Ring Doorbell 2 Solar Charging Questions

There seem to be a number of related issues on this forum regarding the solar charger for the Ring Doorbell 2. I installed my solar charging mount on March 31. At that time I had charged the battery to 100%. After installing the solar charging mount, there was no way to tell whether that device was working or not. The device health section of the Ring app indicated that the doorbell was on battery power, but there is no indicator that the solar charger is attached. Now, almost three weeks later, the battery level is down to 46%. I have been checking the battery level every few days and each reading is lower than the previous reading, so there appears to be no charging happening. I have the charger and doorbell mounted on a south facing wall that gets sunlight continuously throughout the day. I have double-checked all connections and everything is installed according to Ring’s requirements.

My questions are:

  1. Other messages on this forum have indicated that the Ring app is supposed to indicate that a solar charging mount is attached. Is this true?

  2. I realize that the charger is supposed to provide a trickle charge, but does it wait for the battery level to drop to a certain percentage (such as 20%) before it begins charging?

Unfortunately there seem to be numerous complaints about these issues and Ring has seemingly done a poor job of responding to them. Additionally, the instructions for installing and operating the solar charger are pathetically thin.

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Hey @kelleydr. Thanks for bringing your concerns up! I’m happy to help address them. For your first question, you should see on the device’s profile page, where you see a little picture of the device and have different settings to pick from, the little battery icon at the top right should show a charging green battery, if it is connected to a solar panel that is getting sunlight, or if it is getting a trickle charge from being hardwired to an existing Doorbell setup. If you do not see this icon, it’s possible that it may not be sunny enough, or night time. I recommend checking this when you know the solar panel is receiving sunlight. If the battery icon at the top right is not showing a lighting bolt that it’s charging, the solar panel is not registering, and you will need to reach out to our support team here on this. You can also check the Device Health page, which should the device as hardwired or charging. You may see a message that says “connect a solar panel for extended battery life,” which we have isolated to be a bug in the app for users that have the solar panel connected appropriately and see the charging green battery icon. We are working on getting this bug fixed ASAP. If you do not have the charging icon, then that is another concern that will need to be addressed with our support team.

To answer your second question, the charger should provide about a 10% trickle charge if you are receiving 4 hours of direct sunlight a day. It will charge it as long as the weather isn’t too cold and those requirements have been met, as cold weather can halt the battery inside the Doorbell from charging. Therefore, with neighbors with a properly working solar panel and enough sunlight, we’ve found they still get the proper charge and their battery is fine, it’s just the app will say “add a solar panel,” but this is indeed a bug. Please note too, that some neighbors may have excessive motion events happening, normally when it’s more than 10 events a day, and therefore this will also rapidly decrease the battery life, despite having it charging as well. Hope this helps clear it up for you, and I encourage you to reach out to support, as it seems your device is not charging with the solar panel!

Thank you. Your answer was helpful. It is evident that although the solar charge is correctly installed and is receiving almost 8 hours of direct sunlight, that it is not working. I assume that I should contact the link that you provided to arrange for a replacement to be provided?

Also, while your information answered my questions, I have to wonder why I had to resort to using this forum to ask them. This information could easily have been provided in documentation with the solar charging device, or obtainable more easily in an FAQ online. I must say that given my experience with the doorbell and now with the solar charger that I am underwhelmed with Ring.

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@kelleydr Yes, definitely! If you have not already, please definitely reach out to our support team. For the latter point, I really do appreciate your feedback. I think having this information more readily available for our neighbors in a type of FAQ would be great. I’ll make sure to pass this onto our teams that work on that sort of thing so that they’re aware, thank you!

Abit of advice before you contact Ring customer support to arrange the replacement of your solar charger, they need it’s serial number. Unfortunately it’s not in the box, it’s on the rear of the device. so if you have it screwed to a wall (like mine), get it before you contact Ring.

I have the same issue - solar charger in sunlight, correctly wired to my doorbell, battery losing charge each day. No sign of the battery being charged by the solar charger.

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Update to the lack of solar charging…
I’ve installed the replacement solar charger for doorbell 2 and unsurprisingly, it’s still not charging the doorbell. Are the solar chargers just a fake bit of plastic? Surely Ring’s quality control can’t be that bad that 2 x boxed sealed solar chargers are faulty? Or is Doorbell 2 faulty? Has anyone got a doorbell 2 that actually charges connected to a solar charger for doorbell 2?
I feel the axe coming out this weekend. It’s Johnny!

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Hi, just to give you my experience of the solar add on.

Ive had a Ring Doorbell 2 solar charger for over 12 months.

It has never shown charging on the battery icon when I go to the summary page.
But checking the battery level in device health I can see the percentage which holds steady and even increases when we have the sunshine over here in the UK.

I am happy its working as it should. Solar charger status just says add a ring solar device etc.

Are both the solar charger status and battery icon not showing charging known faults?

I’m having a similar issue with my Ring Doorbell 2 not charging with the solar charger. I have it in the front of my house and it get the direct morning light but I never see the battery level go higher or stay the same, it just keeps going down. I’m beginning to wonder if the solar charger isn’t working. Wish there is a way to tell if it is or isn’t. Where it says Solar Status, it just says Add a Ring solar charger to extend battery life.

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Has anyone actually gotten through to customer service? I tried and it says no one is there because of COVID.