Kate Hackett
You know how when you’re home alone, any little noise seems like the world’s scariest bump in the night?
A doorbell camera might solve some of your heebie-jeebies… or it may just make them so, so much worse. We’ve gathered some of the best answers from this AskReddit post by Wigglytunadiddler asking “Redditors who have a ring doorbell, what’s the creepiest thing you have caught on it?” and, yeah, sure, it’s mid-March, but we hope you enjoy this stroll through spooky season.
1. Crawling
I used to teach online in the early hours of the morning. One morning, I got a notification and switched to the Ring to observe a man crawl up the stairs on his hands and knees. He came to my door in a crouched position and scratched on the door.
I was freaked out. My Jack Russell is usually asleep when I teach, so he didn’t immediately react. I was still teaching, so I quickly put myself on mute and yelled, “Who wants a treat?!” Doggo immediately awoke and heard the scratching and went bonkers. I saw the guy running down the drive and was creeped out for several days.
2. They weren’t cops
The creepiest thing I ever saw on my doorbell camera was the night I had two cops come to my door. They stood outside the door talking to each other about if I was home or not.
I, of course, was home at the time. My dog alerted me by whining at the door, and I checked the doorbell camera’s stream. I listened to them talking for about 10 seconds before I called 911. The operator told me they didn’t have cops in my area and to stay away from the door, put at least one more locked door between me and them, and to stay on the line and quiet until the real cops could get there.
I live around the block from the fire department, so it was less than two minutes later when a fire tuck pulled up and the two fake cops ran off.
3. Creepy
Mine caught a man crouching behind my car while me and my mom got out. He crept up right behind the car and we didn’t even notice. His face was covered. We didn’t see the footage until a day or two later while watching random clips.
4. Sleep walking premonitions
My little brother is a sleepwalker. We’d gotten an alert and saw that he had snuck out of the house while still asleep.
My sister said she heard someone talking just outside the door. I went to look and saw my brother [sitting] on the porch couch apparently having a conversation with our grandpa, despite being alone. She says he was saying, “I love you” and “I’m going to miss you.”
My dad got him back inside the house without waking him up, and nobody gave it much thought. Until a couple hours later, when my uncle called telling us my grandpa had passed while asleep.
My little brother says he doesn’t remember anything, but we got it on video. We can’t hear what he’s saying too clearly, but he was definitely talking to someone, and he sure as heck said, “I’m going to miss you” at least twice.
5. Found a key
Once I got an alert that someone was at the door. My dog barked, but there was no knock. I thought I heard something, so I checked the camera and saw a younger-looking guy had walked up and tried to unlock my front door with what I guess was a key he found on the ground close to my house.
This happened in broad daylight! With our cars in the driveway.
6. Salesman… a very persistent salesman
Once a 22ish-year-old door-to-door salesman came and knocked on the door like a sheriff with a warrant. So that was already startling. I turned off the TV and ran upstairs to my dad.
He asked who it was, and the man replied with “Moxie” (Moxie is [an] extermination company). My dad told him he wasn’t interested, but then dude started BANGING on the door. So my dad tells him to leave immediately. The man pretends like he can’t hear my dad and incessantly kept at it. My dad yelled that he was gonna call the cops, and THAT’S when he “heard” and ran off.
When we looked at the footage, he had the most sinister smile. Really eerie.
7. A discussed break in
We had a series of break-ins in our neighborhood when doorbell cameras first came out. So we got one because my husband often worked late and I would be home alone with the kids.
Since they were so new, most people didn’t know it was a camera. One night, my phone pinged that there was movement. I pulled it up, and it was two guys talking about if they should try going to the back to get into the house.
I was on the line with 911 so fast. The cops arrived even faster. The cops caught them both, and it turned out these were the two men responsible for all the other break-ins. They didn’t realize that I was home. Neighbors all got one after this.
8. Toddler play date
It was 5ish in the morning when my husband, half asleep, answers the doorbell on his phone in bed next to me. It was a toddler still in their pajamas.
My husband says, “Hello?” and the toddler responds, “Can (my son’s name) come out to play?” My husband, still half asleep, says “Not right now. Maybe later.”
