Ring’s Protect Basic plan gets another price hike

It’s been less than two years since Ring raised prices on its least pricey subscription plan, but another price hike is already on the way. 

According to a Ring support document as well as a hoard of angry users on the Ring subreddit, the cost of Ring Protect Basic will go up to $4.99 a month starting March 11, 2024, a $1/month price hike that represents a 25-percent increase. The annual rate for Ring Protect Basic is going up to $49.99 a year, up from $39.99/year. 

This news story is part of TechHive’s in-depth coverage of the best home security cameras and the best video doorbells.

The good news is that only the Ring Protect Basic plan–which covers a single camera or doorbell–is getting a price hike. If you have more than one camera or doorbell, or if you have a Ring Alarm or Ring Alarm Pro system, you probably subscribe to one of Ring’s more expensive plans, which are not subject to price increases–at least not right now. 

Reached for comment, a Ring spokesperson confirmed the price hike, while arguing that Ring Protect “offers some of the best value in the industry.” 

The last time Ring raised the price of its Protect Basic plan was back in June 2022, when the monthly price went up from $2.99 a month to $3.99/month. 

But in exchange for that 2022 price increase, Ring Protect Basic subscribers got a big boost in storage, from 60 days of video history up to 180 days, along with the ability to download up to 50 videos at once, up from 20 videos. 

This time around, Ring Protect Basic subscribers don’t appear to be getting any added functionality to coincide with the price increase, or at least nothing that Ring is ready to reveal at the moment. 

A Ring subscription plan is practically a requirement for a Ring security camera or doorbell. Without one, you can only view a live feed from your Ring cam, and a Ring plan is needed for such features people detection, rich mobile notifications, and setting “home” and “away” modes. 

Also, Ring Alarm users who cancel their subscriptions will lose access to in-app features, including digital notifications and the ability to arm or disarm the system from the app, unless they purchased their devices before March 29, 2023.

The Ring Protect Basic plan gives you 180 days of recorded video events for a single camera, along with the aforementioned person alerts, rich notifications, a “pre-roll” feature that adds a few seconds of footage at the beginning of motion-triggered events, and a “Snapshot Capture” feature that takes frequent snapshots between those motion events. 

The $10-a-month or $100/year Ring Protect Plus plan–which, again, isn’t getting a price hike–offers the same features as Ring Protect Basic for all your Ring cameras, while also adding extended warrantees.

Finally, Ring Protect Pro packs all the Protect Basic and Pro features along with 24/7 professional monitoring and broadband backup via cellular network for a Ring Alarm or Ring Alarm Pro system. It costs $20 a month, or $200 a year.

Ring’s move comes on the heels of Arlo raising the price of its basic subscription from $4.99 per month to $7.99/mo.