A couple of weeks ago I shared a post on the iSafe Booster Seat and I asked you lovely lot to share your recommendations for those essentials you couldn’t live without in the first year of having a baby.
SO many of you responded (thanks for that…we love a good chinwag!) and more than a few asked for advice on baby monitors. Which products to buy? Sensor mat vs video? Or both? How much to spend and so on and so forth. Lottie and I chatted the next day and thought it would be a good idea to share our own reviews of the baby monitors that we bought for our own littles in the hopes of helping those of you looking for recommendations.
Lolly
Video functionality was really important to me when picking our monitor and we finally settled on the MBP27T Digital Video Baby Monitor with No-Touch IR Sensor from Motorola.
This was actually my second attempt at a baby monitor after my initial purchase of the MBP36S Digital Video Monitor also from Motorola was sent back not once but twice because of various malfunctions. I’m pleased to report that this new monitor has been performing its job wonderfully for the last two years.
We’ve positioned the camera end of this monitor on the wall (screwed in) above Hector’s cot, since it is on a swivel ball base it can easily be manoeuvred into the best position. The monitor itself comes with a variety of functions including a sensor so you can check the temperature of food/milk as well as your baby’s body temp. I have to say I haven’t actually used the sensor so I can’t testify to its accuracy but I will say that the monitor itself is fantastic.
The screen isn’t the largest on the market but it’s plenty big enough to do the job in hand satisfactorily. Plus the camera can be remotely adjusted downstairs using the pan and tilt buttons from the hand held monitor if your baby moves out of shot which Hector so often does.
The battery life is ok…it started off being fantastic but over time has gradually depleted and I would say that it needs recharging after about four hours. The monitor will beep annoyingly at you when the battery goes low which I suppose is the point really. It drives Ste to insanity however!
There is also the option to add on additional cameras to the system if you have more than one child too which was a plus point for Ste and I. It’s likely that we’ll never make the most of this feature as by the time we’ll be getting round to baby number 2, I think Hector will have outgrown the use for a monitor but you never know.
IF there was a criticism I had to make then it would be that the lights at the top of the monitor (which indicate that the monitor is on and that the monitor is charging) are pretty bright and do cast a bit of a glow in our bedroom at night. I’ve found I’ve had to shove the screen underneath the bed to get rid of the light pollution that results.
Whilst it doesn’t seem as readily available as it did when I first bought it you can still buy it from various outlets including Kiddie’s Kingdom. Here’s a link to the monitor if you’re interested in purchasing it for yourself.
Lottie
Over the last few years we have had a couple of different baby monitors for different reasons. When we were expecting Molly we opted for quite a standard BT baby monitor that cost around £40. We were stabbing in the dark a bit and I will admit we bought it mainly as some seemed so blimmin expensive and it was yet another thing to buy. They don’t do our model anymore but this is similar. I do know that it is an important purchase but I figured a baby monitor was a baby monitor and as long as I could hear her if she cried then that was ok.
I have to say it did exactly what we needed. It worked well throughout our house and was always clear on transmitting sound. Sometimes it would get a bit crackly but you could adjust the settings and channels till it worked clearly.
It was quite sensitive and so we would hear most snuffles and sighs but adjusting the volume made these less intrusive at nighttime. After all I woke anyway the moment Molly started crying. Mothers instinct and all that. We would often take the monitor out in to the garden and it stretched pretty far but would give a little beep if we were out of range.
There were little lights on it that flashed if Molly was crying so you could have the sound off completely and just watch those if needed. The only downside was the battery life which did seem to get worse over time and would need to be charged quite frequently but we just kept it on charge all night which seemed to help. Overall it did its job. Nothing fancy or special but it worked for us and allowed us to spend those pennies on some of the other baby paraphernalia.
When Alice was born we planned to use the same monitor and we did in those first few weeks, not that she slept! After a bit of a sleep crisis we discovered at around 14 weeks that the only way Alice would sleep was on her tummy. I knew in my heart that she was fine but given the guidance I panicked a bit about her new sleeping position. The first night she slept like that I set my alarm for regular intervals to go and check on her. Crazy I know. To help me relax Edd ordered the Angel Care sensor mat on next day delivery and it was a god send. I can’t recommend it enough.
