How to use Ring Modes home and away settings

(Pocket-lint) – Ring has come a long way since it launched its first video doorbell. The Amazon-owned brand now has many different, connected devices – including alarm systems and cameras for inside and out. It can be easy, therefore, to have your entire smart home covered by Ring security systems.

The only problem is managing them all through the dedicated app or web client. Thankfully, the brand offers a feature that makes it easy to control multiple devices with just one tap: Ring Modes. They appear at the top of the dashboard on the Ring mobile app and give you three options to simply arm (or disarm) all of your relevant Ring devices at once.

Here is what they do and how you set them up to work best in your own home.

What are Ring Modes?

Ring Modes are one-tap solutions to control all of your Ring devices at once.

Ring

Many of use now have more than just a Ring Video Doorbell. We might also have an Indoor Cam, Stick Up Cam and/or Alarm Security System too. And, when we go out we don’t really want the fuss of going into each device section on the mobile app to turn it on or off.

Ring Modes, therefore, give you easy one-tap buttons that enable or disable all of your devices at once, depending on your circumstances. There are buttons to tell all your devices whether your are at home, away or to disarm the entire Ring network entirely. They come with default settings, but you can also adjust them in the app’s settings to better suit your home or office – by either choosing which devices to enable or disable with each mode, or remove devices from them entirely.

How to use Ring Modes

Ring Modes are available in the Ring mobile app by default, and they will automatically include all of your registered Ring devices.

They can be accessed by opening the Ring app and simply tapping on one of the three icons at the top of the dashboard screen. By default (we have found), motion alerts and recording for indoor cameras are likely to be disabled when you are “Home”, the same with alarm systems, while external cameras will have both motion settings enabled. When set to “Away”, everything is enabled.

And, tapping “Disarmed” will disable every Ring device.

It’s Home Security Week on Pocket-lint By Britta O’Boyle . 8 August 2022

It’s Home Security Week all this week on Pocket-lint. Here’s what to look forward to.

How to change Ring Modes device settings

To change the different motion settings for each of your devices in the Home, Away and Disarmed categories, just tap the three bars (hamburger) icon in the top-left of your dashboard screen and follow these steps:

• Tap on “Settings” in the left-hand menu bar that appears.
• Tap on “Modes” on the following page.
• Each of the modes will appear on the next page, tap on either of them to enter the “Camera Settings” for that mode.
• Tap on the device you want to set.
• You can then choose whether you want to have “Motion Detection” and “Live View” enabled or disabled in that specific mode.

It’s slightly different if you have Ring Alarm System in that you choose to turn on or off different sensors around the home or office. Also, Home and Away modes can be used to arm and disarm your system easily – as an alternative to punching in your PIN on the system’s dedicated keypad.

An even more recent addition to the app is the ability to turn on a Geofence. The option can also be found in Settings menu – there’s a link within the Modes settings too. By adding a Geofence, you can have your Ring Modes switch automatically as you leave or arrive in a set area around your home.

Home Security Week (8-12 August) in association with Swann UK. It’s Home Security Week all this week on Pocket-lint, we are featuring a whole stack on features, reviews, videos and other exciting snippets dedicated to smart home security. Find all the latest content, each day, on our hub

Writing by Rik Henderson.

Editing by Britta O’Boyle.