elind1010]

I just bought my Arlo pro 3. I have one camera set up in my back room where i keep my cats. I went to settings, then smart notifications and turned off my motion alerts for animals and all other motion. So it would just detect people. But it keeps recording my cats, the battery drained 20% in 2 days of it being out there.  I will definitely not be paying for a subscription if this simple fix cannot be addressed. 

[StephenB · Accepted solution]

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@elind1010 wrote:

I just bought my Arlo pro 3. I have one camera set up in my back room where i keep my cats. I went to settings, then smart notifications and turned off my motion alerts for animals and all other motion. So it would just detect people. But it keeps recording my cats, the battery drained 20% in 2 days of it being out there. 

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When the camera is armed, it always streams to the cloud when it detects any motion.  Then the cloud determines the smart classification.

So just setting smart notifications will not improve the battery life (even if it always correctly classified your cats).  Neither will using cloud activity zones (as they are processed the same way as smart).

What you can do is adjust the camera field of view, so it doesn't capture the cats so often.  Or you can power the camera.

[K80Shooter]

All that setting does is not to signal you when it records animals or others, it does not stop it from recording them as most people believe. As stated above reposition your cameras to eliminate the cats from field of view. You could also try setting up some activity zones outside of where the animals are.

[StephenB]

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@K80Shooter wrote:

You could also try setting up some activity zones outside of where the animals are.

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That will reduce the number of recordings, but will not improve the battery life. 

When running on batteries, the activity zones are processed in the cloud.  All the videos are streamed to the cloud, and then ones without motion in the zone are discarded.

[K80Shooter]

@StephenB 

I completely missed the "battery" part in the op's post. You are correct.