Self-Monitoring an Alarm.com Security System

Hey DIYers, this is Jarrett with Alarm Grid here. Today, we're going to be discussing if you can self-monitor an Alarm.com security system. The answer is, yes, you can self-monitor an Alarm.com security system. But you will need a panel that does have an Alarm.com communicator installed. Now normally the Alarm.com communicators are cellular communicators because the connection is very, very reliable when it comes to a cellular connection. Now if you did want to self-monitor an Alarm.com system, then you could choose a self-monitoring plan that we do provide here at AlarmGrid. We have a couple of different self-monitoring plans, but you have to make sure that it is a plan that supports Alarm.com. Now if you wanted to self-monitor your Alarm.com system, just keep in mind that you do not have central-station monitoring. And what I mean by that is that if the alarm were to be triggered and the system is in the alarm state, there's no central station there to be able to dispatch to police automatically according to the situation. So if the alarm were to be triggered, you will be notified via Alarm.com. You can receive either a text message notification, email notification, or a push notification. So at least you will definitely be notified that the alarm's going off. But it would depend on the customer or the end user to be able to contact the appropriate authorities, whether that be the fire department or the police department. So if you did want to self-monitor the system, and you don't want to worry about any central station monitoring or anything, then the self-monitoring plans would probably be best for you then. Now when you're using Alarm.com to self-monitor, you can either control Alarm.com through the website or you can control it on your phone with the Alarm.com app. You'll be able to receive the notifications, as we had discussed, and you can arm and disarm the system. You can everything that you want to do with Alarm.com, even with the self-monitoring. You're just not having the central station. So if you're using a self-monitoring plan or a central station monitoring plan, as I said a little bit earlier, it doesn't matter. You're still going to be able to use Alarm.com. The only difference between the two plans is that there's no central station involved. So when you're using Alarm.com, it's still going to behave exactly the same, whether it be the email, text message, or push notifications, or arming and disarming. You'd still be able to control Z-wave devices as well, because that is included with the Alarm.com plans that we do provide. And you'll still be able to even view Alarm.com IP cameras remotely as well. So even if you're using the self-monitoring plan, you could still do everything that you want to. You don't have to worry about losing any features or anything. We make sure that you guys still have all those options available. So as this was explained earlier in the video, if you do want to use an Alarm.com self-monitoring plan, then you have to make sure that you do have an Alarm.com panel that has an Alarm.com communicator. So that can be either a 2GIG system, a Qolsys panel, a DSC system, Interlogics. Basically any of those systems. But they normally do use a silent communicator. Now if you did want to use a self-monitoring plan and you did have the correct cellular communicator, most of our customers use either the Self Gold Plan or the Self Platinum Plan. Both of those plans include Alarm.com. Self Gold Plan is if you were just doing self monitoring without cameras. And the Self Platinum Plan as if you were doing self monitoring with Alarm.com but you did have Alarm.com cameras. Now the only case that you can use or have access to Alarm.com by using an IP communication is if you use the 2GIG GC2 system and you've had the 2GIG Go!Bridge IP Communicator. Now the 2GIG Go!Bridge is an IP-only communicator that allows the GC2 to connect to a Wi-Fi connection, other than using just a cellular connection. Well, even if you are using that device, you still will need to pay at least for the cellular monitoring plan or a cellular plan. So even if you're using the 2GIG Go!Bridge, it's really no point to, because a cellular is a lot more reliable just using an IP connection anyway. So you do just want to keep that in mind. You might as well use a cellular connection. Or you can even have dual path where you're using the 2GIG Go!Bridge and you have the cellular communicator as well. So the main question was can you self-monitor an Alarm.com system? The answer is definitely yes. If you have any other questions about self-monitoring or alarm systems in general, please contact us that support@alarmgrid.com or got to our website, Alarmgrid.com. If you found this video helpful, please like and subscribe. If you want notifications of future videos, please click the bell icon. This is Jarrett with Alarmgrid. You have yourself a great day.