Ring Smart Lighting Solar Floodlight review: Bright choice

By Alina Bradford Published April 21, 2022

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The Ring Smart Lighting Solar Floodlight is the answer to your outdoor security needs, especially if you don’t know anything about wiring and don’t want to hire an electrician to get security lights outside your home. This light mounts easily and is powered by a solar panel. No need to worry about batteries or wiring, and installation takes an amazingly quick 5 to 10 minutes. Even better? The Ring app gives you full control over this smart light. Really, there’s nothing not to like

This writer’s backyard gets as dark as a mine shaft at night, so I need a floodlight that can really put out the light. I wasn’t too sure that a solar light would be able to do the job. But when I tried out the Ring Smart Lighting Solar Floodlight on a cloudy night, it lit up most of the quarter-acre lot behind my home.

If you need a little less wattage for your cottage, the Ring app allows you to control the brightness.

It’s adjustable, as well. If you need a little less wattage for your cottage, the Ring app allows you to control the brightness to whatever your yard needs. Altogether, the light provides up to 1,200 lumens of white light (3500K color temperature).

You would think that a simple floodlight wouldn’t have too many app features. Just on, off, and maybe a brightness control, right? Well, the Ring Smart Lighting Solar Floodlight has quite a bit more functionality on the Ring app. In addition to changing the brightness, you can also turn on a motion detection option that will make the light turn on when it senses something moving in the area. You can choose whether or not you want an alert on your phone every time motion is detected, as well.

It really only detected when my dogs moved around and didn’t detect bug movement, which can be a lot here in Texas.

You can adjust the sensitivity, too, so the light doesn’t turn on every time a moth floats by. I set the light up to medium sensitivity and then left my dogs in the backyard for a few hours. A glance at the Event History section of the app told me that the light only came on a handful of times, which means it really only detected when my dogs moved around and didn’t detect bug movement, which can be a lot here in Texas.

The app also gives you the ability to put your floodlight on a schedule. You can link it up with other lights in your home or put it on its own schedule. I set it up to only come on from dusk to dawn, which gives it time to fully power up the battery during the day. Pairing with other devices like the Ring Video Doorbell 3 Plus is a great idea, too. For example, every time your floodlight detects motion it can be set up to turn on your video doorbell’s camera automatically. This ensures that if someone tries sneaking around your property, you have a better chance of catching some video footage of the person — plus it’s a wonderful deterrent.

By far, my favorite feature of the Ring Smart Lighting Solar Floodlight is that it is solar. No need to wire up anything or change out batteries. As long as you put the 2W solar panel in a sunny spot, you’re pretty much good to go.  My backyard has quite a bit of shade, but even so the battery charged just fine. While the solar panel is awesome, it’s dedicated to the light, so it can’t be used with other products.

One important thing to remember is that you will need to buy a Ring Bridge for the floodlight in order for it to connect with the app and to pair it with other lights and smart devices in your home, plus, it reduces the strain to your home’s Wi-Fi. The Ring Bridge is $50 and is about the size of half a deck of cards, so it will take up very little room in your home. Unfortunately, it can’t be used with devices that aren’t made by Ring.

I really can’t say enough good things about this light. The Ring Smart Lighting Solar Floodlight ($90) is affordable, easy to install, and has zero upkeep. The app gives you all the control you’ve ever dreamed of when it comes to an outdoor light. Really, this product fulfilled all of my outdoor security lighting needs.

Not really. There are quite a few solar powered floodlights on the market at a range of prices from $35 to $600, but there are very few that can be controlled with an app, and likely none that can be connected to other lights in your home. The closest light to compare the Ring Smart Lighting Solar Floodlight to is the Link2Home Security Solar Floodlight ($40): It’s programmable, but not really “smart,” and can’t be linked with other smart devices.

I think it will stand the test of time. It is rated to withstand -4 degrees F to 122 degrees F (-20°C to 50°C) and is weather resistant with an IP66 rating. It also has a 1-year limited warranty.

Yes, there’s really no reason why you wouldn’t love this light.