Owlet Dream

This app needs serious improvement. It claims to “clinacally proven, medical grade accuracy” which is true, as long as you can get the app to stay open long enough to load the levels. The app is constantly quitting while in the middle of “loading” my babies vitals and sleep state. It takes 10 or so minutes to update the current sleep state. And often times, I click on my babies profile to see the sleep state and it shows there is no sock connected, causing me to reset everything at 1:00, 2:00, 3:00 in the morning. The range from sock to base is not designed for bigger houses. When we bring our babies from their room to the living room, the base will beep at you constantly because of connectivity issues. And our living room is the same distance as their room. Even if you turn the base off completly, it seems to still beep after a few minutes of getting readings. And when it is beeping at you, trying to open the app takes even longer so I’m sitting there overstimulated with a screaming baby and a phone & base that won’t stop beeping because the app takes FOREVER to load. I love that this is designed to alert me and to keep my baby safe and I will say it has helped me get better sleep since my twins were born. But we spent almost $700 on these two owlet socks. For that money, this app should be working way better than what it is. Do better, Owlet. Do way way better.

I write this at 3am due to my disappointment in this app. Anyone who has a baby wants this app to function properly. I have the camera, no sock (glad I didn’t waste that money), simply because it was supposed to be the better video monitor with background feed. However, even while I was pregnant my friends had issue with how unreliable the app could be for them and their baby. I am often alone at night due to my husband’s work schedule, so I need to be able to run the app in the background of my phone while sleeping so that I can hear if my baby wakes up and needs me. Tonight is the second night in a row that I’ve woken up to find that the app has crashed and will not reload unless I force restart my phone, and then “Try Again” 5x to reconnect to my camera. Not only that, but when the app fails it tends to stop my notifications all together from making any alerts at all. My alarms do not ring, phone calls do not come through. So if I’m in a good sleep, I notice nothing unless I naturally wake up on my own. I can’t simply leave my app off overnight in hopes the notification alert will wake me, it won’t. The sound of my baby crying would, though, which is the whole point of having this camera and app. So that I can be stirred awake by the sound of my baby, look at her video feed to determine if she’s able to self soothe, and be able to receive phone calls or texts from my husband in case my app fails. I can’t consistently say I get that, and it really concerns and upsets me.

I only use the Owlet Dream Sock and although I am pleased with the sock itself and it’s designed purpose of helping keep my mind at ease while my baby sleeps, I am not impressed with the app itself. It takes several “refreshes” and even closing and re-opening the app in order to see the current sleep state. I wish the app would provide some sort of chart that shows awake, light and deep sleep patterns. My Apple Watch tells me more about my sleep patterns than the Owlet does for my baby. Lastly there should be some sort of turn off or check-in button when it’s having “difficulty getting readings”. There will be times where I’m holding my baby, I know he’s fine and even though I dismiss the notification the base will still continue to sound and it’s frustrating. Also I had to move the base to his actual changing table because otherwise when I take it off the base as I’m getting him ready for bed the sock will start alarming if I don’t put it on asap. I’ll snooze the base and it will literally go off in what feels like another minute. There could maybe be some sort of, ready to start tracking sleep button. Overall, the sock does it’s job of keeping track of my baby’s heart rate, oxygen level and sleep status but doesn’t do much more than that. You’d think for $300 the app would be better.