There is no escaping the fact that the Blink Mini camera doesn’t record all of the time nor does it come anywhere close to it if the truth be told.
The Mini has a couple of different ways that it records: motion clips and live view recordings but the maximum length of the video clips that either option offers is very short in relative terms.
The Blink Mini also offers their users two ways of storing any clips which are recorded- remotely (with a subscription plan) or locally on a USB stick attached to a Sync Module. But neither of these two options allow a user to flick a switch and turn their Mini into a camera that records all day every day.
To be clear, all of the options that I explain in this article will need a Blink subscription. Some of them can be used by using a Sync Module 2. None of them will work if you are trying to use your Mini on its own
What are the longest motion clips that they can record?
It could be argued that one of the main purposes of the Blink Mini camera is as a motion detection camera.
And you can modify the length of these clips within the motion settings menu for each individual camera.
But the longest clip that you can opt for in this menu is 30 seconds which isn’t much different from the shortest length of clip- which is 5 seconds.
The recording and storing of these motion clips are available with both a Blink Mini that isn’t connected to a subscription plan but is connected to a Sync Module 2 and to a Mini that is connected to a subscription plan.
But what is a bit strange is that these 30 seconds motion clips aren’t the longest videos that a Mini can record.
And we will talk about that in the next section.
What about recording live views?
The longest video clip that a Blink Mini can record is five minutes and it is a five minute video that can be recorded when a user connects to their camera’s live view.
This feature is only available with a Blink subscription plan.
Once you are connected to a Blink Mini’s live view, the video can be created by tapping on the icon of a black arrow in a cloud which is at the bottom left hand corner of the screen.
As soon as the option is selected, the icon will change to a white check or tick on a blue circular background which shows that a recording is in progress.
Five minutes is the maximum length of recording that can be made and so if this is what you want to do just don’t touch the screen and continue to watch the feed from your camera.
Once five minutes is up, the recording will stop automatically. If you want to watch it then go to the homepage of the Blink app and tap on the “clip” icon at the bottom of the screen in the centre.
What’s interesting is that if you don’t stop the recording manually by tapping on the tapping on the icon of the blue circle and white check when you next connect to a live view, a five minute recording will start automatically. The Blue circle and white check icon is already on display.
If you want to make a recording of less than five minutes, you just need to tap on the icon of the blue circle and white check when you want to stop the recording. To watch the clip, go to the homepage of the Blink app and tap on the “clip” icon at the bottom of the screen in the centre.
90 minute live views
If live view is the next best thing to a video clip, then the Blink Mini does offer something a bit special- it is a 90 minute live view connection. This feature is only available with a Blink subscription plan. And unfortunately this extended session cannot be recorded.
Closest thing to constant recording
So if a Blink Mini can’t record all of the time, how can we optimise the settings in order to get it to record as much video as possible?
Although the longest videos are created through a live view connection, obviously the effort involved in manually having to establish a connection is something that most users haven’t got time to do.
But within the motion settings app there are a few options that you can tweak in order to record as much video as possible.
I have created a video for you to watch below.
Firstly, make sure that the activity zone is as large as possible.
Then set the retrigger time (the time between a motion alert that the camera goes to sleep) to its lowest setting of eleven seconds.)
Next, set the sensitivity to its highest setting of 9 and then change the clip length to its maximum, 30 seconds.
Finally, because these settings will increase the amount of video that your Blink Mini records, they will also lead to a huge spike in the number of notifications that you receive.
If you are just interested in the recordings and not the notifications then turn them off by opening the settings menu from the homepage of the Blink app and selecting notifications and then notification options and toggle the show notifications option to off.
To finish this article off I want to discuss a contradiction related to a Blink Mini camera’s ability to record such short videos.
Which is why has the camera got such a large capacity to store clips when it is set up to record so few?
The two storage systems that the Mini uses are the subscription plan and a Sync Module 2 with a USB stick.
What is the storage capacity of a Blink subscription plan?
As part of your monthly plan, you can store an unlimited number of video clips of unlimited lengths for 60 days (US) or 30 days (Europe.) All of these are viewable from the clip menu in the Blink app.
What is the storage capacity of a Sync Module 2?
The largest USB stick in terms of capacity that you can use with your Sync Module 2 is 256GB. Your Blink Mini can record video in a few different resolutions, with 1080p being the highest.
It is thought that a 256GB USB stick can store up to 24 hours of 1080p video which to me seems to be very large.
However, unlike the subscription plan, only the most recent 1000 clips from the last 30 days can be viewed via the app.
