Reolink Altas PT Ultra review: Long battery life and crisp 360-degree footage

Over the last few years, Reolink has emerged as an excellent alternative to the likes of Arlo and Ring among the best home security cameras, providing high-tech and high-performing security cameras at a lower price than much of the competition. The company's latest offering, the Reolink Altas PT Ultra, is built to offer 4K continuous recording with a 360-degree field of view at $209.99.

But it's not the only company that builds 360-degree security cameras that can be powered with a solar panel. Companies like Eufy offer something similar, and at a lower price. Can Reolink come out on top, or should you save your cash and go for a cheaper option? I tested the Reolink Altas PT Ultra for several weeks to find out.

Reolink Altas PT Ultra review: Price and availability

The Reolink Altas PT Ultra is available right now from the Reolink website, Amazon, and other retailers. It costs $209.99 for the camera alone, or $229.99 for the camera with a solar panel. Most users will want to get the solar panel, as it means features like continuous recording can be used without the camera running out of juice in a week.

Reolink Altas PT Ultra review: Design

The Altas PT Ultra system is bigger and bulkier than most other consumer security cameras out there, but part of that is because of the feature set that it offers. It can be mounted on a wall or ceiling, and it’ll jut out a little to give the camera plenty of space to see what’s around it. It has a large antenna on one side of the base and a bulb-like gimbal structure for the camera itself, allowing it to swivel and rotate as needed.

The body of the camera is mostly white. However, given that Reolink offers other cameras in black, I'd be surprised if it didn't eventually offer this one in black as well. It's mostly built from plastic, and as a result, it can feel slightly cheap at times, but it's not overly cheap looking or feeling. It certainly didn't feel like it would break easily without at least some effort.

Thankfully, the body is rated for some durability. It's IP65 rated, so it should be able to withstand most weather events, including rain. It has a rated operating temperature of between 14°F and 131°F, so while it's unlikely that you live in an area where it will be too hot for this camera, you may well live in an area where it gets too cold for it to work, especially in the Midwestern United States, like Minnesota, or New England.

The camera has all the bells and whistles you would expect. There's a spotlight array above the lens, along with a relatively large speaker on the underside of the base. The base also houses a USB-C port for power, while the camera bulb has a microSD card slot for expandable storage, both hidden behind rubber doors.

Of course, many users will also want to use the solar panel (called the “Solar Panel 2”) that’s available with the camera. The 6W solar panel is pretty similar to the one that comes with Reolink's other cameras.

It has a white base and a black solar array, and most should find it relatively easy to install. When installed, you can simply plug the solar panel straight into the camera to keep it powered at all times.

Reolink Altas PT Ultra review: Video and audio performance

One of the biggest advantages of the Altas over some cheaper options is that it boasts 4K video recording, ensuring that captured video is crisp and detailed. In other words, it should be able to capture things like facial features and other important details relatively easily. That's not to mention the fact that it's excellent at avoiding the fisheye lens effect that some security cameras typically suffer from. Indeed, recorded footage was more detailed and crisp than most other cameras out there, including the also well-regarded Eufy Floodlight Camera E340, which has a 3K resolution. I was easily able to see number plates on cars in my driveway (though they’ve been manually blurred out).

Like other cameras (including the Eufy Floodlight Camera E30) that swivel and rotate to capture things in 360 degrees, the Altas PT Ultra has motion detection features that allow it to track movement from things like people, vehicles, and pets. It can pan 355 degrees and tilt 90 degrees – so save for where the camera connects to the base, there really aren’t any blind spots. When motion is detected, the camera will automatically record footage if it's in trigger mode or move to track the motion if it's in continuous recording mode. This is helpful for larger areas and pretty necessary, given the fact that this camera is built specifically to record footage from larger areas. Helpfully, you can set a “Monitor Point,” or a default position for the camera to set itself at after it’s done tracking motion, and how long it should wait before resetting itself to that position.

Motion sensing worked quite well – it was relatively responsive, and was able to start recording pretty quick after motion was detected.

The camera also leverages Reolink's ColorX full-color night vision, which uses the built-in spotlight to illuminate the area and capture footage in color instead of relying on infrared for a black-and-white image. ColorX footage looked absolutely excellent, and the camera was still able to pick up great detail at further distances, making it far better than most other co-called “color night vision” systems that basically just show whatever the spotlight can directly illuminate and have limited vision at a distance. The only caveat is that if there are any lights in view, they’ll look blown out and could disrupt the image as a whole. In the image above, for example, the big light in the sky is really just actually a kind of dim street lamp.

