The Toucan Wireless Video Doorbell V3 ($109.99) is a completely wire-free model that you can control with both your phone and your voice. It’s very easy to install and delivers sharp footage, but you have to pay extra to view video clips that are more than one day old or download more than five videos per month. The Toucan V3 is relatively affordable, but the TP-Link Tapo D225 ($99.99) costs even less and offers higher-resolution 2K video, local and cloud video storage, and lots of third-party integrations, making it our Editors’ Choice winner for video doorbells.

Design: Lightweight and Battery Powered

The Toucan V3 has a matte white IP56 weather-resistant enclosure with a matte black face. Measuring 5.7 by 2.1 by 1.1 inches (HWD), it’s rather bulky but not quite as large as the TP-Link Tapo D225 Video Doorbell (5.9 by 1.9 by 1.5 inches). The face of the doorbell houses the camera, a passive infrared (PIR) motion sensor, a microphone, a speaker, four IR LEDs, and a doorbell button with an LED ring surrounding it. The LED ring glows solid blue when the doorbell button is pressed or when motion is detected. Otherwise, the LED ring blinks blue during setup, purple during a firmware upgrade, or red when the connection has failed. Around back is a rubber cover for the USB-C charging port, the Set button, and the Reset button.

The camera captures 1,296-by-1,296-pixel video at 25 frames per second (fps) and features a 180-degree diagonal field of view. It will capture color night video if there’s enough ambient light; otherwise, it uses IR LEDs for black and white video. By comparison, the TP-Link Tapo D225 captures sharper 2,304-by-1,728-pixel (2K) video at 20fps, and also has a 180-degree head-to-toe field of view.

(Credit: John R. Delaney)

Supplied with the doorbell is a battery-powered chime box that measures 2.6 by 2.6 by 0.9 inches (HWD) and uses two AA batteries, which are included. It also comes with a doorbell mounting plate and screws, a small screwdriver, a USB-C charging cable, and a user guide.

The V3 utilizes a 2.4GHz Wi-Fi radio to connect to your home network and to the Alexa and Google voice assistants, allowing you to view video streams on a supported smart display, such as an Amazon Echo Show or a Google Nest Hub. The V3 does not work with Apple HomeKit, nor does it support IFTTT applets that allow for third-party smart home device integrations. The Tapo D225 supports Alexa and Google Assistant voice commands and works with scores of third-party devices using IFTTT.

Like other devices from this brand, the V3 doorbell appears in its own panel on the Toucan mobile app (available for Android and iOS). The panel displays the camera's latest captured still image, along with its wireless signal strength and battery level. It also has Snooze and Settings buttons. Tap the panel to launch a live stream, which can be viewed in full-screen mode by turning your phone sideways or by tapping the four-way arrow icon. Below the video panel are buttons for two-way talk, manually recording a video, taking a snapshot, sounding the siren, and playing a pre-recorded message. There’s also a button for subscribing to a Toucan Shield plan and an SOS button for placing an emergency call to a number of your choosing.

(Credit: Toucan/John R. Delaney)

The free Basic Shield plan lets you view video from the past 24 hours, download up to five videos per month, create motion zones, play pre-recorded messages, and adjust motion sensitivity, while the $2.99 per month Pro plan gives you all of that plus seven days of video history, video-in-video playback, custom greetings, and unlimited downloads. For $9.99 per month, the Elite plan provides everything from the Pro plan, plus 90 days of video history.

The V3 has no local storage option, so if you want to store more than 24 hours of video or download more than five videos a month, you'll need to subscribe to one of its plans. The TP-Link Tapo D225 offers local storage and supports microSD cards up to 512GB, or you can subscribe to a Tapo Care Premium plan for cloud video storage. Tapo Care Premium starts at $3.49 per month or $34.99 per year for 30 days of video history for a single camera, rich notifications, and Smart Sort photo tagging. A two-camera Tapo Care Premium plan costs $6.99 per year or $69.99 per year; a three-camera plan is $10.49 per month or $104.99 per year; and a 10-camera plan is $11.99 per month or $119.99 per year.

Tap the gear icon in the upper-right corner of the Toucan mobile app to access the settings screen, where you can enable notifications, choose one of nine ringtones for doorbell presses, configure motion sensitivity, create a snooze schedule that disables motion detection, set up motion zones, and enter a number for SOS (emergency) calling. Here you can also select one of seven pre-recorded greetings or create your own.

Installation and Performance: Swift Setup, Sharp Surveillance

To install the doorbell, I downloaded the app, created an account, and tapped Add a New Device on the home screen. I selected the Wireless Video Doorbell V3 from the list, gave it a name, and entered my Wi-Fi credentials. I tapped Next, pressed the Set button, and when I heard “the device has been initialized,” I tapped Next again and used the doorbell camera to scan the QR code that appeared in the app. After a few seconds, the device was connected, so I took it outside and installed it next to my front door using the included mounting plate and screws.

The V3’s video was relatively sharp and showed pleasant color saturation, but when viewing my doorstep in portrait mode, the control buttons took up nearly half of the screen. Although the color quality in low lighting appeared a bit washed out, that’s fairly common with cameras that use ambient light for color video. On the plus side, black and white night video was sharp with pleasing contrast.

Doorbell presses and motion notifications arrived quickly, and the chime box was adequately loud. Alexa commands to view a live video stream on an Amazon Echo Show 8 worked as intended, and two-way audio came through loud and clear.