Aqara Doorbell Camera Hub G410 review

Aqara Doorbell Camera Hub G410: Introduction

• Type: Wired or battery (6 x AA)
• Connectivity: Zigbee, Thread, Wi-Fi 2.4GHz / 5GHz, Bluetooth
• Ecosystems: Matter, Alexa, Apple Home, Google Home, SmartThings and more

As with Aqara devices in the past that have the word ‘Hub’ in their names, the Aqara Doorbell Camera Hub G410 goes double bubble, as it is both a smart security video doorbell and a smart home hub all-in-one.

Aqara has a history of making its smart security cameras double up as hubs but this is the first time we’ve seen the functionality extended to a doorbell… from anyone in fact.

And the good news is that it’s not just an Aqara hub for controlling Zigbee Aqara child devices, it is – like the Aqara Hub M3 – also a Matter controller too, with Thread border router skills to boot, so you’ll be able to get it synced up and playing nicely within a both an Aqara smart home system or a Matter smart home setup.

I’ve had the G410 stuck to the outside of my door for the past few weeks, read on for my full review.

Design and installation

Looking pretty similar to the Video Doorbell G4, that it succeeds, the G410 is quite a chunky-looking unit, measuring in at 141.5 x 65 x 30.4mm.

But that bulky frame doesn’t mean it ugly when stuck to the wall. The matte finish on the button gives it a nice finish, and you can pick it up in either black or white so it can blend into or standout from your entry depending on your preference.

Aqara also does a good job with the extras in the box: you get a wedge bracket (handy for adjusting the angle if your door frame doesn’t face the street head-on), screws, the indoor chime, and six AA batteries to get it up and running right away.

Both the unit and the chime even come with sticky pads on the back, so if you want to risk it, you can leave the drill and screwdriver in the toolbox. I stuck mine using just the sticky pad to a wooden door frame about three weeks ago and it hasn’t fallen off yet.

However, if you’re upgrading from the older G4, you’re in luck as the back plate is exactly the same. That means you can just slide the G410 in place with zero DIY involved. If it’s a fresh install, it’s only a couple of screws to fix the back panel anyway, so not exactly a big job.

Battery power is the default and will give you around five months of use from those 6 AA batteries.

But, if you’ve got existing doorbell wiring, you can hardwire it instead, which unlocks continuous 24/7 recording, should you want it.

Getting the batteries in is slightly fiddly; you need to undo a screw hidden under a little flap. Aqara includes a mini screwdriver in the box, though any thin cross-head will do. Once you’ve slotted the batteries in, both the bell and the chime come to life with a ding-dong sound and the LED ring glowing around the button.

The chime needs to be powered all the time via USB-C (the doorbell unit will not work without it) and, while its design is unchanged from the G4 – same front-facing speaker, pill-shaped mute/reset button up top, USB-C port down below – it’s actually the brains of the operation and there’s a lot more going on inside.

As with the G4, the chime is his where the microSD card slot lives for local storage, but it’s also where all the hub radios are.

The doorbell itself just talks to the chime, it’s the chime that opens up the G410 to get onboard with Zigbee, Thread and your home Wi-Fi (and is therefore the Matter controller too.)

Setup is straightforward. You don’t scan the QR code on the doorbell; it’s actually on the chime, with both an Aqara QR and a HomeKit one.

Pairing is the usual Aqara process: the chime tells you in a voice prompt when it’s connecting, and once added you can either go down the Aqara app route or skip straight to Apple HomeKit if that’s your ecosystem of choice.

The app then guides you through the physical installation, step by step. It works as a regular doorbell right out of the box, but that would be a colossal waste of money.

Features

Like any modern video doorbell, the G410 doesn’t just ping you when someone presses the button. It’s a full-blown security camera with motion detection, activity zones, schedules and a whole lot more.

Thanks to the built-in mmWave radar sensor, it’s particularly good at presence detection and can even spot when someone is lingering outside your door.

When that happens, the LED ring on the button glows red, which is a nice visual warning if you’re on the other side of the door.

Face detection is supported too, and that can trigger automations in either your Aqara system or through a Matter setup.

You could, for example, set it up so that if the your is detected, the chime plays a pre-recorded voice message like “Hey, welcome home!”

You can also bind devices directly to it, like an Aqara smart lock, for even deeper automations.

It’s worth stressing that while the G410 is a Matter controller and a Thread border router, Matter doesn’t yet support security cameras. So you’re not exposing the doorbell video feed into Matter, you’re using it as a controller for your Zigbee and Thread kit, or as a bridge to get Aqara Zigbee devices into Matter.

