The broadband can drop.
The monitor stays up.
Storms take the internet out. Providers have bad nights. Routers reboot themselves at the worst possible moment. None of that should decide whether you can hear the room, and it doesn't: on your own WiFi, the monitor and your phone talk straight to each other.
It was never only for babies
One spare phone or tablet, and it watches whoever needs watching. Set it up once, and point it at whatever this month is about.
Baby
Cry alerts worked out on the device, sleep and feeds written down, and a night view that keeps the room dark.
Pets · Beta
With Anywhere, watch and talk from work. Pet Beta alerts stay off until you turn them on.
Elder care · Beta
Look in and speak into the room. Optional Elder Beta alerts, including fall detection, stay off until you enable them.
Home · Beta
The hallway, back door, or workshop, with optional Home Beta alerts off until you enable them.
The internet was never in the middle
Most cameras send your video up to a company's servers and back down to your phone. That's why they die the moment the broadband does. The picture takes a long trip to a data centre just to travel eight metres across your landing.
nuvio doesn't work like that. The monitor and your phone find each other on your own WiFi and connect directly, so the video takes the short way round. Better for delay, better for privacy, and an internet outage becomes somebody else's problem.
The listening is local too. Cry detection runs on the monitor, so it never needed a connection to know a cry is a cry.
What needs the internet, and what doesn't
Just your WiFi
Live video and sound, cry and noise alerts, two way talk, the timeline, and everything the monitor works out about the room.
Needs the internet
Watching from outside the house, alerts reaching a phone that's away, and inviting someone new into your household.
Needs neither
The monitor keeps listening and keeps writing the day down even when nothing else is reachable, and catches up when the network comes back.
You do need a network, even an offline one
The two devices have to see each other, so they both need to be on the same WiFi. A router with no internet at all is completely fine, and so is a travel router or a phone hotspot in a cottage with no broadband.
What won't work is two devices with no shared network. There's no direct radio link between them, so a room with no network at all is beyond it.
That does make it a good fit for holiday lets and spare rooms at your parents', where the WiFi is usually there and the internet is usually terrible.
The quiet advantages of a short trip
Less delay
Straight across the room beats a round trip to a data centre and back.
Less exposure
Video that never leaves your house can't leak from a service you've never heard of.
Alerts that don't depend on a company
The monitor hears a cry by itself. No subscription server sits between you and that.
Reliable at 3am
The hour providers do their maintenance is also the hour you most want it working.
Your video never leaves your home
Not uploaded to a cloud. Not kept on our servers. Not shared with or sold to anyone.
The listening and the watching happen on the device itself. Nothing is sent away to be worked out somewhere else, because it gets worked out where it is.
When you open the live view, the picture goes straight from that device to your screen, encrypted end to end, and isn't recorded on the way. If the two can't reach each other directly it goes through a relay, and the relay can't read any of it either.
There are no adverts in nuvio, and no data brokers. If you turn on Help improve detection, it shares model scores, event outcomes and device performance with us. Never audio, video or images.
Every device that can see your camera is listed on the monitor, and you can remove any of them in one tap.
FAQ
Does it work with no internet at all?
On your own WiFi, yes. Live video, sound, cry alerts and two way talk all work device to device with the broadband unplugged. Watching from outside the house is the part that needs a connection.
Do I still need a router?
Yes. Both devices need to be on the same local network, but that network doesn't have to reach the internet. An offline router, a travel router or a phone hotspot all work.
Will I still get alerts if the internet goes down?
On the same WiFi, yes. If you're away from home when it drops, alerts can't reach you until it's back, because those do travel over the internet.
Is watching at home faster?
Usually. Going straight across your house avoids the round trip that cloud cameras make to a data centre and back.
What about while travelling?
It works on holiday let WiFi or a phone hotspot. Pair the two once on whatever network you're using, and it works locally from then on.
Does it upload once the internet's back?
No. There's no cloud recording at any point, online or off, and nothing is shared with anyone else.
Go and dig it out of the drawer
It is probably in the second drawer down. Four minutes from now it can be doing something that matters.