VTech DM221 Audio Baby Monitor with up to 1,000 ft of Range, Vibrating Sound-Alert, Talk Back Intercom & Night Light Loop, White/Silver

This product imagery/wording is purposely misleading to make you believe its 2 wireless units. There isnt a single cord in any of the images but the baby unit requires one to operate.

So I’ve had this monitor for a few months now, it’s got great sound but that’s not to say you can leave it in another room and expect to hear it very well. You can adjust the sensitivity for how much sound you want it to pick up. I have mine set to the highest sensitivity so if I leave my fan running in the room my baby is in, I can hear the fan but I also can hear baby just as much. You can talk through the parent monitor and the sound comes out of the baby monitor so you can talk to your baby if they are into that. Baby monitor does need to be plugged in in order for it to turn on but the cord is long enough so it shouldn’t be a problem. I do recommend that as soon as you start setting it up, first thing you want to do is turn off the parent advisory speech it gives the parent monitor every time it gets powered on. I didn’t mind it during the day but when I’d go to work at 6am and turn it on for my mom, I would try lowering it down when it came to that part but it was quiet during that time which made the speech it gave still be loud. It took me a good few days to turn off the speech, the instructions are a little confusing on how to turn it off but I figured it out somehow. Overall it’s a good baby monitor for the price and it’s both have been dropped on the floor multiple times and they still work without problems. They are very durable.

Everything is great about this monitor except the battery life. You pretty much have to constantly charge it. The other features are great though, I love that you can choose the level of sound that it will start making noise at. The sound is clear even from across the room. The nightlight is nice, but not super bright so it is hard to use it for a diaper change, but still good

Only the receiver unit, not the baby unit is battery powered. They should have made both battery powered. Finding a plug every time is a hassle.

This works fine, and does the job for which I procured it. I should point out that I am not using it in the traditional way - i.e., to monitor a baby. Rather I am using it to monitor a dog that has a pronounced fear of thunderstorms (not unusual for dogs). I crate my dogs at night in another part of the house. If a thunderstorm arises during the night, my dog will panic and try desperately to escape her (wire) crate. The baby monitor allows me to keep tabs on her during the night, if thunderstorms are likely (I dont use it every night) and I will be awakened by her attempts to escape and can come to her rescue. The baby monitor sender and receiver link with no problems (theyre about 30 feet apart through interior walls). Sound quality is very good, and there is no background noise. So the only time you hear anything from the receiver is when there is actually sound being picked up by the sending unit. The sensitivity can be adjusted to pick up very small sounds or to only pick up louder sounds. My only complaint is that turning the receiver ON and OFF isnt easy. The directions say to Press and hold the power button to turn the unit ON, and Press and hold the power button to turn the unit OFF. However, there is no visual indication of power ON or OFF, and no feedback letting you know which state the unit is in. So it can be a bit tricky to turn it ON, but especially to turn it OFF. A minor annoyance, to be sure, but it points out a design flaw - it should be easier to turn the unit ON/OFF, and there should be a more definitive feedback indicating what state the unit is in.

Obviously since I bought an audio-only baby monitor, Im not looking for anything too fancy. This monitor definitely works for what we need. Ive actually been impressed at how well it modulates the sound so that if we have white noise running it fades to the background, but we can still clearly hear when baby makes noise. The battery life on the parent unit isnt fantastic, so we do have to charge it a lot even though we dont use it a whole ton. My other big complaint is that if you move the baby unit (in our case, baby sometimes sleeps in a nursery and sometimes in our room), the next time you turn on the parent unit it makes a LOUD safety announcement. Not great if you forget and turn it on within 15 feet of the baby you just spent a long time rocking to sleep.

I needed to be able to hear my mom from her room, which is on the other side of the house, if she needed help. Had a different monitor previously, but it had a lot of static. This V-Tech works so well. It has 5 volume settings and I able to hear her movement sounds so I know she’s up and about. She feels more relaxed and confident that I can hear her in the middle of the night now. We also like the talk feature on the base unit, because I can let her know I hear her and am on my way to assist her.

Church nursery workers wanted to be able to hear the sermon. Instead of wireless speakers (bad reviews) or running wires (not really feasible) these work great. These are placed approximately 90 ft apart and the sound is amazing.

We have now bought a second pair of these for our second child because they work so well. You can plug in the parent unit or have battery. The sound quality is awesome! These were worth the money!

I really like the simplicity of this device. It’s easy to set up and use and does what it promises. The battery life is very poor. I get a few hours out of a newly purchased device.