The eufy D605 Dog Camera: A Hands on Review!

I’ll admit it: I’m a bit of a worrywart. Especially when it comes to my dogs.

I do not leave them home alone unless absolutely necessary, and when I do have to leave them, I’m a nervous wreck until I return.

So, when eufy reached out and offered to send us a pet camera to try, I jumped at the chance.

Read on to find out about my experiences, as well as everything you need to know about this camera.

The eufy D605 Dog Camera: Key Takeaways

• The eufy D605 Pet Camera allows you to monitor your pet from afar. You can bring the app up on your phone and take a peek at what your woofer is doing, or just wait for the notifications that let you know your pet is moving around or barking.
• In addition to simply monitoring your pet, this camera allows you to interact with your four-footer in several ways. For example, you can enjoy two-way communication with your pet via the associated app, you can record and play commands, and you can toss treats to your pupper.
• By and large, I really liked the eufy Dog Camera. It did everything it was supposed to do and provided me with some peace of mind. That said, there were a few things I didn’t love about the camera — I’ll lay out all the pros and cons below.

eufy: Getting to Know the Manufacturer

Unlike some other treat-dispensing pet cameras that are made by manufacturers you’ve never heard of, eufy is a relatively well-established brand in the smart-home-product space.

Guided by the motto “smart home simplified,” the brand offers a number of high-quality consumer products, ranging from laser-guided robotic vacuums to home security systems.

The parent company of eufy — Anker Innovations — is a well-known consumer electronics brand in its own right. Other brands under the Anker Innovations umbrella include soundcore and NEBULA.

The eufy D605 Dog Camera: Basic Characteristics and Features

Now that you understand a bit about the manufacturer, it’s time to dive into the eufy D605 Dog Camera itself.

In most respects, the eufy is like many of the other high-end, treat-dispensing pet cameras on the market and offers broadly similar functionality and capabilities.

Eufy Pet Camera Features:

How Does the eufy Pet Camera Compare to Other Pet Cameras?

If you’re in the market for a pet camera, you probably want to know how the eufy stacks up against the competition. We’ll help you do that below, by pointing out some of the key similarities and differences between the eufy and some other high-end options.

For starters, lets talk about the features that are common to most high-quality pet cams:

• A wide angle lens: Because it is important to be able to see your pet from one location, almost every pet camera we’ve checked out has a wide angle lens, though some are wider than others.
• Two-way communication: Two-way communication is pretty standard among treat-tossing cameras — at least among the leading products in the category.
• Treat-tossing capabilities: The defining characteristic of treat-dispensing pet cameras, all of the options available on the market will sling treats in Spot’s direction.
• An associated phone app: All the treat-tossing cameras we’ve examined work in conjunction with a phone app. Some can also be operated from a tablet or desktop computer, but that isn’t true of every option on the market.
• Wireless connectivity: As far as we’re aware, every treat-tossing pet camera on the market will connect to your home’s wireless network. That said, some only work on one Wi-Fi frequency.

Having reviewed the things that are pretty consistent across the pet-camera category, we can now turn our attention to some of the key features that differ from one model to the next — and specifically the eufy.

• Motion tracking: This is one of the key things that sets the eufy Pet Camera apart from the crowd is its motion-tracking functionality. To our knowledge, the eufy is the only pet camera that automatically tracks your pet as she moves around.
• Night vision: A few of the very best pet cameras — including the eufy — have night vision. This is obviously important for monitoring your pooch after dark.
• Bark alerts: The eufy and many other high-end pet cameras will let you know when your dog is barking. The cool thing about the eufy is that it doesn’t require a monthly subscription to do so. In fact, the eufy doesn’t require a subscription (or even offer one) to access any of the camera’s capabilities.
• Activity alerts: Doggo jump off the couch? The eufy will notify you. This isn’t completely unusual among the high-end pet camera market, but once again, eufy gives you this capability without requiring you to pay a monthly fee.
• Field of view: Different pet cameras offer differing fields of view. But the eufy offers one of the widest field of views on the market. The top portion of the eufy actually spins, which — when combined with the wide-angle lens — gives you a full 360° view.
• Scheduled treat delivery: This is one of the few places in which the eufy doesn’t quite keep up with some of the other treat-dispensing cameras, as it does not allow you to schedule treat delivery — you simply have to open the app and fling a tasty tidbit manually.
• Automatic selfie mode: The eufy and some other pet cameras automatically detect when your pet is looking in the camera and take a snapshot.

Testing the eufy D605 Dog Camera: A K9 of Mine Hands-On Review

We had the chance to try out a eufy D605 Dog Camera ourselves to see if it was all it was cracked up to be. We’ll share our experience below, from the initial set up to day-to-day use.

Setting Up the eufy Pet Camera

The eufy Pet Camera came in a nice-looking box, and it was carefully packed to ensure problem-free arrival.

There weren’t really many components to assemble — I simply plugged it in and scanned the QR code on the bottom to download the app.

I then rinsed, dried, and filled the dishwasher-safe treat cannister. I just used my dogs’ regular food — Blue Buffalo Large Breed Chicken & Rice — because I didn’t have any small training treats on hand (scroll down to see the treats I did eventually test).

