Apple does charge for HomeKit Secure Video features. Apple has always tied HomeKit Secure Video to iCloud accounts for recording and viewing footage, but the Apple Intelligence features are costlier. Here’s what Apple charges now:
HomeKit Secure Video recording
- 50GB: 1 camera
- 200GB: Up to 5 cameras
- 2TB: More than 5 cameras
However, that 2TB plan, which costs $9.99 a month, is the least you can spend to get Apple’s new AI Home app features, including video descriptions for recorded clips and natural-language search. And that only supports a single camera:
HomeKit Secure Video recording with AI
- 2TB: 1 camera
- 6TB: 2 cameras
- 12TB: Up to 5 cameras
A setup with five cameras that costs you $2.99 a month will now cost $59.99 a month if you want to include AI summaries. That’s a steep increase just to get AI summaries, but it speaks to the overall expense of AI. Storing and analyzing 4K videos all day long isn’t cheap. And Apple cautions that “camera counts and other iCloud+ plan features may change over time,” so costs could go up.
And it sounds like Apple is going to charge for other services soon. On the Apple Intelligence usage limits support page, Apple warns that limits are coming to other features, including Siri AI and Photos:
