Amazon’s Ring Unveils Flying Drone and Robot to Patrol Homes and Businesses

Amazon‘s Ring takes surveillance a step further with an indoor drone for home surveillance and an autonomous robot designed to patrol businesses.

The company on Tuesday unveiled the $250 Ring Drone Cam, a security camera that can fly from room to room, including upstairs, as well as capture images day or night. When an alarm or sensor on windows, doors and home security devices is triggered, the textbook-sized drone travels a predefined path to investigate suspicious activity. Users can also deploy the drone at any time, the company said.

During a demonstration in New York on Monday, Ring CEO Jamie Siminoff said the drone could be used as a home surveillance tool and as a crime “deterrent” thanks to LED lights built into the device.

“If someone walks through your house at night and your motion sensor goes off on your Ring doorbell, imagine if you see spotlights and something flying through the window,” Siminoff said. “You probably won’t go to that house.”

The drone, which can fly for up to eight minutes at a time before returning autonomously to its charging station, has two plastic-sheathed propellers that emit a loud buzzing sound when in flight.

Ring devices have provided Amazon with another way to grow its smart home presence beyond its Echo smart speakers and Eero routers, expanding into a market that Grand View Research estimates will surpass $200 billion in sales this year. It’s equally fertile ground for Amazon’s rivals Apple And Google.

Ring, acquired by Amazon in 2018 and known for its doorbells, faces privacy concerns, mainly due to its partnerships with police. Earlier this year, Ring faced renewed scrutiny over a controversial Super Bowl ad touting an AI pet search tool called “Search Party.” It then canceled an integration with police technology provider Flock Safety, which also faced widespread backlash over its automated license plate readers.

Ring first previewed its drone, then called Always Home Cam, in 2020. Siminoff said he chose to wait to release the device until Amazon could perfect the design, sensors and data processing.

The company also launched the $1,000 Ring Rover Cam on Tuesday. The device repurposes Amazon’s Astro home robot, which had a short life as a professional device and has seen few upgrades since its 2021 debut, to allow businesses to patrol offices, warehouses and other workspaces.

Ring said it “harnessed the best of Astro” to build the Ring Rover Cam, which it describes as a “purpose-built security robot.”

Similar to the Astro, the device is a display mounted on a two-wheeled base with an extendable periscope camera. It also has a “built-in siren,” two-way audio, and a “tower light” that illuminates the ceiling to help users know where it is.

Siminoff said in an interview that the drone and robot allow users to monitor multiple areas of their home or business with a single device.

“People like indoor cameras, but they don’t necessarily want them everywhere in their house,” Siminoff said.

Ring said privacy is the “default” mode for both the drone and robot, which flash an LED light when they are recording.

Siminoff said the drone cannot be flown outdoors, per Federal Aviation Administration regulations, which limit the use of drones unless they are within a pilot’s line of sight.

“We’ve told our customers not to do this because it’s illegal,” Siminoff said. “We also installed guardrails to prevent it from flying outside.”

The Ring Drone Cam will ship in the United States on January 27, pending approval from the Federal Communications Commission, while the Ring Rover Cam will begin shipping to users on December 16, the company said.

WATCH: Amazon worries about cloud growth