From there, I just followed the instructions provided by the app to set up a profile and connect the camera to my Wi-Fi. I did have to try this twice before it would connect, but that wasn’t a huge problem.

Establishing my profile was easy, as I wasn’t required to enter much data. And because the eufy doesn’t require a subscription, I didn’t even have to get out my credit card.

That’s all there is to setting it up! I was ready to start monitoring my doggos and tossin’ treats.

Overall, it was a pretty simple process.

Using the eufy D605 Dog Camera: Navigating the User Interface

You’ll control your eufy D605 via the associated app. It’s all pretty simple and intuitive. Here’s the home screen:

This screen shows the last thing the camera detected (person, pet, or “something”) and the status of the treat reservoir. You can also see three of the basic sections of the app at the bottom: the home screen, the activity interface (which displays a list of the latest recordings), and your profile.

If you click on the little “play” icon, it’ll open up the live feed.

From this screen, you can also:

• Access the settings menu (the little gear at the top right)
• View the connection speed
• Take a screenshot
• Start recording
• Issue a pre-recorded voice command
• Speak to your dog
• Access the sound settings
• Toss your pet a treat

You can view the live feed in a small window or maximize it for a better look. Here’s what it looks like maximized.

J.B., our sweet-but-serious Rottie, is in the first photo; Willow, our derp-tastic Pyrenees, is in the second.

It’s easy to adjust just about anything the camera does via the settings menu. You can see some screenshots of various settings below:

The eufy D605 Video Feed: Quality, Motion-Tracking, and Nightvision

Now that you understand the basic manner in which you’ll interact with and control the eufy D605 pet camera, we can talk about the primary thing most owners will use it for: visually monitoring a pet.

The eufy D605 Video Quality

The eufy’s video quality is about what I expected, if not a little better. You’re certainly not going to use it to shoot your film school final project with it, but it does feature a wide angle lens and shoot in1080p. I never had trouble seeing what the camera saw — everything looked crystal clear.

It definitely gets the job done, as you can see here (there is a little backlight issue, but that’s because of the way I set things up — not the camera itself):

It’s a bit easier to see the polar bear, thanks to her white fur. As you can see, we caught her putting her paws on the counter (something she knows she’s not supposed to do):

The eufy Pet Camera’s Motion-Tracking

One of the neat things about the eufy D605 is its motion-tracking capabilities. Essentially, it will follow your pet around the room.

Best of all, setting this up is easy; it’s actually turned on by default (though you can turn it off). You can also tweak the sensitivity level and establish an “activity zone” if you want to monitor a specific area. Additionally, you can set it to track your pet’s movements, people movements, or both.

Here it is in practice:

Seeing Your Pet After Dark: The eufy D605’s Night Vision

The eufy D605 includes night vision sensors so that you can see your pet at night.

I don’t really need to use this function often, but owners who work at night or go out frequently will certainly appreciate it. Plus, it means you can monitor your mutt without having to leave lights on. This will help ensure your pup can snooze without issue and it may even help keep some canines calmer.

Overall, I found that the night vision function worked pretty well, and it was easy to see the doggos in a pretty dark room.

The eufy’s Two-Way Audio and Sound Detection: Talking to Your Pet

As mentioned, the eufy Dog Camera is equipped with two-way audio capabilities. In other words, you can hear and speak to your pooch. This is helpful for a variety of reasons, including:

• You can hear what is going on in your house when you aren’t there.
• You can distinguish between your dog’s normal barking-at-the-mail-carrier vs your dog barking because something is actually wrong.
• You can hear if your dog is whining or crying because of fear, anxiety, boredom, frustration, or pain.
• You can try to soothe your dog by talking to her.
• You can try to correct your dog if she’s doing something she’s not supposed to be doing.

Now, the amount of success you’ll achieve on those last two points will vary.

Talking to my pups via the two-way audio system doesn’t really seem to soothe them at all, nor has it proven that effective for delivering corrections (as occurs when Willow places her paws up on the counter as shown in an earlier video).

That said, J.B. does follow cues given via the two-way audio system.

The eufy doesn’t record the two-way audio feature, so you can’t hear my voice in the following clip, but you can see that my dog obviously does hear me — I’m telling her to sit and lay down. Forgive the off-center framing.

To hear your pet, all you have to do is pull up the feed — you’ll see and hear everything the eufy is picking up. But to speak to your pet, you’ll need to hold down the “Speak” button.

In addition to letting you and your pet to hear each other, the eufy D605 will also notify you when sounds are detected.

Dispensing Treats: Capacity, Anti-Clog Technology, Treat Compatibility, and Controls

One of the key features of many popular pet cameras is the treat-dispensing mechanism. These components give you a way to use positive reinforcement to encourage good behavior, distract her when she’s barking or anxious, or simply spoil her because, well, just because.

But pet camera treat-dispensing mechanisms are complicated and there are quite a few things to discuss about them, including their capacity, the treats that work best inside them, and any anti-clog technology present. There’s also the interface — the way in which you actually dispense treats — to consider.

We’ll talk about each of these subjects below.

