Ding! The Smart Doorbell of the Future, Today
Webster’s Dictionary defines “doorbell” this way: “a bell inside a house or building that is rung usually by pushing a button beside an outside door.” How quaint. Now the doorbell has gone all smart. Take Ding, for example. Ding is a smart doorbell that looks sleek and stylish but has more, er, bells and whistles under its charming exterior.
It has three elements that work together seamlessly: a discreet doorbell button that’s fixed near your front door, a doorbell chime that looks cool and alerts you in your home when a visitor arrives and a free app for your smartphone.
Using the wonders of modern technology, the Ding system lets you speak to the person ringing your doorbell from anywhere in the world: When he or she presses the doorbell button, the chime rings in your home and at the same time connects to the Ding app on your smartphone. Just imagine: The FedEx delivery person is at your door and rings the bell. You, speaking from your hotel room in Paris: “Hi! Can you please leave the box with Will Starrett at number 43 next door? Thank you!”
Of course, the instant-talk feature could be handy in other situations too, such as if you’re bathing a child when the visitor rings the doorbell. You can ask them to wait for a minute until the baby is safely out of the tub and all dried and dressed.
“At the moment there are either ‘dumb doorbells’ that come with your house or are bought in a rush from a hardware store or ‘smart doorbells’ that are driven by technology, offering you more features than you could ever use,” they explain.
We think they succeeded.
As for setup, you can either hard-wire the Ding to your home or run it on battery power. The button connects via Wi-Fi to the chime, and it has a range of around 120 feet.
Find the chime too loud? No problem. You can use the Ding app to lower the volume or change the sound, and you can even set it to mute when you’re heading off to bed.
Ding hit its funding target on Kickstarter this month, and Nussey and O’Neil are now accepting preorders.