As you’ll discover if you try to buy one: Google has discontinued both its outdoor IQ Cam. In its online store, you’ll simply see a greyed-out buy button saying ‘Out of stock’.
But the company has confirmed that the cameras won’t ever be back in stock in a statement, which it has reiterated on Twitter when users question why it’s out of stock.
The statement reads: “We’ve sold out of Nest Cam IQ Outdoor, and it will no longer be available on the Google Store. Nest Cam IQ Outdoor users won’t see any change in their service. We’ll continue to deliver ongoing feature support, software fixes, and critical security updates.”
Although the IQ Indoor isn’t mentioned, it’s also ‘Out of stock’ on the UK version of the store (but remains available to buy in the US).
If you already own a Nest Cam IQ, it will continue to work as normal.
But it’s odd that you can still buy the original – and even older – Nest Cam Indoor (above, a development of the original Dropcam!) and the first version of the Nest Cam Outdoor, which launched in 2016. These lack some of the features available with the IQ versions, such as Supersight which uses the increased resolution of the sensor to crop in on people and ‘follow’ them around.
When will the new Nest Cam be launched?
The final part of Google’s statement reads “Nest will keep investing in new innovations, including a new lineup of security cameras for 2021.”
This was back in January, and since then no additional information has been volunteered, with replies on Twitter sticking to the same wording.
Hi James, we came across your tweet and thought we could help. We’ve sold out of Nest Cam IQ Outdoor and it’ll no longer be available for sale on the Google Store. Our team will keep investing in new innovations, including a new lineup of security cameras for 2021. 1/2
— Made By Google (@madebygoogle)
March 11, 2021
Unlike phones, which tend to have an annual release schedule, security cameras launches tend to be a lot more ad-hoc so there’s no telling when Google will announce the promised new models.
The Nest Cam IQ (later rebranded as IQ Indoor) launched in June 2017, followed by the IQ Outdoor in September.
So those are two possible months when we could see the new devices unveiled. The latter could be more likely, given that Google tends to hold a launch event in September every year.
Google I/O 2021 came and went in mid-May, and while we were introduced to new versions of Android and Wear OS, no new hardware (including Nest Cams) appeared on stage.
What features will the new Nest Cam range have?
This is where there’s literally no information whatsoever. We’ll update this article when any leaks or rumours surface, but for now, Google is staying tight-lipped about what it’s working on.
In August 2020 – it bought a stake in security company ADT and said that the two companies “will offer customers an advanced, integrated helpful home security solution [which] will sit at the centre of the new, helpful home, and advances in machine learning will transform the smart home security customer experience.”
So, it’s possible that the new Nest Cam lineup will be a part of this as yet unreleased ‘solution’. We’ll have to wait and see.
Our guess is that Google won’t change Nest Aware, the subscription service that sits alongside the cameras. This was always way too expensive considering the high prices of the cameras themselves, but with ‘Aware v2’ that changed and a lower-priced annual subscription covered all your cameras instead of having to pay for each one individually.
If you need to buy something now and don’t want to wait for Google to launch new models, here are the best security cameras.
Don’t forget, though, that you can still buy both Outdoor and Indoor cameras from other retailers which still have stock, though it’s disappearing fast. In the UK at the time of writing for example, Screwfix had stock of the IQ Indoor.
