Xiaomi Smart Camera C701 has arrived in Czechia! It boasts 4K resolution, local AI, and a low price

At its Munich conference, in addition to the 15T series phones, Xiaomi pulled another ace out of its sleeve – the Smart Camera C701 security camera. It has been sold in China since April as Smart Camera 4, and is now heading to Europe with a slightly altered name but the same features. And most importantly – at a great price.

Sharp 4K for a steal? Almost

For 1,449 CZK, you get a camera with an 8-megapixel sensor that can record video at a resolution of 3840 × 2160 pixels. That’s a serious amount of pixels for such an inexpensive device. The f/1.6 aperture lens promises decent results even in low light, complemented by eight infrared LEDs with a wavelength of 940 nm.

Why 940 nm? Simply because this wavelength is not visible to the human eye – no red lights will disturb you while sleeping at night. Xiaomi claims the camera can see up to 10 meters in complete darkness, which is more than enough for a typical apartment or smaller house.

Artificial intelligence that stays at home

This is where the C701 gets interesting. Inside, an AI chip with 1 TOPS (trillion operations per second) performance processes all smart functions locally. No sending data to the cloud, no waiting for a server response. The camera recognizes:

• Baby crying – sends you a notification when the little one cries
• Pet movement – but only works for cats and dogs
• Person tracking – automatically rotates the lens to follow a moving person
• Loud sounds – for example, if someone breaks a window

In practice, this means you get notifications faster and your data doesn’t travel anywhere. The question remains how precisely the detection will work – whether it will confuse a cat with a dog or a baby’s cry with a meow.

360-degree rotation

The camera can rotate 360 degrees horizontally and 109 degrees vertically. This, combined with AI tracking, means almost nothing happening in the room will escape your notice. You can set fixed monitoring points or let the camera perform a panoramic tour.

An interesting feature is the physical lens cover. When you don’t want to be monitored, you simply cover the camera in the app – a cover mechanically moves in front of the lens. No taping with electrical tape or turning it to the wall.

Wi-Fi 6 and dual-band

Xiaomi has finally understood that in 2025, 2.4GHz Wi-Fi alone is no longer enough. The C701 supports Wi-Fi 6 on both bands (2.4 and 5 GHz), so you can choose based on how congested your home network is. OFDMA technology also promises lower latency – the image should be smoother and without stuttering.

For storage, you have three options: a microSD card up to 256 GB, paid cloud storage, or NAS network storage. The microSD card is not included in the package, which is probably not surprising given the price of 1,449 CZK.

Voice control and two-way communication

The camera works with Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa. It’s a shame, however, that you can’t call directly from the camera – two-way communication must always be initiated from the Xiaomi Home app.

According to Xiaomi, the speaker has a “large sound cavity” for louder and clearer sound. The microphone, in turn, promises ambient noise suppression. In practice, this means you should be able to communicate without problems with children in their room or check what the dog is up to again.

Czech price

For 1,449 CZK, you get a lot of bang for your buck. 4K resolution, local AI processing, Wi-Fi 6, physical lens cover – these are things you won’t find in cheap cameras.

The biggest question mark hangs over the real performance of the AI functions. Crying or pet detection sounds great on paper, but how will it work in everyday operation? Will the camera send dozens of false alarms daily?

For typical home use, however, the C701 looks like a reasonable choice. Especially if you have small children or pets at home and want to keep track of what’s happening when you’re not there.

What do you think of the new Xiaomi camera?

Source: press conference, Xiaomi