Hi,
I would like to do a backup of the SD card contents on my Wyze 3 Camera, but can not find any way to do that.
Any input is appreciated.
Thanks,
Gerry
You would need to pop the card and read it with a computer.
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It is winter here in Canada and the camera is 16 feet off the ground. The camera is connected to my local network, why would I need to remove the card?
You have no file system access thru the app. The best you could do is record a clip.
If you want to backup the entire multi-GB contents, the only way would be to read the card with a computer.
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Gerry - Do you need to backup everything currently on the SD card, or do you need to backup certain things on the SD card?
This has been requested before. If someone could find a way to hack into the internal linux OS, it would be fairly easy via SCP or better yet being able to remotely mount the file system. As far as I know, no one has figured out how to do that. Would be nice.
Hi,
I would like to back up the complete card contents. It looks like Wyze is not allowing us access to our video feeds other than to view through the app.
I have lots of backup capacity and would like to have more archive available than just the card capacity before it is overwritten.
I agree, that would be nice. Unfortunately, I am no where near a good enough linux hacker to figure it out…
If you are just looking to backup your video feed, then you can install RTSP firmware and use a 3rd party app to record the feed. However, I have zero experience with RTSP.
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It seems odd we would need to hack into a camera we own to download the data that is also our content. I think this is by design, so Wyze can sell us access to our data. I understand the need to make money, but you need to be reasonable. A camera I paid for connected to my network generating my data should be accessible to me at no charge.
I run Linux because I don’t want someone else deciding what I can do with my computer or the data on it.
I have been trying to make these cameras work for me, but it is starting to look like I may not be able to do that.
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I have looked at that, but was trying to preserve the other functions that I am told may not work with RTSP firmware.
I may need to go that route, though.
Thanks,
Gerry
Some people who want both RTSP and other functions end up just having 2 cams covering the same area. Then you get all the extra features on one cam (maybe all the AI detections, etc), and the second cam running RTSP to continue to have the full stream stored on an NAS. Also, with RTSP people have said they have been able to do their own person and object detection programs for free among many other features. So it is certainly worth looking into. Thankfully Wyze cams are fairly affordable, so having a second cam isn’t too bad of an extra cost even if you run 2 in order to have the best of both worlds.
Edit: If you do this, I would recommend not having them side-by-side. exactly, but make use of them of them by having them cover the same area from different angles and covering each other, so they are still separately useful.
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I agree with the gist of this. I am also a long time Linux user and OS/2 before that. Monkey$oft has always been crap… And along with the mobile OSes, far too susceptible to big tech tyranny.
What also bothers me about wyze is the inability to access footage recorded to microSD earlier than the two weeks allowed by cloud recording. I would have much less of a beef if that was possible.
I continue to maintain that this is a comprehensive solution…
Not trying to be combative here, but this reeks of false government spending mentality… The sort that is used to justify over-taxation, perpetual budget mis-allocation, and bloat. Most of us are not interested in buying two of everything logistically or budgetarily when a better designed solution is in order… 
I have been doing some more reading and I think I will try the RTSP firmware.
It looks like my NAS (Asustor) has an app I can import the cameras into and get some of the functions I want.
My trial of Cam plus will expire in a week, so I will sign up for a month to see if it is functional before committing to it.
Thanks,
Gerry
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No worries. I get it. Single coverage goes farther for less money, I did this at first, and still do in most indoor areas that I don’t care much about. Even now, it is only my few outdoor areas that I consider critical that have redundant coverage. I was mentioning it as an option for the people who don’t mind since the cameras are routinely only $20-$35.
The reason I have more than a single device covering an area include the following:
- I personally double up viewing area in critical areas so there is always a failsafe.
- I usually have the second camera coverage through another company too, that way if one company’s servers go down, the other can show me stuff and keep recording, alerting, etc.
