Ring Desktop App Discontinuation

App updates are seriously among the smallest problems for desktop app users.

Everyone here (and everywhere else, too) would opt-in for continued desktop apps. They are the reason to choose Ring products over others.

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Iā€™m finding many applications, not just Ring, that are prejudiced against older people. Likely Ring and other companies hire new, near adolescent, programmers who live exclusively with their cell phones.

Managing my devices, including electronic items such as my thermostat, are far easier on my desktop/laptop.

As a security device I would expect many options to view my home cameras as a basic feature. Like sirens, security issues need to be broadcast far and wide immediately.

Why deprecate or eliminate the product entirely? Keep it until you have something better and start hiring older programmers who know how to program with Mac, Windows, and Linux in mind.

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but isnt the Ring app just an embedded ā€˜browserā€™ anyway?

Very poor decision by Ring. How does a browser remain ā€˜always onā€™ so that the functionality of it actually works? a typical user closes browser window/tabs when not used (and having too many open causes problems on some computers).

A stand-alone app is essential because

  • it can be started automatically at login
  • it can be kept open even it crashed or accidentally quit (via a cronjob)
  • and automatically logs in

There is also the other matter that Ring.com wont support Safari on macOS for 1 year (at least, most companies fail to meet rollout promises). So they are deprecating the App whilst not providing an alternative. I do not permit the use of Google Chrome in my company for various reasons, and I am not alone.

If there is no desktop app then the product is not fit for the purpose for which it was intended, a browser/website cannot perform the tasks that the app can do, which is monitor and provide live notifications, I will be asking for my money back.

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Please reconsider discontinuing the desktop app, or at least replace it with a simplified background utility that lives in the menubar or system tray to provide live video popups and the ability to answer rings without going to the webpage. Iā€™m fine with having to use the app or webpage for more advanced functionality.

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If you want to lose the lead in home security, this is a great way to do it.

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Terrible idea unless you change the login process.

Every time I switch to the ring tab I have to login FOUR TIMES, and thats not including the times the 3 ā€œpick the correctly positioned animalā€ pops up, and by the time Iā€™ve logged in the sound Iā€™ve heard outside is gone.

Google Chrome? The worlds most compromised browser? Because hey, Google is now evil much less doing no evil. Edge? Likewise. But not the more secure browsers ? Yeah I know, but everything is relative.

Just now sitting with the laptop (MacBook) heard some commotion and thought to check on what it was. Oops. Live View is not available in your browser. Suggest you get Chrome and just give all your data to Google. Or Edge (which isnā€™t going to work so well with your Apple. Oh well).

As several someones have noted even if I wanted to go pickup the phone the screen is much too small to be useful most of the time. No matter how ginormous your phone is.

Iā€™m afraid to ask. If I pulled out the iPad is the app for it still working?

This is one of those corporate occasions where the suits think they have a captive audience. But soon as someday somewhere someone markets a solution just like the one you did originally weā€™ll all be gone in the blink of an eye.

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I was skeptical about abandoning the desktop app for the web app, but after having it for a few months I can confidently say that the web app is garbage. I need an app (whether desktop or webapp) that has one-click live view. If I want to get to live view with the web app then I bring up a browser, click on my shortcut, type in my username and password, get an error page saying I need to enter two-factor authentication, wait for the 2FA text, enter the code, then sigh as my live view is now displaying nothing because of how long it took to get to it. All the webapp is good for is a daily dose of disappointment. The webapp will never be secure without 2FA and it will never be useful with it. Bring back the desktop app or give me the ability to build one for my Ring device on my own.

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Just tossing my 2 cents in the mix. Ring.com is not 100% feature rich yet, so far Iā€™m noticing these critical features are missing which are critical for our business to respond to visitors in a timely manor.

  1. Sound & Push (Win 10 Toast) notifications missing. Yes, read thatā€™s itā€™s being worked on but Iā€™m not sure how you can remove the desktop app without these features in place before shutting down the app.
  2. Ring.com browser sign out seems to happen after 30 minutes. You canā€™t expect our users to sign in every 30minutes in order to receive event updates & notifications.
  3. The browser is not as responsive. The video in the browser seems to lag when loading live view and the first few videos of the History. After that load (buffer?) period, things seem to work as expect. Not a deal breaker but definitely not as responsive as Desktop App.
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I was disappointed to see that the Ring Desktop app for Mac OS is being scrapped but have been trying to use the web app as a replacement. The problem Iā€™ve been having is that it keeps logging me out after a short time so whenever the doorbell rings I donā€™t have anywhere near enough time to log in again and open the doorbell camera!

