What Is AOV in a Camera? Always-On Video Explained for Importers

AOV Means Always-On Video

In a security camera spec sheet, AOV stands for Always-On Video: the camera records continuously, around the clock, instead of waking up only when a PIR (passive infrared) sensor is tripped. On a solar camera that matters enormously, because the traditional trade-off was brutal — you either ran continuously on grid power, or you ran on battery and accepted that everything between triggers was simply never recorded. AOV closes that gap by keeping the image pipeline running at low standby power and using on-device AI scene analysis to decide what deserves full-quality encoding, flagging and alerting. The stream is continuous; the expensive work is selective.

AOV is an industry-generic term, not a proprietary feature name. Any factory can print it on a datasheet, which is exactly why a buyer needs to know what to verify underneath it. In our own 150-SKU catalogue (wholesale prices quoted per order), 49 models are AOV — the rest are conventional PIR-triggered or wired units.

A note on the other AOV

If you have a photography background, you have met AOV as angle of view — the horizontal or diagonal field a lens covers. Both usages are alive, and they collide on product pages. The rule of thumb: in the solar and 4G LTE security camera trade, and on Chinese factory datasheets in particular, AOV almost always means Always-On Video, and angle of view is written out as FOV or "angle" with a degree figure attached. If the abbreviation sits next to battery capacity and standby current, it is Always-On Video. If it sits next to focal length, it is angle of view.

Why PIR-Triggered Recording Loses Events

PIR detects change in radiated heat across its zones. That physical mechanism has failure modes your customers discover in the field, not in the showroom:

• Slow movement. Someone walking directly toward the lens, or crawling, or easing a gate open produces very little cross-zone change. PIR often does not fire at all.
• Wake-up lag. Even when PIR fires, the sensor and encoder have to come up. The first seconds — the approach, the face, the plate — are the seconds that were missing.
• Out-of-zone events. PIR covers a cone, usually narrower than the lens. Anything happening at the edge of frame is visible to the sensor but invisible to the trigger.
• Hot ambient conditions. In Vietnamese and Latin American afternoons, ambient surface temperature climbs toward body temperature and the thermal contrast PIR depends on shrinks. Detection gets erratic precisely during the hours nobody is on site.
• Non-thermal subjects. A vehicle rolling in neutral, a drone, cargo being moved — no heat signature crossing zones, no recording.

For a distributor this is a support-ticket problem before it is a technical one. "The camera didn't record it" is the single hardest complaint to defend, because the customer is right and there is no footage to discuss. AOV changes the conversation: the event is on the card whether or not the AI classified it correctly, so you are arguing about search and tagging, not about missing evidence.

What Continuous Recording Costs in Power

This is where an honest AOV spec separates itself from a marketing one. Continuous operation raises the daily energy budget, so battery and panel have to be sized for it — and the pairing, not the battery alone, is what determines whether the camera survives a run of overcast days.

Our AOV range uses two configurations:

• 8000mAh battery with an 8W panel — the volume configuration, suited to sites with clear southern (or, north of the equator, southern-facing) exposure and no heavy canopy shading.
• 20000mAh battery with a 15W panel — for monsoon-season buffering, shaded mounting positions, higher latitudes in the Southern Cone, or installations where nobody will climb the pole again for a year.

Nothing above 20000mAh and 15W exists in the range, and treat any quote that jumps far past those figures at a similar price point as a specification worth auditing. Resolution across the AOV models is 2K (2.0MP per sensor); the catalogue standard is 1080p–2K, with 4K available only as a custom or OEM build. Weatherproofing is IP66 throughout — dust-tight and protected against powerful water jets, which is the right rating for pole and eave mounting. If a project genuinely needs a higher ingress rating for submersion or pressure washing, say so at the quotation stage rather than assuming it.

The 49 AOV SKUs, by Series

Four series, all 2K, all IP66. Note that price varies within each series by lens and configuration variant, so quote from the variant, not the series:

• SG-C41G-10T66-V series — 4 variants, single 2.0MP lens, 8000mAh, 8W. The entry point into AOV; good for gates, doorways and narrow yards.
• SG-D42G-10F66-V series — 18 variants, dual lens (2.0MP×2), 8000mAh, 8W. The widest choice in the range and the usual volume pick.
• SG-D42G-15F66-V series — 16 variants, dual lens (2.0MP×2), 20000mAh, 15W. Same optics as above on the larger power system.
• SG-S43G-10T66-V series — 11 variants, triple lens (2.0MP×3), 8000mAh, 8W. Widest coverage per pole, which lowers the camera count on open perimeters.

Commonly sampled individual models: SG-D42G-15F66-V1 (dual lens, 20000mAh, 15W), SG-D42G-10F66-V1 (dual lens, 8000mAh, 8W), and SG-C41G-10T66-V1 (single lens, 8000mAh, 8W). Full specifications sit on the product pages, with wholesale prices quoted per order.

Matching a series to the site

Farms, ranches and open perimeters usually favour the triple-lens SG-S43G series, because covering more arc per pole cuts both hardware count and installation labour. Construction sites and yards that relocate every few months favour the 8000mAh/8W dual-lens units on cost. Anything mounted where a technician cannot easily return — remote pumping stations, boundary fencing, plantation blocks — should go to the 20000mAh/15W configuration regardless of unit price, because one site visit costs more than the difference.

Storage Under Continuous Recording

A continuous stream fills a card faster than event clips do, and this is the specification importers most often skip. Storage across the range is microSD up to 128GB, with larger capacities available on custom orders. Two things to confirm before you commit an order:

• Loop overwrite must be enabled, so the oldest footage is recycled rather than the camera going silent when the card fills.
• AI event bookmarking must be usable, because 24/7 footage is only valuable if an operator can jump to the moment that matters. Continuous recording plus no search index means hours of scrubbing on a phone over LTE.

For buyers who need long retention on site rather than in an app, plan around higher-capacity cards and a defined review workflow, and budget the cellular data separately — LTE upload is a running cost, not a one-off.

Sourcing AOV Cameras: MOQ, Margin, OEM and Lead Time

The AOV models are manufactured by Shenzhen Leksell (established 2012, TÜV Rheinland certified, with CE, FCC and RoHS), and OEM and private label are available on every model, including all 49 AOV units. Commercial terms:

• MOQ — 10 units for a trial order, 100 units for OEM/ODM work.
• Dealer margin — 20% from around 10 units, 30% from around 50.
• Lead time — samples 7–10 days by air; bulk production 25–40 days by sea; Vietnam 7–10 business days from our Ho Chi Minh City office.
• Installation — 5–10 minutes per camera, no grid power and no WiFi required. This is a real commercial number: it is what lets a distributor quote per-site installation confidently.

Wholesale pricing tiers are set out on the wholesale page, and territory terms on the dealer page.

Questions worth putting to any AOV supplier

• Is AOV continuous recording, or scheduled recording windows dressed up as always-on?
• Which battery and panel pairing is quoted for each SKU, and how was it sized?
• What resolution does the AOV mode actually record at, versus the headline number?
• What is the maximum supported card capacity, and is loop overwrite on by default?
• Are the certifications held by the factory, or borrowed from a component supplier?

Get those five answered in writing and you can compare AOV quotes on equal terms. For a specification sheet against your own project list, write to info@solaguard.net.