Arlo battery icon changed color from fully charged black icon to fully charged red icon?

[ska967]

Arlo battery icon has changed color from fully charged black icon to fully charged red icon.  What does this mean?

[ska967]

We want to let you know the development team heard your feedback about the new changes where the battery icon shows a red icon when the Solar Panel is plugged in and fully charged. They have made some changes where you will see a Solar Icon instead when your Solar Panel is connected to your camera. This update will slowly appear on both the web client on your browser and on the Arlo iOS or Android app.

You can learn more about this here: What do my Arlo camera's battery level icons and notifications mean?

[ska967]

Hi MPIndiana,

You can learn more about the red charging battery icon from this article here: What do my Arlo camera's battery level icons and notifications mean?

[LandJS]

What Arlo needs is one place to go to that explains what all these symbols mean and if they change something get it added rather than waiting for 100 people to ask.  I have six of mine powered and one on battery.  All of those on power have a yellow dot on the 3 black dots at the top.  Now the yellow dot according to the documentation I've seen means it's recording.  Since it's not actively recording an event I assume it's because being plugged in means it has the 3 sec roll back feature and therefore shows recording but that's a guess.  If this is a state of the art device, the documentation should be also.  One spot dedicated to all the symbols and kept updated.

[StephenB]

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@LandJS wrote:

All of those on power have a yellow dot on the 3 black dots at the top.  

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I don't know which 3 black dots you mean - can you explain a bit more (or post a screenshot)?

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@LandJS wrote:

What Arlo needs is one place to go to that explains what all these symbols mean and if they change something get it added rather than waiting for 100 people to ask.  

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I agree.  

[LandJS]

actually I should have said along the bottom with the rest of the icons for each camera however the settings dots at the top also show the yellow dot I assume for the same purpose

[StephenB]

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@LandJS wrote:

the settings dots at the top also show the yellow dot I assume for the same purpose

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The one on the settings wheel is linked to activity zones.  If you click on the settings wheel, you should see a notice under the camera picture that will either remind you to create them, or tell you that the camera might have moved so you need to adjust them.

[TaurusPete]

With the risk of stating the obvious... considering how much discussion this change has caused, it would be VERY desirable to update the web documentation simultaneously with the roll-out of new "features".

Regarding the choice of red for the icon: that typically indicates something is wrong as folks mentioned above. It would have been a lot more instructive to pick a less alerting color. That would also have reduced the need for immediate answers to this change.

And since I'm on my rant: the official documentation at https://kb.arlo.com/1179176/What-do-my-Arlo-camera-s-battery-level-icons-and-notifications-mean doesn't include the battery being fully charged as a reason for the red icon. However, I am observing exactly that behavior.

[LandJS]

OK except I don't use zones and have always turned down setting them nor have any of my cams or settings changed in at least two years.  The only documentation I've found said it means they are recording.  As long as they don't cause issues it really doesn't matter to me, they are just there for some unexplained reason.  Also clicking on the settings and going to the cam has absolutely no reminder for setting zones, it's just there.

[StephenB]

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@LandJS wrote:

OK except I don't use zones and have always turned down setting them nor have any of my cams or settings changed in at least two years.  The only documentation I've found said it means they are recording.  As long as they don't cause issues it really doesn't matter to me, they are just there for some unexplained reason.  Also clicking on the settings and going to the cam has absolutely no reminder for setting zones, it's just there.

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Well, that is what I was told when I first saw the dot over the settings.

When I click on settings wheel for this particular camera I see this (part of camera name edited out):

 When I adjust the zone, the dot disappears.

Clicking on a subscribed camera that has no activity zone set shows me this when I click on the settings wheel:

All my cameras are in a subscription plan now (thanks to the unlimited cameras in Secure), but I recall seeing this same message a few weeks back on a Pro 2 that was AC powered and not in a plan.

The various cameras w/o the dot do not have any activity zone message.

[Dtrader1972]

Red should have NEVER been chosen for this. The ONLY thing red should ever be used for is some type of error, issue, etc. ANY other color...

