blink system

blink adapter for ioBroker

ioBroker adapter for Blink cameras.

Supported devices

This adapter is intended for Blink home security cameras and related Blink account devices.

Manufacturer website: Blink
Device overview: Blink products
Support / device documentation: Blink Support

This adapter is not affiliated with, maintained by, or endorsed by Blink or Amazon.

Getting started

Install via the ioBroker Admin interface

Fill out your credentials:

Features

• Connects to the Blink Cloud
• Polls camera and sync module status
• Supports manual snapshots
• Stores live snapshots
• Downloads the latest available cloud video
• Allows enabling or disabling motion detection
• Supports battery warning states and notifications
• Supports Smart Detection states for classified motion events (works only on paid cloud services)
• Supports cloud stored videos and local stored videos on sd-card (SyncModule 2 and XR) via local server on port 8085 - JavaScript needed, see below !
• The script requires ffmpeg installed and a lot resources if you have a lot cameras and is then only partially suitable for Raspberry Pis (min. 4GB — more is better)
• initial release for live view with javascript for each camera - required javascript is installed automatically - except for the old XT2, because it uses a different video stream
• Experimental native LiveView session (no JavaScript helper / ffmpeg required) via commands.start_live / commands.stop_live, see "Real LiveView session" below

Blink Adapter: Datapoints

Overview of all datapoints provided by the customized ioBroker adapter blink.0. Status: after refactoring for cloud history + local-storage fallback, plus the experimental native LiveView session added in v0.0.37/0.0.38.

Conventions

• <CamID> — numeric camera ID (e.g. 1754227). Also used in the MP4 filename.
• <NetID> — Network ID of the sync module / home network (e.g. 174553).
• <N> — slot index of the video history, 0 = newest clip, 9 = oldest.

All MP4 and snapshot files are stored in the configured snapshot directory (default: /opt/iobroker/iobroker-data/blink/).

Adapter globals

Camera datapoints

Each camera gets its own channel blink.0.cameras.<CamID> with the following sub-structures.

info – Master data

status – Current sensor state

Smart detection (only with active Blink subscription)

Extracted from the newest cloud clip of the camera:

battery – Extended battery status

Used to avoid repeated notifications.

live – Snapshot and live stream

video – Current video

The newest video for the camera. Cloud is preferred automatically; falls back to local storage (Sync Module 2 USB stick) if needed.

video.history.0 … video.history.9 – Ring gallery

Each camera has 10 slots containing the 10 most recent clips. Slot 0 = newest clip, slot 9 = oldest. On each new clip the slots rotate automatically (oldest drops out).

commands – Trigger datapoints

Set to true → action is executed, adapter automatically resets to false. (commands.motion_detect is the one exception — it is a persistent on/off switch, not a self-resetting trigger.)

Sync module / network

Each sync module gets its own channel blink.0.sync.<NetID>. Note: The state path uses the network_id, not the actual sync-module device ID.

info – Master data

status – State

commands – Trigger

File layout in the snapshot directory

Default path: /opt/iobroker/iobroker-data/blink/

Filenames are constant per slot, contents change on rotation. For web embedding use a cache-buster in the query string (?t={timestamp}) so the browser actually reloads the new file.

Optional video archive

The adapter can copy downloaded MP4 clips to a separate archive directory, for example a mounted NAS path. The archive is optional and disabled by default.

Archive settings are configured in the adapter admin UI:

• Enable video archive: enables copying downloaded MP4 clips to the archive directory.
• Archive directory: absolute path for archived MP4 files, for example /opt/iobroker/iobroker-data/blink-archive.
• Create camera subfolders: creates one archive subfolder per camera.
• Maximum archive clips per camera in grid: limits how many archived clips are shown per camera in the web grid.

When the archive is enabled, the adapter also backfills existing local MP4 files from the current video state and video history into the archive. The camera grid shows archived clips under the Archive navigation button, sorted by clip timestamp and deduplicated by clip ID.

The following archive status states are created under blink.0.archive:

The archive status states are read-only status indicators. Change archive settings in the adapter configuration instead of writing to these states.