This basically makes the app useless to me - Iā€™m on my computer all day and need to be notified and able to respond to people ringing my doorbell quickly, which is simply not possible with the login timeout that the web app has.

Itā€™s a nice app once youā€™re in, but sad to say itā€™s just not fit for purpose as a result of this issue.

I fully understand the need for security etc. so please donā€™t explain that to me (Iā€™m a software developer myself) but aggressive session timeouts defeat the whole point of the application - this hasnā€™t been thought through at all.

Is there any plan to solve this issue for the desktop or is Ring essentially a ā€œmobile onlyā€ solution now?

If not then PLEASE consider maintaining the current desktop apps to at least provide the basic functionality for us in future.

Note for the development team: if you donā€™t want to maintain the desktop app UIs, the desktop applications could simply become local token-providers to allow the web app to silently authenticate without requiring the lengthy input of credentials every time?

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This is absolutely terrible. A browser solution is no way a replacement for an app. Who wants to sign in every 30 minutes.

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I came here specifically to throw in my support for the Ring App.

Why on earth would Ring discontinue an app that gives people instant access to their live camera notifications without having to lift a finger?

Why does Ring think itā€™s more convenient to ditch the app and instead have the user bring up their browser, go through the process of logging into their account, losing several seconds to almost a minute to gain access to their feed?

This is ludicrous.

Why does Ring have to ruin this wonderful experience that their users have been enjoying in favor of a more complicated portal experience?

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Please do not discontinue the desktop app, this makes no sense and is very inconvenient for many many reasons!

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To discontinue the desktop app is an incredibly badly considered move.

I imagine you will lose a lot of customers as a resultā€¦ me for one. I will see how it goes, but I imagine that Iā€™ll just try and sell my Ring doorbell and get a different one that does have a desktop app.

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I just discovered using Firefox or Safari on my Mac I cannot access Live Viewā€¦says I need Google Chrome or Edge. That is completely unsatisfactory!! Whoever at Ring came up with the bright idea to eliminate the App for Mac should be fired! This idea is stupid and is backward thinking. Makes using Ring on my Desktop a royal PITA! Many alternatives to Ring now available and this idea will cause many cancellations! Hope people at Ring reconsider this terrible idea!

Once again. It is the 3rd of December. If I log into ring.com I am required to use 2fa. After a few minutes, I am required to login again with 2fa. This is NOT going to work. I need to be able to be notified of an event. I need to have it pop up without prompting. I need NEED to be able to trust my security system to notify me ā€œwheneverā€ not just when I have my phone open. If this is an Amazon idea, itā€™s really dumb, if it is a ring.com corporate idea it is deadly. I know I will be finding a suitable replacement.

I need something that will show up on my TV as well as my computer. It only sometimes works and works so slowly, when it does, that itā€™s worthless. I donā€™t know how you and Amazon can claim this as a feature when it works so poorly.

Last I checked it still doesnā€™t work with Safari. I canā€™t pull up a camera.

And the Chrome version has very limited event history and itā€™s hard to get to.

Step up guys!

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Iā€™m disappointed to see the desktop app going away, but Iā€™m suspecting that itā€™s based on market research, utilization metrics, and acceptable collateral damage (i.e. if the bean counters think that youā€™ll lose $10m/year in revenue, but save $20m/year in development costs, than it may be a business positive.

That said, Ring should make feature parity for the web apps a required milestone for sunsetting the app. Ringā€™s mediocre notifications process for low battery coupled with the inability to see device health on the web today means that Iā€™m more likely to get surprised with a nearly dead battery or a dark camera.

I pull my phone out to look at the Ring app when Iā€™m not at home (the wrong time to charge a battery). I am on my laptop and using desktop or web apps when I am at home (the right time to charge a battery).

Live view on Safari is also a bit of an oversight. That should have been at the top of the list when the team evaluated sunsetting the Mac app.

Weā€™ll see; Iā€™m holding off on extra cameras until I see if this is really temporary or permanent.

Just re-iterating that probably 90% of my Ring interaction is through the desktop app and the constant 2fa when using the web browser is untenable. I am clearly not the only person in this position. You must re-think.

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Well. After todayā€™s shenanigans, this is a perfect illustration of why forcing everyone to use the online system is flawed beyond belief.

My desktop app is still apparently working (though I am sure some motion alerts were missed earlier today). But after reading about the problems Amazon and Ring have been having today, I discovered I cannot log into my Ring account, and I got several errors trying to log in here.

My Ring annual subscription was renewed less than a month ago. It will be the last time, as I am moving away from Ring at the earliest opportunity.

Ring dot com IS NOT the same as the desktop app, and it never could be. And this proves it, with bells and whistles on.

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