Parents who are put off by feature-rich, internet-connected baby monitors might just want a simple solution to see if their little ones are asleep or not. The Bonoch Long Range Baby Monitor ($169.99) fits the bill with a crystal-clear 1080p screen, high-quality night vision, weeklong battery life, and no Wi-Fi connection required (or possible). All of this comes with one big downside, though: a massive monitor unit that is cumbersome to cart around as you do your post-bedtime chores. The competing Infant Optics DXR-8 Pro ($199.99) requires daily charging but is a more portable and versatile non-internet-connected monitor, while the Nanit Pro Complete Monitoring System ($379.99) remains our Editors' Choice for keeping an eye on your baby from your phone.
Design: Plug In, Nod Off
The Bonoch Long Range Baby Monitor and the Infant Optics DXR-8 Pro share a far simpler design than the internet-connected models that now make up a large portion of the baby monitor market, like the Nanit Pro. The Bonoch offers no breathing or growth-tracking sensors like the Nanit Pro, or any other cutting-edge tech. The system consists of a camera that you place in your baby’s room and a monitoring device with a 5.5-inch screen.
The monitor is wedge-shaped, like an oversized Toblerone bar. In addition to the screen, the front of the unit features most of the secondary controls, including buttons to access the menu, zoom the video feed, play music from the camera's speaker, and activate the intercom feature to broadcast your voice from the camera’s speaker.
The top of the monitor has a flip-out antenna and the two most-used controls: the power button and the volume rocker. Press and hold the power button for two seconds to turn the unit on or off; a shorter press will activate sleep mode, which turns off the screen but still lets you hear what's going on. Around back, you’ll find the monitor’s speaker and USB-C charging port.
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Infant Optics DXR-8 Pro Baby Monitor
While the DXR-8 Pro’s monitor is easy to cart around the house thanks to its 0.8-inch-thick body and flip-out kickstand, the Bonoch’s is emphatically not. It stands 3.3 inches tall and 6.8 inches wide, which is roughly the same as the DXR-8 Pro, but its wedge shape means that it’s a massive 2.8 inches deep at the base. This triangular design obviates the need for a flip-out stand, but in testing, I found it impossible to grasp with one hand, much less carry it around. I could awkwardly hold it with one hand by curling my thumb around the base and sticking my pointer finger into the indentation on the back for the USB-C port, but it was uncomfortable and felt like I would drop the unit at any moment. This is a potential deal-breaker for busy parents who need a monitoring device they can carry from room to room after their little ones are asleep.
Privacy concerns aside, the benefit of a smart baby monitor like the Nanit Pro is that you can watch the feed from your phone without needing to tote around a separate device.
Setup: No App or Wi-Fi Required
The Bonoch is a high-quality baby monitor with few downsides besides its bulky size. To start, setup is refreshingly simple, with no cumbersome app downloads or account signups required. In addition to the camera and monitor, Bonoch also includes two USB-C wall chargers, two USB-C cables, a wide-angle 110-degree lens that can be swapped in place of the standard 55-degree lens that comes preinstalled on the camera, and basic mounting hardware.
Setup mostly consists of unpacking the camera and monitor and installing the camera where it has a clear view of the crib or other area you want to monitor. The camera is unobtrusive enough, though mounting it on the wall requires two screws compared with just one for the DXR-8 Pro.
Once the camera’s installed and plugged in, turn on the monitor unit, which is already paired with the camera. It takes a few seconds to boot up and establish a connection (which can be an agonizing wait if your child is crying), but overall, it’s likely to be a shorter process than finding your phone, unlocking it, and opening an app. And monitors like the Nanit Pro also require more involved setup, from downloading the app to registering an account to completing the Bluetooth pairing process.
By comparison, additional software-based setup for the Bonoch is extremely simple and entirely optional. The monitor’s on-screen display (OSD) has a handful of options, including setting audible alarms when it detects crying or abnormally hot/cold temperatures in your baby’s room. You can also adjust the screen brightness and timeout duration (1, 3, or 5 minutes), as well as select which lullaby plays when you press the music button. If you install a memory card in the camera unit’s slot, you can also set up the Bonoch to record audio and video using the OSD.
Physical buttons to adjust the monitor’s screen brightness are omitted. You have to use the OSD menu to do this. That means you'll have to wade through the OSD when you lower your screen brightness before you go to bed to avoid being blinded when your baby wakes up in the middle of the night. The DXR-8 Pro’s physical brightness controls make this daily task much simpler.
Moreover, the camera's microphone lacks any form of noise reduction, an unwelcome omission if you use a white noise machine in your baby’s room. For comparison, the DXR-8 Pro offers a noise reduction feature that effectively filtered out white noise in testing.
Performance: Battery Life for Days
Most parents who are interested in a baby monitor without internet-connected smarts are probably only planning to use it for naps and at night, when the blackout curtains are drawn, so high-quality night vision is essential. On this front, Bonoch delivers. The camera’s night vision mode is excellent, with a crystal-clear picture showing through the 1080p display.
If you’re interested in the Bonoch because of the “Long Range” in its name, you’ll be reassured to know that it worked well mostly everywhere in my two-story single-family house. This is partly thanks to transmitting over the less-crowded 900MHz frequency rather than the congested 2.4GHz band, and partly because you can extend the flip-out antenna for a bit of extra range. I never needed to extend it while testing the Bonoch on the same floor as the camera unit, but I did extend it when I moved to the basement or the backyard. The monitor displays a handy signal strength indicator to help you know when you should flip out the antenna.
Despite the mostly strong signal, I did experience occasional hiccups, though any video freezing I noticed never lasted for longer than a fraction of a second. Because of its name, one might assume that the Bonoch model has the edge over the DXR-8 Pro in terms of coverage, but their range is pretty much equal.
In terms of battery life, however, the Bonoch has a clear upper hand. The stamina of its 7,200mAh battery is impressive. In several weeks of testing, I only needed to plug in the monitor unit once a week with approximately 3 to 4 hours of daily use. If you keep the monitor turned on all night long, you’ll need to charge it more frequently or keep it plugged in, but that’s still probably not a deal-breaker because you likely already have a USB-C cable on your nightstand to charge your phone.
Contrast that with the DXR-8 Pro, which needed to be plugged in every other day under the same conditions, and requires a proprietary charging cable instead of the more versatile USB-C connector.
In testing, the temperature sensor on our Bonoch review unit proved to be inaccurate. It was consistently three to five degrees Fahrenheit above the actual room temperature. A Bonoch spokesperson says that the temperature sensor is rated to within two degrees of accuracy. The camera itself gives off a fair amount of heat, and the temperature probe is designed to minimize the camera heat’s impact, though the spokesperson noted that some influence is possible.
A standalone temperature and humidity sensor is essential for a baby’s room, though, so most parents won’t need to rely on the built-in thermometer.
Verdict: A Super-Simple Baby Monitor
Were it not for the unwieldy display, the Bonoch Long Range Monitor would easily be our top pick for parents who simply want to see and hear their children through a lens. If you prioritize long battery life and sturdiness over portability, this monitor could be an ideal choice. Most other people in the market for a non-internet-connected baby monitor should consider the Infant Optics DXR-8 Pro, which offers better portability and noise reduction at the expense of battery life. If you want a smart model that lets you monitor your baby from your phone and track health stats like breathing, growth, and sleep, the Nanit Pro is our Editors' Choice.
The Bonoch Long Range Baby Monitor lives up to its name, offering good coverage as well as long battery life and an extremely simple setup experience, but its unwieldy display is tough to carry around the house.
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