If you already have multiple Aqara hubs, the G410 just adds itself as a secondary hub in the cluster.

Super nerds will also love that it even exposes a REST API for advanced Home Assistant tinkering, letting you manage Thread networks and issue specific commands at a pretty detailed level.

On the ecosystem side, it ticks all the boxes. It’s Apple HomeKit Secure Video certified, and it works with Alexa and Google Home, so you can stream footage directly to an Echo Show or Nest Hub.

Beware though that if you’re going down the HomeKit route with the G410 and using HSV, video tops out at 1080p, whereas the Aqara app gives you the full-fat 2K (2048 x 1536).

For storage, you’ve got a few options: local recording to a microSD card inside the chime (up to 512GB), NAS support, Aqara’s own HomeGuardian cloud plan, or iCloud via HomeKit.

The HomeGuardian subscription isn’t bad value either, starting at $3.99 a month for a single camera, up to $69.99 a year for unlimited cameras.

That unlocks AI-powered extras like searchable video timelines (faces, packages, pets, etc.), clip summaries, and 90 days of cloud storage. Without a subscirption, you still get a decent event history – doorbell presses, face recognition, and lingering detection are all logged – but the timeline filtering is stripped back.

Other nice extras include a tamper alarm (if someone tries to pull the unit off the wall and a loud siren will come from the main unit, and the chime’s 95db one too), privacy masking so you can block out sensitive areas from being recorded, and even a voice-changing feature for two-way audio with four different effects.

If you’re answering the door from afar, you can have some fun with your kids, for example, by switching your voice around.

Performance

The G410 impressed me during testing, even when running purely on batteries. The video quality is excellent in 2K, with crisp detail and a wide 175° field of view. The 4:3 aspect ratio is a better fit for doorsteps than the cinematic 16:9 you got on the older G4 and it means you’ll catch both people’s faces and packages on the floor in the same frame.

The Aqara app defaults to a lower-resolution “fluent” stream for speed during playback , but you can bump it up to 960p or 1536p playback on demand.

Night vision also worked well, giving a clear picture in the dark. Two-way audio is solid and responsive, and the funny voices option is surprisingly good at lightening otherwise mundane package interactions.

The mmWave radar also deserves a shout. Detection was reliable, consistently waking the doorbell, recording short clips, and firing snapshot notifications without much delay. You can dial in the detection range anywhere from one to five metres, so passersby on the pavement don’t trigger it unnecessarily, and you can also tweak the detection check frequency to 15, 30, or 60 seconds depending on how responsive you want it to be.

This level of control makes it feel smarter than rival doorbells that just offer a blunt “motion sensitivity” slider.

Battery life looked good in my testing too. Aqara rates it at around five months from the six AA batteries, though as always it depends on how busy your front door is. If you’re in a high-traffic spot, you’ll probably want to either wire it in or drop it into the power-saving mode. Once hardwired, you get the benefit of continuous 24/7 recording, which some rivals lock behind pricey subscription tiers.

Connectivity was strong as well. The G410 supports both 2.4GHz and 5GHz Wi-Fi, with WPA3 security, and I didn’t notice any lag whether I was streaming live or watching back clips. Video loaded quickly, and notifications arrived on time.

With just an IPX3 rating, it’s splashproof rather than waterproof. If you stick it under a porch or a canopy and you’ll be fine, but you probably wouldn’t trust it bolted to a gatepost out in the open.

Final thoughts

If you’re in the market for a video doorbell and you’re even remotely interested in building a smart home, the G410 is a bit of a no-brainer. It does everything you’d expect from a premium video doorbell, but it also saves you from buying a separate hub or Matter controller. That makes the slightly chunky design much easier to forgive, especially when it delivers consistently slick performance.

Yes, there are sleeker options out there, and yes, some rivals push higher waterproof ratings, but very few combine this much functionality into a single, reasonably priced package. The G410 feels like a doorbell for people who don’t just want to see who’s at the door, but who also want their front door to be a proper part of their smart home.

How we test

When we publish our reviews, you can rest assured that they are the result of “living with” long term tests.

Smart video doorbells usually live within an ecosystem, or a range of products that – supposedly – all work in harmony. Therefore, it’s impossible to use a security camera for a week and deliver a verdict.

Because we’re testing smart home kit all day, everyday, we know what matters and how a particular video doorbell compares to alternatives that you might also be considering.

Our reviews are comprehensive, objective and fair and, of course, we are never paid directly to review a device.

Read our guide on our review process for a video doorbell to learn more.