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We’ve had a Logitech Circle View Video Doorbell installed at my house since January 2021, which is a long time for a doorbell compatible with Apple Home.

Like many other HomeKit users, I’ve run into a few technical issues with the Logitech Circle View Doorbell, mostly early in 2021. But this Fall, the doorbell stopped working, wouldn’t connect with the WiFi network, and was sitting on my desk, acting like a paperweight.

First Thing to Try in Any Case: Uninstall and Reinstall the Circle View Doorbell

In the past when the Logitech Circle View Doorbell became unresponsive, I had done what normally worked for me:

1. Popped the doorbell out of the mount.
2. Waited 30 or 40 seconds.
3. Reinstalled the doorbell.

The doorbell would often rejoin the network by itself and go on working for weeks or months with no further intervention.

Reading the FAQ, but Not Carefully

A few weeks ago, this tried-and-true process didn’t work after several attempts. So I went to the Circle View Video Doorbell Support Page, and looked at the FAQ.

There is some very good information in the FAQ, but I really did not know what the value of that information was when I was reading it for myself without talking to Logitech Technical Support, getting my doorbell back online, and then performing a bit of a post mortem on the entire process.

What Worked: Calling Logitech Technical Support on the Telephone and Patiently Working with an Engineer

I had some time on a Tuesday morning, so I followed the instructions on the Circle View Video Doorbell Support Page and called the Logitech telephone technical support number in the United States. I decided to call, thinking that they could at least steer me in the right direction if the doorbell had some sort of component failure.

What surprised me was how quickly I was connected to someone who could actually troubleshoot my doorbell. I initially thought I was talking to someone who would triage my case. The engineer asked, “Were you able to successfully perform a factory reset of the doorbell?”

I said, “Yes, I went as far as I could with the troubleshooting instructions in your documentation, but I could not get the doorbell to be re-added to my home in the Apple Home app.”

Then, the engineer asked me what my test configuration was?

She didn’t particularly like that I was using an Anker PowerBank for testing. I told her it was because someone on Reddit suggested this in order to get the doorbell as close to one of my eero 6 Extenders as possible while trying to re-add it to Home. (This was because the Reddit user had achieved success only when he re-added his doorbell to his home while it was almost sitting on top of an eero 6 Extender. Apparently this was not the main reason he or she had succeeded.)

We ended up trying to re-add the doorbell while it was connected to house power via an Apple 5 Volt / 1 Amp adapter and a USB A to USB C Mini Cable. This configuration would allow me to factory reset the Circle View Doorbell, but it would never it would never result in the doorbell getting added back on the Apple Home. (I discuss why this configuration didn’t work later in the article.)

Because we had gotten this doorbell running in the installed configuration, and it had worked successfully for a long time, the Logitech Technical Support Engineer suggested that I re-install the doorbell, by following this procedure:

1. Write down the numeric code for the doorbell, which was in my case 6647 7900. (Note: I’m not certain this is the numeric code for all Logitech Circle View Doorbells.)
2. Re-install and factory reset the doorbell in its already-installed mount.
3. Re-add the doorbell to the Home in the Apple Home app.

This worked on the first try.

If you got the information you were looking for, you can skip down the article to Conclusions.

What Didn’t Work: Following Some of the Information in the FAQ and Glossing Over Other Information

I’m now going to discuss some things that I tried to get my Logitech Circle View Doorbell back into my Home. These ideas didn’t end up working.

To the extent that I have a theory about why these ideas didn’t work, I will state it. If you agree or disagree, you can reach me personally at @daveaiello or the site @OperationGadget on X, and I will discuss these ideas with you if I have time.

What I Should Have Tried: Factory Resetting the Doorbell on Its Mount

I skipped past the suggestion to factory reset the doorbell while the doorbell is installed in its mount, and perhaps that I was my big mistake.

In hindsight, I understand why I did this, because my first troubleshooting option is always uninstall and reinstall the doorbell, see the discussion above. I probably didn’t ever attempt to:

1. delete the Circle View Doorbell from Home,
2. factory reset the doorbell on its mounting,
3. re-add the Circle View Doorbell to the Home.

If I had done this, it probably would have worked.

What I Did Instead: Factory Resetting the Doorbell on House Power

Instead I attempted to factory reset the doorbell while it was connected on house power.

I attempted to do this using an Apple 5 Volt / 1 Amp AC adapter and a USB A to USB C Mini Cable.

This configuration would allow me to factory reset the Circle View Doorbell, but it would never it would never result in the doorbell getting added back on the Apple Home.

What went wrong in this situation was that I used an adapter with less than 2 Amp output. Logitech’s FAQ says, “NOTE: Make sure your USB power adapter has at least a 2 amp output. Computer USB, wall outlet USB, and power banks may cause a pairing failure.”

I would also recommend having two differently designed USB A to USB C Mini cables. I recommend that because adding the Circle View Doorbell to Home didn’t work with an underpowered home power adapter, and it also didn’t work with my Anker PowerCore battery pack, which emits sufficient voltage and amperage.

It may be that I had two points of failure, the Apple 5 Volt / 1 Amp AC adapter and a faulty USB A to USB C Mini Cable.

As to why the Logitech Technical Support Engineer that I worked with didn’t like the configuration where I used an Anker PowerCore battery pack, she probably knew that some battery packs do not emit the correct voltage or amperage for the Circle View Doorbell to be re-added to Home, and didn’t want to spend the time confirming that the battery pack had sufficient specifications to make the re-addition of the doorbell successful.

Conclusion

Logitech Telephone Technical Support impressed me. Logitech makes that service available to any Logitech Circle View Doorbell owner.

The engineer identified the most likely issues that were causing my doorbell to fail to be added to my Home, provided short instructions to me in order to circumvent each issue, and waited on the line while I made sure the doorbell was initially working and that all of the key features of a HomeKit Secure Video Doorbell were all working on this Circle View Doorbell unit.

I recommend Logitech’s Telephone Technical Support wholeheartedly.

When you add Smart Home devices that cost significantly more than $100 to your Apple Home, you want those devices to be useful for a long period of time. Logitech’s Telephone Technical Support proved that they stand behind their Smart Home devices. Their willingness to work with customers whose purchases took place several years ago is much appreciated.