Professional-Grade Surveillance to Protect Your Home Exterior

When looking for an outdoor security camera, you’ll often run into several roadblocks like the need for power, blind spots, video storage, and more. But the Eufy SoloCam S340 lays almost all of those issues to rest with great image quality, internal storage for recorded video, and a built-in solar panel.

Eufy SoloCam S340

Eufy SoloCam S340 provides a top-notch way to keep an eye on what’s happening outside of your home. The camera provides a full, 360-degree look at your location using pan/tilt. The camera also features dual lenses, a wide-angle 3K lens and telephoto 2K option. Together, those provide up to 8x hybrid zoom so you can get a closer look. And instead of paying extra for cloud storage, the S340 features 8GB of included memory. 

Brand

Eufy

Resolution

3K wide-angle/2K telephoto

App Compatibility

Yes

Night Vision

Yes

Integrations

Amazon Alexa, Google Home

Hub Required

No

Field of view

135 degrees

Spotlight

Yes

Storage

8GB built-in

Weather resistance

-4°F – 122°F

Two-way speaker

Yes

Motion detection

Yes

Subscription required?

No

Pros

• Dual-lens camera with 3K resolution
• Included solar panel can provide consistent power
• Manual pan/tilit
• Up to 8x hybrid zoom
• AI tracking can follow motion
• Built-in storage for recorded video
• Amazon Alexa, Google Home compatibility

3K Resolution and More Thanks to Dual Lenses

The SoloCam S340 is a bit larger than other outdoor security cameras you might have previously seen. But there is a good reason for the added bulk. The headlining feature is dual camera lenses. Much like a smartphone, the lenses can help you see more of the situation.

One 3K resolution wide-angle lens while the other is a telephoto 2K lens. Combined, those can provide up to 8x hybrid zoom.

But your view won’t be confined to a single location. The camera can pan a full 360 degrees and 70 degrees vertically. With that, you should be able to see pretty much anything in view of the camera.

Installation can sometimes be an issue with outdoor cameras. Depending on your home type and where you’ll be installing the camera, you might have to find additional hardware to mount the camera correctly. Thankfully, Eufy provides everything you need.

After choosing where you want to install the weather-resistant camera, you’ll drill in anchors into the wall and then screw in the nice bracket mount. The entire process took me less than 5 minutes. For the best possible video, Eufy recommends installing the camera 7 to 10 feet off the ground.

Just like with Eufy’s Indoor Cam S350 that I previously reviewed, the dual-lens combination on the S340 provides great image quality in the standard view and all the way up to the 8x zoom. The standard option is with a 135-degree field of view.

To zoom in closer, select the 3x on the live screen and then just pinch-to-zoom. You’ll see 8x on the screen when you’ve reached the maximum.

The easiest way to use the pan/tilt is with the Eufy Security app for iOS or Android. Choose Pan and Tilt on the live view page to see a joystick to control the camera.

While the pan/tilt is great, especially when you’re looking at the camera view live, Eufy’s AI tracking is the real star of the show.

The camera can automatically detect three different types of motion; a human, a vehicle, or anything else. You can select what type of motion is recorded. With humans and vehicles, the camera will automatically pivot and follow the movement.

When someone approaches the view of the camera, it will automatically track the person, pivoting and zooming in so you can get a closer look. The AI worked wonderfully, and I never saw any issues like confusing an animal or blowing tree branch with a person or car. If you ever have any issues with false alerts or recordings, you can customize the sensitivity of the motion detection.

I installed the camera in my front yard at a corner of my home. While it worked well following people and cars, I was happy to see that it even rotated and recorded when I was raking leaves in the side yard. Without that pan/tilt ability, I would likely have to install two cameras to keep track of both of those areas.

Video quality was great during the day and at night. Eufy says that you should be able to see details, like a license plate, up to 50 feet away from the camera. But during the day, I was able to see faces and license plates down the street, at least 75 to 100 feet away from the camera.

The camera can also be used with two major smart home systems: Amazon Alexa and Google Home. Unfortunately, Apple HomeKit isn’t supported, which is a bit of a surprise as many Eufy cameras support the protocol.

I used the camera with Amazon Alexa and was able to see a live view of the camera on my Echo Show and even in the Alexa app.

Harness the Power of the Sun With an Included Solar Panel

There is also an additional add-on not usually found with other outdoor cameras, an included solar panel. With it, you shouldn’t need to worry at all about ever recharging the camera’s battery.

Panel placement is flexible depending on the most sun coverage. You can screw it onto the SoloCam S340 with the included hardware and plug it into the back of the camera’s USB-C port. Optionally, you can install it a bit away using the included cord and then plug it into the camera. There is also an additional 6-foot extension cord.

The panel can swivel up and down and side to side to help you find the best possible location for sun coverage.

If, for some reason, you don’t want to use the panel, Eufy says the SoloCam S340 can last for up to three months of normal operation on a single charge. But the solar charging provides true flexibility, and you never have to worry about climbing a ladder and removing the camera for a recharge.

To better make use of the battery and solar charger, there are three different options regarding recording length. In the Optimal Battery Life Mode, the video clip length is 20 seconds. With Optimal Surveillance, that increases to 60 seconds. You can also choose a custom mode to specify both clip length and detection period. In my use, Optimal Surveillance was the best mode as it provided a great balance between battery life and video recordings.

To better understand how the solar panel is working on battery charging, the Eufy app offers a full battery dashboard with current charge percentage and more. You can see how the battery charge has gone up or down in the last week or month. That can be essential, especially when the seasons change and you might need to reorient the solar panel for a better charge.

I completely charged the SoloCam S340 before installing, and in a little more than two weeks of use, the battery is still at 100 percent. While other cameras like Arlo and Ring do have the ability for solar chargers, they are an additional cost and don’t offer the simplicity of being attached directly to the camera. That’s a big plus for anyone who is looking for simple outdoor surveillance.

Built-In Storage Pays off in the Long Run

Another big plus for the SoloCam S340 is where recorded video is stored. For most outdoor cameras, you’ll need to be prepared to pay anywhere from $3 to $10 a month to store and view recorded video events.

In just a few years of use, that cost alone can almost be as much as the camera itself. Eufy offers a somewhat novel approach to the issue—8GB of built-in storage. In my testing, though, it has held up just fine.

With the small amount of storage, don’t expect to be able to view video from months ago. But for a few days, or even a week of recordings, you’ll be just fine. If you’re worried about the storage limit, you can downgrade the quality of recorded video from the full 3K to 1080P or 720P.

In my use, depending on how much action was captured, I could easily store at least a week of recordings with full 3K, so I will keep using the highest quality setting for now.

If you’re worried about the storage limit, you can also subscribe to Eufy’s cloud option for $2.99 per month, which will store recordings from a single camera for up to 30 days.

Should You Buy the Eufy SoloCam S340?

If you’re looking for an outdoor video surveillance camera, it’s hard to go wrong with the Eufy SoloCam S340, as long as you aren’t an Apple HomeKit user. The camera is similarly priced to other options on the market, but offers a ton of more features.

Being able to store video locally without needing to pay for a cloud storage subscription and the included solar panel make the SoloCam S340 a perfect way to keep an eye on your home’s exterior.

Eufy SoloCam S340

Eufy SoloCam S340 provides a top-notch way to keep an eye on what’s happening outside of your home. The camera provides a full, 360-degree look at your location using pan/tilt. The camera also features dual lenses, a wide-angle 3K lens and telephoto 2K option. Together, those provide up to 8x hybrid zoom so you can get a closer look. And instead of paying extra for cloud storage, the S340 features 8GB of included memory.