Your alarm system’s ability to communicate with our monitoring centers may be momentarily disrupted by power outages or communication failures caused by severe weather.
Severe Weather and Your ADT System
We know severe weather can be stressful, and we hope you are safe and secure. We want to prepare you for what might happen to your alarm system in the event of severe weather, and how you can troubleshoot most common problems.
ADT’s monitoring centers are not affected by inclement weather and will continue to help protect what’s important to you.
Your alarm system normally runs on AC (Alternating Current) power from your location. During a power outage, your system will switch to its internal back up battery. The internal backup battery typically lasts 4-6 hours. Until the backup battery is depleted, your system will alert you with low battery beeps.
To silence the low battery beep, visit our Silence Low Battery Beeping FAQ page.
It takes 24-48 hours for your alarm system battery to recharge after power has been restored. The low battery message should clear once the battery is recharged.
If you are still experiencing battery issues after waiting for your battery to recharge and silencing the low battery beep, your battery may need to be replaced. You can order most batteries through MyADT.com, or via chat with one of our agents.
When there is a communication failure, your alarm system will display an error message or code on its panel. Within 24 hours of the communication failure, your panel will automatically attempt to reconnect.
If after 24 hours, your panel still displays a communication failure, then you may have to clear the error with a communication test. To initiate a communication test, you will have to trigger your alarm. To learn how to do a test, visit our Test Your Alarm System FAQ page.
Much like your alarm system, your cameras may go offline due to power outages and/or communication failures. In order to get your cameras back online, follow the Camera Offline FAQs.
If your alarm system goes offline or battery depletes during severe weather, your sensor devices may be impacted as well. Verify that any door and window sensors haven’t been displaced and is still closely aligned to the magnet. Smoke and carbon detectors and motion sensors won’t be impacted. Glassbreak detectors also may sound off due to thunder and lightning.
Please know that severe changes in temperature (see below) do impact your Nest Doorbell (battery):
Extremely cold weather has unfortunate effects on lithium-ion batteries. As the temperature drops, these batteries begin to have trouble holding a charge and if it gets cold enough, they'll stop working altogether. As a result, at certain temperatures, the batteries in your doorbell device may run out of power faster than expected and may need to be recharged more often.
- 41°F: the battery may not hold charge as effectively, resulting in more frequent recharges
- 32°F: the battery may not charge at all. Even hard wired may not charge. Battery life starts to decrease when the temperature reaches from 32 to -4 degrees Fahrenheit.
- -4°F: the battery may stop working completely until it warms up.
The above changes are designed to help prevent permanent damage to your Nest Doorbell.
Nest Doorbell (battery) is designed for the outdoors.
| Operating | –4°F to 104°F (–20°C to 40°C) |
| Storage | –4°F to 176°F (–20°C to 80°C) |
* Nest Doorbell includes battery options.
Google and Nest Doorbell are trademarks of Google LLC.
