Ring Drone Cam, left, and Ring Rover Cam. (Ring Images)
Amazon’s Ring unveiled a $249.99 flying indoor security drone and a $999.99 mobile patrol robot for businesses, bringing back two ideas that stalled in earlier incarnations.
The Ring Drone Cam and Ring Rover Cam, announced Tuesday , are the first products under the Ring Robotics name, which the company calls “a new category of autonomous, mobile security.” Both devices use a system Ring calls AI Pilot to map a home or business, suggest spots worth checking, and find their own way around obstacles such as furniture and shelving.
The drone stays docked with its camera off until it’s sent out on a schedule, on demand, or automatically when another Ring device is triggered. The Rover patrols stores and offices, using a periscope camera to see over counters and shelving.
The Rover is available for preorder in the U.S. and is scheduled to ship Dec. 16. The Drone Cam is slated for Jan. 27, 2027, but Ring is only taking email sign-ups for now. The fine print notes that the drone hasn’t yet received the required authorization from the Federal Communications Commission.
Scheduled flights and patrols, and reviewing the Rover’s recorded video, require a Ring Protect subscription plan. Ring didn’t say which plans qualify.
Ring says customers wanted to see spots a fixed camera can’t reach, and rooms where they wouldn’t want one mounted.
“The honest answer wasn’t more cameras; it meant reimagining what a security device could be,” said Jamie Siminoff, Ring’s founder and chief inventor, in a statement. “That kind of invention is hard, and it takes time.”
Ring unveiled a flying indoor camera called the Always Home Cam in 2020, also priced at $249.99. The company later opened an invitation list, but the device never went on general sale.
Ring Drone Cam patrols a darkened home, left, and Ring Rover Cam projects a ring of light onto a stockroom ceiling. (Ring Images)
The original drone flew only along paths that owners mapped out with it in advance. Ring says the new one builds a floor plan as the owner carries it through the house, suggests spots to check, and plans its own routes.
The Rover Cam traces back to Astro for Business, a rolling security robot that Amazon launched in November 2023 at a starting price of $2,350. Amazon discontinued it less than a year later , refunding customers and shutting the robots off.
Astro for Business was a spinoff of Amazon’s Astro home robot, an Alexa-powered device on wheels that debuted in 2021 and can patrol the house on its own.
Ring says the new robot was inspired by Astro customers who said roving security was their favorite feature. The Ring team “leveraged the best of Astro” to build it, the company says. Ring is pitching the Rover as “not a home robot that also does security, but a purpose-built security robot.”
The original Astro for the home remains an invite-only product. Amazon has redeployed much of the Astro team to work on a new home robot, CNBC reported Sunday . In March, Amazon acquired Fauna Robotics , a New York humanoid robot startup, saying it would become part of a new Personal Robotics Group. Ring’s announcement doesn’t mention either effort.
The Rover also extends Ring’s push into commercial security, following a $5,000 surveillance trailer for parking lots that it unveiled in January. In security robots, it competes with companies such as Knightscope , which rents its robots through a subscription , and Cobalt AI . At $999.99, the Rover costs less than half what Astro for Business did.
On the security drone front, Indoor Robotics makes a ceiling-docking drone that patrols offices and warehouses, but flying security cameras for the home remain rare.
Siminoff, who launched Ring’s predecessor, Doorbot, in 2012 and sold Ring to Amazon in 2018, left the company in 2023 and returned last year to lead Ring and Amazon’s related home security businesses. Last month, Ring unveiled its first smart lock , a $249 deadbolt with no keyhole and a dial that recharges a dead battery by hand.
