Nest is responding to COVID-19 with the lowering of camera quality and bandwidth usage for all users.
According to an email sent to all users, Nest specifies that settings for quality and bandwidth will be adjusted to the “default setting.” This move should put less strain on local networks as many individuals are working from home during existing stay-in-shelter orders.
To answer the global call from ISPs to prioritize bandwidth for learning and working, in the next few days we’re going to be adjusting the quality and bandwidth setting on Nest cameras to the default setting.
This change is temporary, and you may notice a difference in quality, but only the quality and bandwidth setting will be adjusted. All other settings will stay the same, and all core features will continue to work. However, if your needs require a higher video quality setting, you can easily change it back at any time by going to your camera settings.
As Nest notes above, you can always switch back to whatever setting you want, but if you don’t need the extra quality, feel free to leave your camera feeds at the default setting. We can all do our part to make these times a bit less terrible, whether it be limit our bandwidth usage, to staying away from crowded areas.
// Nest