[LandJS]

StephenB after seeing your pic I had to go get the wife's phone because ours are not the same, I'm on a android and you appear to be iphone.  I have no wheel, mine is 3 dots and our icon order is different.  Her iphone has a wheel like yours but the battery icon is in a different place and hers shows no orange dot on any of the cams like mine does.  I'm still wondering lol

[StephenB]

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@LandJS wrote:

StephenB after seeing your pic I had to go get the wife's phone because ours are not the same, I'm on a android and you appear to be iphone.  

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I do have an iPhone, but the screenshots were taken from my.arlo.com.

[LandJS]

I'll have to look there to see what shows there.  I seldom use it since the two step verification, find it to be a pain in the ass.  Once my pc is shown safe I shouldn't have to keep doing it on that machine.  They say you can for so many days now but haven't found that to be true.

[Rebtop]

My icon is red and my spotlight does not come on anymore. 
Now what?

[Rebtop]

The spotlight on my Essential does not illuminate on detection anymore either. 

[Rebtop]

Per your advice, clearing cache did not help. 

[Rebtop]

I live in Florida so too cold and no sun is not the reason. And my spotlights stopped lighting when motion is detected at night. The nighttime pictures are unusable.  

[PGalore]

I thought I was the only one noticing this!  Mine changed 3 days ago, and even though this KB article (https://kb.arlo.com/1179176/What-do-my-Arlo-camera-s-battery-level-icons-and-notifications-mean) says red means 'battery not charging,' mine are still being charged via solar panel.   What I find odd is that only 2 of 3 cameras connected to solar panels show this red battery icon and these two happened to be connected to the first gen solar panels. 

Anyway, one of the cameras that showed the red battery icon stopped charging altogether today and its battery is down to 86% from 100%.  I usually disable the cameras when it's windy to conserve battery life because they continuously record motions all day.   

[geoffstc]

My Arlo Floodlight is only a few months old and is charged by a solar panel.

I noticed the red battery icon two days ago when travelling away from home but wasn't concerned as it said my battery was 100% charged.

On arriving hme the next night, my Arlo would not connect to the app because the battery WAS FLAT.

It has never gone flat in the past or even anywhere near it. 

I removed the Floodlight from the wall, gave the battery a full charge via the USB and reinstalled it.

I won't know until sometime tomorrow if it is operating OK........... 

(Dumb to use a red battery icon to show it is not charging - as already mentioned, red means danger.)

[Justin1994p]

This indicates that, for some reason (temp, low light, etc), the battery is temporarily not charging. Mine is currently doing the same. Probably low light on solar panel.

[Edinburgh_lad1]

Hello

I'm finding myself writing on here again to complain about Arlo. This time, it's about the meaning behind the red icon on my solar charged camera. Would you Arlo please explain why it's red all the time - is there something wrong with it?

[jguerdat]

Have you read the zillion other posts about this and the responses from Arlo? It's a UI change that indicates a solar panel is connected and the battery is at 100%. Whether red was the best color to use is open to debate but that's what it is for now.

[dcfox1]

@Edinburgh_lad1 This recent KB article explains it though it omits the red a %100 full as @JamesC stated in several post. 

What do my Arlo camera's battery level icons and notifications mean?

[PGalore]

The most recent app update a few days ago made it worse. Now green charging bolt is displayed even after sunset and battery charge status is 100% when clearly it's not.  The only way to tell if your battery is fully charged is when it shows the red charging bolt icon after sunset. I have 3 cameras that are connected to solar panels and 2 of them are green charging bolt and 1 is red after sunset. I know the 2 cameras with green icon are not fully charged 

[Edinburgh_lad1]

I'm sorry, but this is a very confusing system @JessicaP 

My battery icon is red. So, would you ask your dev team why it's not changing to 'battery full' even in the middle of the night? 

I really don't know who is responsible for development in your company, and frankly, I don't really care. However, what I do care about is that I have a system that works and doesn't confuse me as a user every time there's firmware/app update.

FYI: If so many users are posting here being confused about the red icon, then this should be a hint to you and the company that something is not right. It's really that simple, actually @JessicaP 

So, red/orange - charging; green - charged 

[NetgearNetowkri]

There is NO question:  I think this should have been communicated before the change, and I think using red for this status was an unfortunate choice.  THANKS SO MUCH FOR STATING THAT POINT!

[Bruce77777]

I put a solar charger on my camera and it says 100 percent but showing a red bolt .