The eufy D605 Dog Camera’s Anti-Clog Mechanism

The treat dispensers in many pet cameras become jammed, leaving you unable to give your doggo tasty treats until you get home and unclog the mechanism.

To address this problem, eufy designers incorporated an anti-clog loading mechanism, which you can see below.

Those little turning doodads propel treats toward the ejection port.

But here’s the cool thing (and I didn’t even see this in any of the product documentation or marketing materials — I only noticed when I took the lid off and started firing treats): If it senses a jam, the wheels turn the opposite direction for a few rotations to help unclog everything.

Now, it didn’t work perfectly in this regard, as the camera did become clogged a time or two while I was using it.

However, this is likely to be the case for any pet camera — the occasional clog is just part of the game. By and large, it did seem to toss treats effectively and jammed treats were very rare.

The Treat-Dispensing Interface: How Do You Get the eufy D605 Dog Camera to Toss Treats to Your Dog?

Tossing treats to your dog is super easy (and kinda fun) with the eufy Dog Camera — you don’t even have to navigate away from the main cam-monitoring page.

All you need to do is put your finger on the little treat icon in the shaded circle, swipe it down, and then release it. The eufy will then produce an alert sound to get your pup’s attention and then launch a treat.

You can use the left and right arrows to aim the treat, and you can adjust the strength of the toss by swiping the treat down to varying degrees. Swipe down just a bit and the treat will shoot out pretty softly; pull it all the way down and the eufy will launch the treat halfway across the room.

I did have two small complaints about the treat-tossin’ feature:

1. There’s a considerable delay between you triggering the treat toss on your phone and the treat shooting out. In some cases, my dogs had already looked away, which means the treat fired out without them seeing it. But overall, this is a pretty small problem.
2. I found the alert sound that occurs before the treat launches to be pretty obnoxious. YMMV here, but it really irritated me. There is a place in the settings menu where you can ostensibly change it, but it didn’t give me any alternatives. Perhaps eufy will be upgrading this feature in the future.

What Is the Treat Capacity of the eufy D605 Dog Camera? How Many Treats Will It Hold?

There’s one more important thing to note about the treat-dispensing machinery of the eufy: its incredible capacity. Per the manufacturer’s specs, the eufy D605 will hold a whopping 1.5 pounds of treats.

The manufacturer claims that the eufy will hold more treats (in terms of weight) than any other pet camera on the market, and we think they are correct.

But regardless of whether the eufy holds the very top spot in the treat-capacity arena or not, it definitely holds plenty of treats — you won’t be running out while you’re at work, no matter how many times you spoil your sweetie.

Which Treats Work with the eufy D605 Dog Camera?

One of the challenges of using a treat-tossing pet camera is treat compatibility.

Not all treats work with all pet cameras. In fact, some cameras are notorious for requiring specific treats or treats that only fall within a narrow range of size, shape, and texture criteria.

Fortunately, that’s not a problem with the eufy. It works with any dry treats that are about 1/4- to 1/2-inch in size.

Unfortunately, there is a bit of conflicting information out there on this subject: On the eufy website, the recommendation is 0.24” to 0.60” / 6mm to 16mm; but the language on their Amazon listing page recommends using treats less than 1-inch in diameter.

The manufacturer also recommends using dry, crunchy treats and discourages owners from breaking treats in half.

So, just to make sure I really put this thing through its paces, I tried it with five popular dog training treats:

• Zuke’s Mini Naturals
• Blue Wilderness Wild Bits
• Merrick Power Bites
• Simply Nourish Poppers
• Nutro Mini Bites

All five of these treats worked well with the eufy.

This actually kind of surprised me — while they are all approximately the right size, they differ drastically in terms of shape. Some are gear-shaped, some are shaped like little bones, and others don’t have any conventional shape at all (they’re kinda “blobby”).

Again, I did run into a jam or two during the testing process, but the camera doesn’t appear to be especially finicky with respect to the type of treat you use.

The Bottom Line: Is the eufy Pet Camera Worth It?

Overall, I liked the eufy Pet Camera and think it is definitely a wise (not to mention fun) investment for most pet parents.

It gives me peace of mind when my dogs are home alone and allowed me to capture some cute moments on camera. It also provided some helpful insights, as I could see the gals when they didn’t know I was watching.

Plus, my girlfriend and I have just had fun messing around with it, slinging treats to the floofs, and trying out the recorded command feature.

No, it isn’t perfect — I wish the treat alert sound was customizable, the camera feed is a wee bit delayed, and, contrary to the manufacturer’s no-jam claims, the treats have become stuck a time or two. But none of these issues have been dealbreakers. For that matter, ALL pet cameras have bugs and shortcomings.

I give it two enthusiastic thumbs up and encourage our readers to give it a serious look.

The eufy Pet Camera: FAQ

As with any pet camera, many pet parents have questions about the eufy. To help, we’ve answered some of the most common questions about the eufy Pet Camera below!

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As you can see, I generally liked the Eufy D605 Dog Camera. But what about you? Have you tried this pet camera out yourself? How did it work for you? Did you stick with it or go shopping for another one?

Let us know in the comments below!