About three minutes later, my husband suddenly sits up as the reality of the situation dawns on him. He rushes out of the house to track down a wandering toddler walking barefoot in the streets in freezing weather, as it was the middle of winter.
It turns out my son’s toddler friend from daycare who’s been to our house once for a playdate just walked straight out his front door undetected and memorized the route to our house. For me it was the possibility of his little journey ending very differently than it did in a number of terrifying scenarios that still haunts me.
9. Just sitting
At around 2 am, my dogs start going nuts. Sleepy and just awakened, it finally occurs to me to check the doorbell camera.
There is a guy just standing out on the front porch. He alternately sits on a window sill or leans against the wall. He gives the vibe that he is waiting in a way-too-long line but does not try to ring the doorbell or knock. He is not acting threatening in the slightest, just weird.
10. Baseball bat
My mom saw a guy wandering around her yard with a baseball bat in hand late at night. Her, my brother, and our Great Dane went out to ask him what he thought he was doing. The guy immediately ran off.
11. Tried to break into our fence
Where I live, our houses are surrounded by walls, so no one can actually walk in from the street to the front door, as they would have to go through a gate first.
The people across the street from us came over to ask if we had camera footage from the night before as someone had broken into their house. When we reviewed the camera footage, we saw that whoever did it had attempted to break into our house first by using an electricity box to try and climb over the wall. Fortunately, the wall and fence was still too high for them to get over, but it was scary nonetheless.
12. Casing
I woke up at 6 am and saw an alert that went off at 1am.
It was a rainy night. I see one guy crouch-sneaking up my drive way and squat behind my wife’s car, essentially hiding. He looks like he’s keeping a lookout on the street. I see a car slowly drive by my house and leave. The guy then proceeds to run away.
13. Tried to take our dogs
My house has an invisible fence for the dogs and signage that says so. A woman came all the way up our driveway, almost to our garage door to try and take our dogs. She opened her car door and tried to convince them to hope in (they are large boxers and this was a small woman).
My dad just happened to check the camera notification and caught her trying to get them in. He sprinted out our door so fast to yell at her. My dad scared her. She claimed she thought they were abandoned? But in a yard with signs that say, “Dogs behind invisible fence.” With dogs that have collars on. Toys all around. And the dogs were quite chunky.
It gives me the creeps everytime I think about the footage. I mean, she just pulls up our drive way and parks like she owns the place.
14. Thanks, doorbell!
I bought my Ring because next-door neighbor got broken into. The guy doing it was clearly looking at my doorbell wondering if it was indeed a camera or just some fancy new doorbell.
I recorded him using my neighbor’s doorbell with his t-shirt over his finger (to stop his prints) and him breaking in by kicking through the bottom panels of the door. I also caught him smoking a cigarette, throwing it on the ground and leaving that sweet DNA on the butt.
I showed the video to the police, and they said, “Aha. Yep, we know him.” Police picked him up, used the cigarette and my videos as evidence, and charged him. He ended up getting three years at her majesty’s pleasure.
15. Music
There was a Honda Civic riding back and forth slowly around our neighborhood while playing ice cream truck music loudly. I’m hoping it was a stupid prank and not something more sinister.
16. Surprise!
I think I found a guy trying to stake out my place. He came up to my door, knocked, tried to ring the doorbell (the doorbell was broken), and finally rang the Ring doorbell. He looked shocked to see it working, and he quickly took off in his car.
17. A whole group
There were six people standing about 10 feet from my door and just staring at my house this past September. They were there muttering to each other for almost 20 minutes before going to the next house on the row and muttering there, too.
My girlfriend thinks they were the HOA, but I don’t totally believe that.
18. Bear
My father-in-law is a wood carver. He had made us this really nice bear cub climbing up on some rocks carving. It’s super heavy, like 150+ lbs of solid wood. I woke up one morning with a Ring notification [from] like 4 am the night before. I figured it was a car driving by or something and went to watch it.
Some dude just walked up to our front porch, picked this carving up, and started running down the street with it.
I was mad because the carving was really nice, but also completely amazed by the sheer strength to pick it up and run. Funnily enough, our next-door neighbor found it on FB Marketplace like two months later and was able to get it back for us.
The bear now has a few 2″ threaded rods bolted through the deck and some additional blocking I put in. You have to be the Mountain from GoT to pull this thing up now.
