Today, we are happy to announce new doorbell APIs for smart home cameras and doorbells, unlocking new customer scenarios in home automation and monitoring. By updating your smart home skill to use either or both of the new Doorbell Event Source and Motion Sensor APIs, you can enable your customers to connect their doorbell press and camera motion sensors to Alexa. These new additions to the Smart Home Skill API are available today in the US, with support for additional locales coming soon. By implementing these APIs, customers can turn on voice “Announcements” for your smart home camera or doorbell by visiting the smart home section of the Alexa App. Customers can also set up smart home automations using doorbell or motion events like turning on lights, playing music or custom announcements using Routines within the Alexa app. Ring and August have implemented these new APIs so that customers can take advantage of the benefits of smart home automation.

In addition to the above APIs, we have also released the 2-Way Communication API that enables smart cameras and doorbells to establish a 2-way communication with Echo Show and Echo Spot. Ring has implemented the 2-way communication API and this feature is coming soon with August. We currently support only WebRTC compliant cameras or 3Ps who use a WebRTC bridge to connect to Alexa. Alexa voice commands are currently only available for full duplex cameras. Half duplex cameras will have push to talk capabilities on the Echo Show or Echo Spot.

Get Started

• Learn about smart home development with Alexa
• Read the Smart Home Skill API documentation
• To create a skill from scratch, see Steps to Create a Smart Home Skill
• Learn how to Build Smart Home Camera Skills
• Learn more about the Doorbell Event, Motion Sensor, and 2-Way Communication APIs
• For more information about state reporting, see Understand State Reporting for Smart Home Skill