The monitor has a mat that slips under the mattress to monitors baby’s smallest movements and it sets off an alarm if no movement has been detected for 20 seconds. How it picks up those small movements I have no idea but it does and it gave me the piece of mind I needed. It really does work and I only ever had one middle of the night jump out of bed when the alarm went off and I dashed in to Alice’s room but she was absolutely fine.
The monitor clicks off and on automatically when sound comes out so you don’t have a constant background noise. You can adjust the sensitivity as well so as Alice got older I would turn this down so it was only the louder noises that I heard. If you do experience interference you can just adjust the channel. I’m pretty sure all of Edd’s fancy TV speaker system contributed to this!!
It also has a light indicator that changes withe the level of the cry or noise so it’s handy to watch that as well as listen, especially if you have turned the volume down. In addition there is a temperature indicator for the room which was handy.
The only annoying thing about the monitor is that if you forget to turn the monitor off in the room the alarm goes off at full volume and I’d often find myself racing back up the stairs to turn it off. That’s more my fault at being forgetful than a real downside!
I have to say that I would highly recommend the Angelcare for piece of mind and functionality. I’m not sure I could have coped with constantly setting my alarm to check on Alice!
I hope this helps in some ways those of you currently looking for a monitor. Please feel free to share your thoughts on the models you’ve chosen or have whittled down to a shortlist be they the same as Lottie and I have or otherwise. Oh and also if you have any questions about them don’t be afraid to ask. We’re always happy to advise in any way we can.
People say “I don’t like the idea of having a video monitor, I’d end up being paranoid and watching it all the time” – but that’s the thing, it has the opposite effect. I think it’s one of my favourite pieces of parenting kit as over the last 2.25 years, it’s meant I’ve had the confidence to leave Fern to her own devices where I might otherwise have intervened and disturbed her unnecessarily. If she (rarely) shouts out during the night, I can have a quick peek and see that in fact, she’s gone straight back to sleep. I was once able to see that she’d been really sick silently, whereas I might not have gone in to check on her at that point. Our last house had a garden seating area quite a distance from the house and I’d not have been able to relax sitting outside with just a sound monitor while she napped. The video monitor meant I could be completely sure she was fine.
I don’t know if your version has a lag, Lolly, but on ours, if you turn it bank on after its been disconnected from the power, for a split second it shows a still image from the moment you had switched it off previously. One night in the early hours we had a power cut and the burglar alarm woke us up along with the other bleeps and neighbour alarms standard to a power cut. My reflex response was to reach for the baby monitor to see if Fern had been disturbed. I switched it on to see a big hairy arm in front of the screen reaching into the cot. In a blind mad panic, I grabbed my husband still in bed beside me and screamed “GO AND GET FERN!!!”…. it turned out that the lag had shown a still from the moment he had put her down in her cot hours before. Unbelievably, she slept right through the alarm, my frenzied screaming and her dad bursting in the room to check she hadn’t been kidnapped by some crazed power-line cutting maniac with arms extremely similar to himself…. Even remembering it now I feel the white terror I experienced that night!
We have the MBP36S Motorola. The power unit is crap and we’re on our second one. It has to be plugged in permanently which is a pain but we’ve got used to it. From what I read/anecdotal reports, they seem to have this issue over time across all the different monitors/manufacturers. The BLEEPING though. Omg I’m with Ste. TORTUROUS!
And the lights! Yes! Why do they have to be so bright?! I shove an old dark grey muslin over mine. I do wonder what the cleaners must think about the purpose of this manky bit of cloth that lives permanently by my pillow 😂
Oh my goodness Philippa that must’ve been terrifying! We have the same monitor and had a few moments were my heart has stopped from the still image haha!
We also had an issue with the charger and unit and had to change it. To be fair they were very quick about exchanging it and no issues with the replacement. I still think despite that that it’s been my best baby buy!
