A Ring camera that is not working usually has either a live-view problem or a motion-alert problem. Power, Wi-Fi, bandwidth, and settings cause more failures than hardware.
These steps apply to Ring Stick Up Cam, Spotlight Cam, Floodlight Cam, and Indoor Cam models.
Does this affect you?
Use this if live view is black, frozen, spinning, or erroring, or if the camera is online but no longer sends motion alerts.
Confirm power and Wi-Fi
- Open the Ring app.
- Tap the camera.
- Check the status at the top.
- If it says Offline, fix connection before troubleshooting video.
- For battery cameras, open Device Health and check battery level.
- For wired or plug-in cameras, check the cable at both ends.
- Try another outlet.
- Check for a tripped GFCI on outdoor outlets.
A very low battery can make a camera drop offline intermittently before it gives a clear low-battery warning.
Fix black or frozen live view
- Force-close the Ring app.
- Reopen the app.
- Check home internet upload speed.
- Pause large uploads or heavy streaming temporarily.
- Open Device Health and check Wi-Fi signal strength.
- Look for weak RSSI values, often worse than about -65 dBm.
- Try live view while your phone is on cellular data.
If live view works on cellular but not from your home Wi-Fi, the bottleneck is likely the home network or upload capacity rather than the camera.
Fix missing motion alerts
- Open the camera in Ring.
- Go to Motion Settings.
- Confirm Motion Alerts are on.
- Review Motion Zones.
- Expand or move zones if they miss the active area.
- Increase Motion Sensitivity if it is too low.
- Check Modes schedules that may disable alerts in Home or Away.
Without Ring Protect, many Ring cameras still show live view but do not save video history. Ring cameras also do not have their own microSD slot; Ring Edge local storage depends on Ring Alarm Pro and eligible subscriptions.
If several cameras trigger at once, bandwidth competition can briefly interrupt live view. If a wired camera shows no power with a known-good outlet and cable, check warranty support.
Sources
- Ring Help – My Ring Camera isn’t working (2025)
- Ring Help – Fix Ring Camera Live View issues (2025)
- Ring Help – Motion detection settings for Ring cameras (2025)