Why Is My Ring Doorbell Camera Not Working?

If your Ring doorbell camera not working, you have come to the right place! In this post, we will reveal the most common causes for this issue and possible solutions so you can fix it at home.

Throughout the post we will leave helpful tips and recommendations that you cannot go wrong with, so keep reading and hopefully, you will get your Ring doorbell camera working again.

To resolve the issue with your Ring doorbell camera, you need to address several important things some of which include the network, the device functionalities, and OS.

Further down in the post we will carry out an inspection of your Ring connectivity and troubleshoot possible issue causes.

We will also pay attention to a well-known issue where the Ring doorbell camera is not working at night and hopefully resolve it.

It is highly likely for the trouble you’re experiencing to be caused by something insignificant where the solution is really simple.

So, without further ado let’s go right into the solutions.

How to Fix Ring Doorbell Camera Not Working Easily?

As we mentioned in the introduction, there are quite a lot of possible reasons your Ring doorbell camera is not working.

We will now try to illustrate a different issue with each of our methods and resolve it immediately after.

Our recommendation is to apply all methods in numerical order as they are listed and checking your camera each time you apply a troubleshooting step.

This way you will quickly find out when your Ring doorbell camera issues are gone otherwise you might lose a lot of time in unnecessary troubleshooting.

How to begin really depends on the nature of your issue. We will start by troubleshooting your network connection in case your Ring doorbell camera is offline.

If this is your case here are the most common symptoms:

• Live View not available
• Occurrence of “Activating Device” message
• Unresponsiveness

If you experience any of the above-listed symptoms, then troubleshooting your network should be the first step to take.

Method #1 Check Your Network Connection

To identify issues with your network connection you can start by running a speed test online. It is highly likely for a speed test to reveal why your Ring doorbell camera live view not working.

The idea behind this test is to check if you are sending as many packages as you are receiving, which is a sign of a healthy network.

By running a speed test you will also learn more about your network speed and how it works.

Here is how to test your network speed:

• Take your smartphone out and connect to the WiFi that your Ring doorbell is using
• Open your web browser and go to ring speed test
• Find and click the start button to initiate the speed test
• Shortly after you will be provided with your results

For Ring devices to function properly we are aiming for at least 2 Mbps of upload and download speed or greater.

If your network speed results indicate that your network upload/download speed is below 2 Mbps, you might want to resolve this issue first, before you blame the Ring doorbell camera.

Method #2 Troubleshoot Your Network

If your network is indicating problems such as delay, low download/upload speed, you should continue with this method, as here we will show you how to troubleshoot network issues.

If your Ring doorbell camera live view is not working, you might want to continue reading as this method addresses this issue as well.

Before everything else, open the Ring application on your smartphone and make sure that the doorbell is connected to the Wifi.

If the Ring doorbell camera is still not responding it is time to restart your network by rebooting the router.

Here is how to restart your router:

1. Locate the Power Button on the back of your modem

2. A single press of the Power Button will shut down your router (an alternative method would be to plug out the cable from the power outlet)

3. Wait for about 3 minutes before turning it back on

Your network will now restart and if there was an issue with it previously, feel free to run one more speed test to check if not everything is fine.

For your Wi-Fi to get online after the router restart, it might take a couple of minutes.

Pro Tip:

Some routers emit more than one WiFi network. Test the network your Ring doorbell is connected to as it is the only network that matters.

Also, if there was a network password change recently your Ring doorbell was certainly disconnected.

If this is the case, you might have to re-connect by inserting the new password.

Method #3 Inspect Your Ring Doorbell Device

If you are here, we assume that you have already tested your network and everything with it turned out to be fine.

The next step would be to ensure that the strength of the network signal between your router and Ring receiver is stable.

To check the status of your network strength follows the steps below:

• Take your smartphone out and open the Ring application
• Navigate the three lines icon on the top left of your screen and press on it
• Press on Select Devices
• Tap on the device you would like to test
• Go to Device Health

Once there you will be provided with Power and Network statistics where you can easily see if your WiFi, signal strength is good.

If not, the issue could be related to the placement of your Ring device and more specifically the distance from the router.

If your router is too far away from your Ring doorbell, it is highly possible for your signal strength to be low, which is definitely why your Ring doorbell camera is not working.

Another possible cause for a low signal strength would be if your Ring device is placed nearby matter such as metal, brick, glass, or mirror because they could impact your signal strength.

Tip:

While in Device Health, you can check your power as well.

If your Ring doorbell is using batteries make sure that the battery level is green, otherwise many features could stop working.

Method #4 Restart Your Ring Device

The easiest way to reset your Ring doorbell device is by holding the reset button for about 20 seconds.

Then the light will start flashing several times, which indicates that your device is successfully restarting.

The process might take a few minutes to complete but after the reboot, all services will be restarted, including your camera service and hopefully it will get it back working.

How to Fix a Ring Doorbell Camera Not Working at Night?

If you are experiencing issues with your Ring doorbell camera only during the night, then the answer might surprise you.

Most likely there is no issue with the camera itself except for the fact that night vision does not turn on.

If it is daytime when you’re reading this, you can test this out by covering the lens of the camera with your hand.

If the night vision does not turn on simply perform a reset by holding the setup button for 20 seconds.

In general, this is method #4, and it will most certainly resolve the issue you’re having.

In case your Ring doorbell camera still does not work at night, we recommend applying our troubleshooting methods above as they are proven to resolve many Ring doorbell issues.

If you have tried everything so far and your Ring camera still does not work as intended, this is the time to contact the official customer care service.

Once there explain what you’re experiencing and what have you tried so far and hopefully they will come up with a solution.

Bottom Line

We hope our post was able to resolve the issue where the Ring doorbell camera is not working and provide you with helpful tips and recommendations to avoid this issue in the future.

If, however, your issue is still there you might be dealing with a problem that requires a technician touch.

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