Oh yes! The lag! Yep we have that too…can be quite funny if the monitor has been disconnected at the moment Hector is standing up and then you turn it back on when he’s lying down…it’s like he’s some supersonic kid or something. Not so funny when you have a mild heart attack from thinking your child is being kidnapped though. You must have been absolutely terrified…I would have freaked out! And I’m with you on the video monitor thing – you’ve encapsulated it perfectly in your comment above. I think I’m a much less stressy mum because of it…because I can see when I need to intervene or not rather than rushing in blindly. It’s definitely up there in my most useful buys list!
That’s so scary! We have the same and It’s bizarre the way it flashes an image from just before you turned it off. And as for the lights, crazy bright. The monitor lives under my bed by night and I’ve stuck tape over the light on the camera in the nursery because Alex would sit and stare at it!! Other than that, great monitor! 😃
Also we recently purchased a second camera g R the unit, as sometimes the only place little miss will sleep is on our bed, so rather than one of us be upstairs early every evening, the second camera gave us peace of mind.
When we bought the monitor it came as part of a bundle with a BabySense movement monitor. I didn’t get on with that at all! When she was tiny in the snuzpod I always forgot to turn it off so 20 secs later the hideous alarm went off. Obviously the point of it but waking the hubby, making the baby cry. Then when she went into her own room, because of the gap between the bars, we couldn’t fit it to our cot, so that ended up being a bit of a wasted purchase unfortunately, as I would’ve liked that reassurance when she first went into her own room.
We bought the AngelCare when Silvia was about 4 months and I wish we had bought it sooner! I had terrible anxiety about SIDS and would just lie awake watching her as I couldn’t relax. Even the occasional false alarms were good as they reassured me it was working. Would absolutely recommend.
Another recommendation for the Angelcare video monitor with Sensor Mat. Pretty sure I got it on special offer in Boots plus got a shed load of advantage points so look out for offers. My husband was against getting it for the reasons listed – that we’d spend all our time watching the monitor and jumping out of bed at the slightest squeak. But it really had the opposite effect and it’s been one of my best baby buys. I guess it felt like a huge weight off our mind having that visibility and in the early days I wanted all the quick wins I could get. Plus the sensor pad you can switch on and off easily to suit you. Sometimes this would go off as he’s shuffled to one end of the cot out of sensor reach so if we were happy to we could just deactivate it via the monitor and just pop it back on when we felt we needed it again.
I never knew you could deactivate the sensor mat. Shows how well I read the instructions!!! xx
First time around I didn’t have a monitor at all, which was fine except I found that I would wake Juliet by going in to her when she’s not been properly awake and crying, which was hugely frustrating.
I did a couple of things differently this time so we’ve actually ended up with two monitors – I put Tessie down on her tummy from quite early on, so we got an angelcare monitor for the peace of mind. We had lots of middle of the night alarms too – mainly from me bringing her into bed with me to feed, and forgetting to turn off the sensor pad in the cot! It also beeped the whole way to Hastings once as we didn’t work out where the noise was coming from until we unpacked the other end…
As Tess got bigger and we moved her into her own room, the priority was having sight of her, over necessarily being able to hear her. To that end we bought a standard wireless infrared camera from Amazon and have used that along with a phone app to see what she’s up to when she’s grizzling in the night (or won’t settle at bedtime). It has a speaker function too, so I also quite enjoy being a disembodied voice telling Juliet to tidy her bedroom up without having to go upstairs 🙂
I forgot to mention that my monitor also has a speaker function as well Sara. Definitely handy for getting Ste to bring things down from upstairs when I’m downstairs although it’s not exactly designed for this purpose!
We use an Angelcare sensor mat monitor (no video) and it’s now on baby no 2. We’ve been pleased with it and gives great peace of mind. For me, the sensor pad is more important to have than to see a video monitor but everyone is different. I know Philippa above is a bit dismissive of people like me who think they’d watch it all the time & aren’t keen on the idea of a video but each to their own 😊 We’ve been lucky with a good sleeper so can go into his room to check him (& crash around getting getting clothes out or putting away which I do!) and not disturb him.
I think it’s good to check out all the options available, there’s so many!
Also Lottie I always forget to turn the hand held monitor off before turning the base off and it always beeps at me! I’m with you on that!