Tips for VIS integration

For a live preview in VIS:

{cameras.1754227.video.file}      → absolute path
{cameras.1754227.video.timestamp} → use for cache-busting
{cameras.1754227.video.ready}     → if false, show a "no video" hint
{cameras.1754227.video.lastError} → if non-empty, show as error status

For the history gallery query slots 0–9 individually:

{cameras.1754227.video.history.0.file}
{cameras.1754227.video.history.0.timestamp}
{cameras.1754227.video.history.0.source}
... through slot 9

source = "cloud" means the clip came directly from the Blink cloud (fast, no stick upload). source = "local_storage" means the clip was uploaded from the Sync Module 2 USB stick through the cloud.

Notes

• Battery-powered warnings are handled via the battery.* states.
• Devices without a built-in battery, such as Mini/Owl/PanTilt-like devices, are excluded from battery warnings.
• In that case, battery.lastMessage is set to no built in battery.
• Live image states are updated when a snapshot is fetched or when live snapshots are enabled.
• MJPEG stream states are only relevant if streaming is enabled in the adapter configuration.
• The native LiveView session states (live.mode, live.active, live.url, …) are independent of the MJPEG web-grid helper; check live.unsupported before calling commands.start_live on older camera models.
• Smart Detection states are updated when classified motion metadata is available from Blink Cloud.

Optional LiveView Web Grid

The adapter can optionally install and update a helper script for the LiveView web grid.

This helper script is created in the ioBroker JavaScript adapter namespace as:

script.js.common.blink-video-url-server

This is intentional and only used for the optional web grid / LiveView helper functionality. Existing user scripts with the same object ID may be overwritten. If you maintain a customized version of this script, please create a backup before enabling or updating this feature.

Note: This web-grid helper is a separate feature from the native LiveView session described above (commands.start_live / live.url). The native session does not require the JavaScript adapter or ffmpeg and is the recommended starting point if you only need a single camera's live URL in VIS or another integration.

Requirements

The LiveView web grid requires:

• the ioBroker JavaScript adapter
• ffmpeg installed on the host system and available in PATH
• supported Blink cameras using the current IMMI/MCLV LiveView flow
• network access from the ioBroker host to the Blink cloud services

On Debian/Ubuntu systems, ffmpeg can usually be installed with:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install ffmpeg

Camera compatibility

Not all Blink camera generations expose the same LiveView flow.

Cameras using the current IMMI/MCLV LiveView flow can be converted to an HLS stream for the web grid. Older XT/XT2/LFR based cameras may not provide a usable stream through this method. In that case the adapter detects the unsupported LiveView state and disables the LiveView button for that camera instead of starting a broken stream. The same live.unsupported flag also applies to the native LiveView session (commands.start_live).

Notes

The LiveView web grid is a convenience feature. The core adapter functions such as login, device discovery, motion states, battery states, thumbnails and video downloads do not require the JavaScript helper script or ffmpeg. The LiveView web grid helper is supported on Linux-based ioBroker installations only. It uses Linux paths and process commands such as /opt/iobroker, /tmp, /usr/bin/node, nohup, and pkill. The core adapter functionality remains platform-independent, but LiveView web grid features require a Linux host.

DISCLAIMER

All product and company names or logos are trademarks™ or registered® trademarks of their respective holders. Use of them does not imply any affiliation with or endorsement by them or any associated subsidiaries! This personal project is maintained in spare time and has no business goal. Blink is a trademark of Amazon Technologies, Inc..

Changelog

Older entries are available in CHANGELOG_OLD.md.

0.0.39 (2026-08-08)

• Automatically clears the cached Blink session once after HTTP 401/code 101 and retries the connection.
• Allows the clear session command even when the adapter is not connected.

0.0.38 (2026-07-13)

• Added units for temperature and battery voltage states.
• Removed duplicate detail roles for Fahrenheit temperature and secondary live URL states.

0.0.37 (2026-07-13)

• Fixed button command states to use read: false as required for role: button.
• Fixed object hierarchy by creating cameras, sync, video.history and video history slots as folders where they contain child objects.
• Fixed remaining English object names for smart detection and live URL states.
• Fixed device information roles for name, serial number and camera model states.
• Added dBm unit metadata for Wi-Fi signal strength states.

0.0.36 (2026-07-12)

• Fixed remaining admin checker warnings for archive translations.
• Normalized admin UI translation keys for streaming settings.
• Normalized English runtime labels and debug messages.
• Documented that the LiveView web grid helper requires Linux.

0.0.35 (2026-07-12)

• Fixed remaining admin checker warnings for archive translations.

License

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2026 Pischleuder1 pischleuder@gmx.de

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.