- I also often have cameras covering the same area, but often from different ends and pointed slightly toward each other, so a person can’t sneak up behind any of the cameras and sabotage them without getting caught by the other camera.
These kinds of methods are pretty standard practice in the tech world (not just government). Often companies have multiple servers so if one goes down they don’t necessarily totally go down. Or Cloud storage is built this way to store the exact same data more than once, so if one harddrive crashes, the data isn’t lost. Even home storage is often turning to Redundant Arraay of Independent Disks as an example. Nearly anything professional is done based on these principles already.
Regardless, it would be preferable to have ALL the features simultaneously available in the cam at the same time for logistical and budgetary convenience as mentioned. The problem is that the V3’s don’t have the resources to run the RTSP AND get all the newer features. They don’t have the memory, processor, etc to do it all, so it’s just not something Wyze CAN do with the current model. That is why they branched the firmware into an either/or situation because it is just not capable of both.
This is also not uncommon with some competitors. For example, with my Eufy cams, even though RTSP and normal function are both on the cam at the same time, if I turn on RTSP, I automatically LOSE other features, they straight disable some things, including 2K recording getting disabled.
But I think the best solution here would be to use RTSP. The Wyze AI and cloud stuff is awesome and convenient (and I love it and use it myself on dozens of cams), but using RTSP firmware will allow a person to run the stream through other AI programs to still get all those detections and in a way not lose any functionality. So if a person definitely just wants a single cam, that is probably the way to go.
Alternatively, there are 3rd party solutions such as a new Home Assistant Docker app that will take the regular Wyze stream and make it act like RTSP. Others have leveraged Tiny Cam Pro to get the cams to run as though they are RTSP. So there are definitely plenty of options out there depending on an individual’s personal preferences and which solution they wish to employ. I was just giving options. 
Totally understand and respect the single cam coverage model though, as that’s all I do indoors too.
What? If you have either large enough card that it lasts more than two weeks (or use event only recording), or have a camera that runs at a fairly low data rate because nothing ever changes, you certainly can watch uSD card based recordings more than two weeks old. No, a 32GB card with continuous recording set for the highest resolution and lots of motion, will not last anywhere near that long. I have a couple cameras where the motion almost never changes, and larger cards that routinely last more than 2 weeks.
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Yes, I agree with you. I access videos on my cams as far back as a month on some of my larger cards, or those that I set to record events only instead of continuous. I have never been limited to 2 weeks.
It just needs to be accessed from the camera → playback section directly, instead of linking to it from the Events tab. The events tab will still only go back 2 weeks, but the SD card recordings access goes back as far as there are recordings. Just can’t look for it in events, because events just means cloud. Wyze could relabel that for clarity, but they were trying to keep it short and fairly fairly intuitive.
I appreciate your response, but I think you misunderstand the import of my statement. Totally agree with you that 32gb gets you way more than 2 weeks… Especially using event-based recording only which I do.
The issue is, the only way to access footage further back than 2 weeks is to remove the card and browse through the folders. Historically, you can’t choose a date prior to the two week threshold and view conveniently through the app on a device. I stand corrected if that has changed or is about to change.
EDIT-1: Happy to discover that it actually is possible to access local recording prior to two weeks ago via the app now. Not sure this was the case back in the day, but my comments above aren’t accurate.
In my experience, this has never been the case.
From the home screen select any of your cams with an SD card in it. Select the bar at the bottom that says “View Playback” and then you will see a sliding timeline and a Date just below that. You can slide along the timeline to any date/time with video, or take a shortcut by clicking on the date and change it back to whatever date you want to jump to. If you view a date with no playback it will tell you there is no playback at the selected time, so move forward to when the last video is.
Doing this you can view videos even months ago if you have a big enough card or are set to record just events.
Hopefully that helps you no longer be limited by the 2 weeks in the cloud events tab now SD card is accessible as far back as there are recordings. 
Pretty much always worked this way. Maybe they should add a notice in the events tab or something so it’s more clear.