That blimmin beeping Victoria! I was never bothered about having a video element either and found the sensor pad was enough with Alice. We are also the same that I can be in their rooms without waking them. I figure being noisy has helped them later in life to stay asleep. Molly has slept through full on drilling and a wall being knocked down when we were having our house done up and now is an ace sleeper. Except when I am trying to be Father Christmas and she woke up every time I tried to pop her stocking in her room … Go figure!! x
Same here Victoria 🙂 Even though our little man is a very light sleeper. The sensor mat was my only priority about a monitor – and we also tend to forget to turn the hand held one off 😀
We have an Angelcare video monitor with sensor mat – but we’ve never used the sensor mat! Not sure why exactly, I think because she was in a sleepyhead next to me for ages and then we just never got around to installing it. But I wouldn’t be without a video monitor – it’s soooooo useful for seeing whether that random cry was a dream or whether she actually needs attending to. My only criticisms of our Angelcare one though is that the screen isn’t particularly big or great quality, and you can’t swivel it once out of the room. If I was to buy another one I would skip the sensor mat (weirdly, because I was convinced pre-birth that it was an absolute essential and I know plenty of people who swear by them!) and invest in a monitor with a big, crisp screen and the pan and tilt function.
Another one for the Angelcare – very happy with it and with the sensor mat. As we started co-sleeping a few months in, I also got a Snuza Go as I completely freaked myself out about SIDS. We had one night when both alarms suddenly went off and when I got to the boy’s room (I don’t think I have ever moved this fast in my life), he was completely still and I had to almost shake him to wake him up. So for me, I would not want to be without the sensor mat or the clip on now.
As for video monitors, I’m just not a fan – and after being told they can (and quite regularly are!) hacked and reading up a bit on that, I’m even more put off. Though I’m sure if you make sure you change the password and follow instructions, they’re perfectly safe.
I feel very lucky though that I am able to make choices on a what monitor to get and that there is technology like that around nowadays!
I think its important to note that only wifi video monitors can be hacked – the type where you can use your phone or computer to link to the camera.
We have a video monitor, which is just like a normal plug in monitor – doesnt need wifi to work and so no risks of hacking from outsiders.
Very true Claire – I should have differentiated better, thanks for pointing that out 🙂
As no one else has mentioned it I thought I would say we have been really happy with our BT7500 monitor. It’s a video monitor but also has a temperature sensor for the room, plays a variety of music/sounds and can also project a light show onto the ceiling (although we haven’t really used that last function). As with previous commenters I have found the video monitor invaluable for being able to decide whether I actually need to go in the room if she makes a noise. As she is quite the wriggler the remote pan and tilt function is also really useful to see where she has got to in her cot during the night! We also still play the white noise from the monitor every night and nap time even though she’s now 17 months old as I’m convinced it helps settle and reassure her if she wakes and provides some familiarity of home when we travel. Only bug bear is that the battery life on the video unit has got worse with age so now once she’s asleep we usually turn the screen off, but keep the sound running so we know to check the screen if needed.
We’ve got the Summer Infant wide view video monitor and are really happy with it.
You can buy extra cameras for it and switch between the two which will be handy when baby number 2 arrives later this year!
The only downside is that the monitor doesn’t hold a charge for long.
We have the Angel Care sensor pad and it was brilliant for peace of mind when he was little, I’d highly recommend it. You soon get used to switching the sensor pad off and once he started to move too much we just stopped using it and now use it as just a sound monitor.
I was totally anti video monitors pre baby but now I wish we’d gotten one, not so much so I can judge when to go in but because I’d love to see what he gets up to! We’ve somehow ended up with a funny wee man who’ll roll around in his cot chatting to himself and laughing with his Snowman teddy for up to an hour after he wakes up and I wish I could watch him! 😂😍
Returning to these comments as our (third) Motorola MBP36S has finally died and I really struggled to decide which replacement to get as it seems although there are few with the functionality of the Motorola, I don’t want to get ANOTHER as they’ve still not resolved the issues. Instead I opted for the Summer Infant Panorama and I’m really impressed. All the functionality of the Motorola and both the units are sleek and seem good quality. it remains to be seen if the power unit stands the test of time but so far so good.
Love a return to an old post. Glad you’ve managed to find a new one, fingers crossed it lasts xx