Ubiquiti Protect NVR recorder (Network Video Recorder)

An NVR is the central device of a surveillance system: IP cameras send their video over the network to the recorder, which writes it to hard drives and lets you search and play back recordings later. Unlike a memory card inside a camera, video from every camera is kept in one place, and if a camera is stolen the recording does not disappear with it.

Local recording means video does not have to stream continuously to an external cloud service. That saves internet bandwidth, especially with several cameras, and keeps the footage under the owner's control. Whether and how Protect offers remote viewing is not stated in the supplier data.

The name indicates that the recorder is designed for the Ubiquiti Protect video surveillance platform. The advantage of such a system is that cameras, recorder and management all come from one manufacturer. The supplier data does not include a list of compatible camera models, so check the manufacturer's compatibility list before choosing cameras.

The supplier data does not state the number of channels, the number of drive bays and maximum capacity, whether there are PoE ports, or which video outputs are available. These determine how many cameras can be recorded and for how long. Before installing, look these parameters up in the manufacturer's technical documentation and consider whether hard drives need to be sourced separately.

Businesses, warehouses and homeowners building a surveillance system on Ubiquiti Protect who want recordings from every camera kept in one place on site, and installers who already use Ubiquiti network equipment and want video surveillance to run in the same manufacturer's system.