Stop Unifi Protect False Alerts: An Optimisation Guide

How to Eliminate False Alerts from Your Unifi Protect System

Unifi Protect offers a powerful and sophisticated surveillance experience, but a constant flood of irrelevant notifications can undermine its utility. If your phone is buzzing every time a car drives by or the wind blows, you may be experiencing 'alert fatigue', causing you to miss the notifications that truly matter.

The key to a quiet and effective security system lies in moving beyond basic motion detection and leveraging the advanced AI features within Unifi Protect. This guide will walk you through the essential settings to configure for a dramatic reduction in false positive alerts.

The Problem with Basic Motion Detection

The primary source of false alerts is traditional, pixel-based motion detection. This method works by detecting any change in the pixels from one frame to the next. While effective at catching movement, the system cannot tell the difference between a person walking up to your door and other common triggers, such as:

• Moving tree branches and shadows.
• Headlights from passing vehicles.
• Raindrops or insects on the camera lens.
• Small animals.
• Rapid changes in lighting at sunrise or sunset.

The Solution: A Multi-Layered Optimisation Approach

To fix this, we will use a combination of Unifi Protect's best features: Smart Detections, Motion Zones, and Sensitivity Tuning.

1. Prioritise Smart Detections (The Most Important Step)

For any modern Unifi camera (like the G4 and G5 series), Smart Detections are the most powerful tool for eliminating false alerts. This feature uses on-camera AI to identify specific types of objects.

• Enable Smart Detections:

  1. Open your UniFi Protect application.
  2. Select the camera you want to configure.
  3. Go to the camera's Settings.
  4. Tap on Detections or Smart Detections.
  5. Ensure that Person and/or Vehicle detection is enabled.

• Change Your Notification Settings:

  1. In the same camera settings, go to Notifications or Alerts.
  2. Instead of being notified for 'All Motion', change the setting to only send notifications for Smart Detections.
  3. You can choose to be notified for 'People', 'Vehicles', or both.

By making this one change, you have told the system to ignore all motion events unless they are specifically identified as a person or a vehicle, instantly cutting out the vast majority of environmental false alerts.

2. Configure Precise Motion and Smart Detection Zones

Zones tell your camera where to look for motion. This is crucial for ignoring activity in public areas.

• Go to the Zones Setting: In the camera's settings, find the Motion Zones or Detection Zones editor.
• Refine the Motion Zone: First, adjust the standard 'Motion Zone'. Draw the zone to cover only the areas you care about. Crucially, exclude any public roads, pavements, or neighbours' properties.
• Refine Smart Detection Zones: You can create separate, more specific zones for your smart detections. For example, you might want a 'Person' detection zone for your front path, but a 'Vehicle' detection zone only for your driveway. This granular control is extremely effective.

3. Fine-Tune Motion Sensitivity

After setting up Smart Detections and Zones, you can make a final adjustment to the underlying motion sensitivity. This helps the AI engine by pre-filtering out very minor environmental 'noise'.

• Navigate to Motion Settings: Go to the camera's Settings → Motion.
• Lower the Sensitivity: You will see a 'Motion Sensitivity' slider. If it's set high (e.g., above 75), try lowering it. A setting between 50 and 65 is often a good starting point. This tells the camera to ignore very subtle changes, like leaves rustling, before the AI even needs to analyse the motion.

4. Set a Notification Schedule

If you only need alerts at certain times (e.g., overnight), use the scheduling feature.

• Go to Notification Settings: In the camera's settings, find the Notifications Schedule.
• Set Your Times: Define the hours and days when you want to receive alerts. For example, you can disable notifications during the day when you are home and active, and have them automatically enable at night.

Conclusion

Stop letting your security system bombard you with irrelevant information. By prioritising AI-powered Smart Detections and carefully defining detection zones, you can transform your Unifi Protect system from a noisy distraction into a precise and reliable security tool. This ensures that when you do get an alert, it is for an event that truly warrants your attention.