Like most security cameras, audio is fine – but it is a little fuller than many others, thanks simply to the space available. The device has a larger speaker built into the base, allowing it to get much louder than many alternatives without introducing too much distortion. You’ll be able to talk to people through it just fine. The microphone could use work too, but again, it’s good enough to chat through for brief conversations.

Reolink Altas PT Ultra review: Subscription fees

One of the best things about this security camera is that you don't have to subscribe to a cloud storage service to get the most out of it. Reolink doesn’t charge a subscription fee to access footage remotely. Instead, the camera has an onboard microSD card slot to store footage, or you can use it with the Reolink Home hub, which supports up to 1TB of local storage.

You don’t have to use it with that hub though, so if you want that additional local storage, you’ll have to pay to get it. The Home Hub has a list price of $99.99, though at the time of this writing it was available on Amazon for $89.99. That said, Reolink’s setup is pretty versatile. Only some alternatives even have the option of a MicroSD card slot. A good example of that is the aforementioned Eufy Floodlight Camera E340, though it’s slightly more expensive and doesn’t have a 4K resolution.

Then, when you want to access footage, you'll be accessing it from one of those storage locations. The downside of this is that if you suffer from an internet outage, you won't be able to access previously stored footage remotely, but you will still be able to access physical storage like MicroSD cards, of course. That seems like an edge case though, and a trade worth making, considering the lack of subscription fees. Not only is there no subscription, but Reolink says that footage is end-to-end encrypted, and that even it can't access the footage.

Reolink Altas PT Ultra review: Battery life

If you can, it's probably worth using the solar panel to ensure that you never have to worry about charging the camera. If you don't want to use the solar panel, rest assured that the camera has excellent battery life overall.

The battery capacity in the camera sits at a huge 20,000mAh, and according to Reolink, it can last up to 96 hours or four days when in continuous 4K recording mode. If you want to use continuous recording, you will want to use the solar panel, as while four days is pretty good, most people aren't going to want to charge their security camera twice a week. If you instead opt for Trigger Mode, the camera will last a massive 500 days on a charge, so you won't have to charge it more than once every year and a half. In my few weeks of testing the camera, I used the solar panel that Reolink sent us with the camera, so it was always charged up.

Reolink Altas PT Ultra review: App

Like other Reolink security cameras, the Altas PT Ultra works with the Reolink app, which works well and offers access to all the features you would need. The app has gotten a lot more modern and up-to-date over the years, and at this point, it’s quite well-designed. It also has two-factor authentication, allowing you to safeguard your recorded footage.

From the home screen of the app, you'll see a layout of all the cameras you have set up, allowing you to quickly jump into a live view of any of them or access their settings. From the live view, you'll be able to initiate two-way audio or control the viewing direction of the camera manually. You'll also be able to manually start recording and switch on the spotlight.

The settings menu for the camera is fairly comprehensive. For starters, you'll be able to toggle on pre-recording mode, which is built to start recording footage before the motion event is detected. However, keep in mind that doing so will use more power. Not only that, but you can set up continuous recording through the app. I appreciate that instead of simply being on or off, you can schedule continuous recording to happen at specific times, like at night or on particular days of the week.

Reolink Altas PT Ultra review: Smart home compatibility

Like other Reolink cameras, the Reolink Altas PT Ultra can be connected to Google Home or Amazon Alexa, but that's about where its smart home support ends. There's no native Apple HomeKit support here. So if you're a HomeKit user, you'll want to look for an alternative unless you're willing to tinker with a system like Homebridge.

Reolink Altas PT Ultra review: Verdict

The Reolink Altas PT Ultra is an excellent option for anyone who wants a camera that can record 360 degrees, has an excellent battery life, and prioritizes security over cloud storage. While there are other 360-degree cameras, they often sacrifice things like resolution and features, and usually charge a fee for subscriptions. For example, the Eufy Floodlight Camera S340 offers a similar feature set, but doesn’t support continuous recording like the Reolink camera.

The Altas PT Ultra is not the cheapest camera out there, but given its feature set and the ability to record continuously, it represents a great value. Among the best outdoor security cameras, it’s a fantastic choice if you’re looking to cover a really wide area.