HardwareThe Furbo Mini 360 is priced from around £21, plus subscription (Alistair Charlton / The Independent)The Furbo Mini 360 measures 9.3cm x 8.7cm x 8.7cm and weighs 250g. It’s plastic, with a bamboo top cover that attaches magnetically over a storage area for the treat-tossing function. It connects via Bluetooth and wifi, and is powered by an included USB-C cable.There’s no mains plug in the box, so you’ll need to provide your own. Weirdly, the first two I tried caused power issues. With the first, the Furbo crashed and rebooted every time I tried to use the treat-tossing function. With the second (a more powerful iPad charger), the crashing and rebooting stopped, but the treat tosser still didn’t work. Furbo suggests using a 5.2-volt USB power adaptor, and while it cheerfully says “there’s probably an extra at home,” two of the three I tried were seemingly incompatible. Eventually, I used the plug included in a full-size Furbo 360 that I also have for review.The unit rotates left and right, but the camera does not tilt up or down, so you’ll need to think about where to position the Furbo for the best view. High up is best, but I wish there was a way to angle the camera down for a nice, broad view of the floor.Video qualityVideo viewed on the Furbo app (Alistair Charlton / The Independent)The Furbo Mini 360 records 2K video, also known as QHD or 2560 x 1440. This is a bit higher than Full HD and produces high-quality video clips of your pet as they go about their day. There’s also automatic colour night vision for checking on them at night, and I found video clips streamed reliably to my iPhone. As expected, quality drops markedly when the camera zooms in, but it’s still clear enough to see exactly what your dog is doing.Recordings are split into 15-second clips and stored in chronological order. Descriptions, such as “running around” and “looking up at the oven” are automatically added to each recording, and they are saved on Furbo’s cloud storage service, where they can be streamed or downloaded to your phone.Treat throwingOnly a few small treats can be inserted into the Furbo Mini 360 (Alistair Charlton / The Independent)This works well, but because of the Mini’s compact dimensions compared to the full-size Furbo, only very small bits of food (about 0.6cm to 1.0cm in diameter) can be inserted. There’s a handy guide at the top of the Furbo Mini showing the minimum and maximum size, and I found it’ll hold about 20 pieces of Enzo’s smallest food.It’ll then throw three or four pieces at once, so you get about five tosses before it’ll need refilling. Handy if you’re out at the shops and your dog needs a distraction, but for some pets, this will quickly run out. The Furbo makes the sound of a squeaky toy to get your dog’s attention, then tosses the food a few feet across the room. Enzo enjoyed this, but since he’s only four months old, the food did little to settle him when crying while I was out.App and AIThe Furbo app includes video recordings, activity data and an AI chat bot (Alistair Charlton / The Independent)The Furbo app generally works well and is full of features that make the cost of the Furbo Nanny subscription feel justified. At the time of writing, the standard subscription tier (which saves videos online for three days before they’re deleted) is £67.12 for 12 months, down from £95.88. Opt for a two-year plan upfront, and the discounted price is £124.65, or the equivalent of £5.12 a month.I was surprised by the accuracy of Furbo’s AI model. It uses natural language to say what your dog is doing, then creates a summary each evening of sped-up highlights edited together with music. Activity and barking events are plotted on a graph over time, and the app shows when the camera played its calming sounds to help deal with barking and crying. These didn’t seem to work with my puppy, but with time and maturity, he might well learn to find them comforting.Daily highlights include shots of Enzo and me walking by the camera, him sitting down, and him walking through the doorway. None of this is particularly interesting, but it at least demonstrates how the AI has a decent understanding of what the camera sees. I imagine this would be extremely helpful to monitor an injury or illness, and to capture memories of pets in their later years.Weirdly, one diary entry said Enzo had “made some wonderful furbabies today,” by which I assume it meant memories and not offspring. Lastly, there’s a chatbot that you can type to. You can ask for highlights of your dog’s day, or ask for guidance on any issues you’re having. This sounds great, but in reality, the advice it gives is very simple and likely heard by dog owners many times before. I asked how to stop Enzo from crying and barking when alone, to which it said: “Ignore the barking…Practise departures…Teach a quiet command…Create a distraction…”This is all true enough, but nothing out of the ordinary. Reassuringly, the chatbot cites its sources with each response, using websites like PetMD.com, TheSprucePets.com and MSDVetManual.com. After that answer, it suggested I ask about whether Enzo had been running recently. I said yes, and it showed me three recent recordings of him running around the kitchen, with timestamps and brief descriptions, like: “being fed” and “investigating their friend’s cage.” No, I don’t know who the mystery friend is either. Naturally, the chatbot always reminds you that it used AI, and asks you to check for accuracy.I suspect most users will ask the chatbot if their dog ate lunch while they were out, and whether they slept after. Storage, subscription and valueNo video is stored on the Furbo itself and there’s no way to add local storage of your own. All recordings are uploaded to Furbo’s cloud storage service, which requires the aforementioned Nanny subscription. Furbo’s pricing varies considerably. Without a subscription to the Nanny video storage, the Mini 360 is £59, but this falls to £21 if you also pay £67.12 for a year of the standard subscription, totalling £88.12. Opt to pay monthly, and the Mini 360 is £24, plus an initial £23.97 “activation fee”, then you get three months of Nanny for free. After that, it’s £7.99 a month.(Alistair Charlton / The Independent)The verdict: Furbo Mini 360There’s a lot to like about the Furbio Mini 360. It’s a compact indoor camera that’s easy to use but is also packed with clever AI, tosses treats to keep your pet entertained, alerts you to barking, crying and signs of illness, helps to calm them when they’re agitated, and delivers a fun highlights reel of their day, every evening.I had some issues finding a suitable mains, since one isn’t included in the box and the Mini 360 acts strangely if it’s provided with a slightly incorrect power supply. But once I'd addressed that, it worked very well. The camera is quick to act when motion is spotted, produces high-quality video, streams it smoothly to the Furbo phone app, and uses AI to correctly label just about everything it sees.A subscription is basically required, since video can’t be saved without paying a monthly or annual fee. But the prices are reasonable and the service works well. Ultimately, dog owners will discover a lot of utility here, from the alerts and recordings to activity stats, treat tossing and clever use of conversational AI. How I testedI installed the Furbo Mini 360 in my kitchen, where Enzo spends his time while my partner and I are both out. He’s still being crate-trained, so generally doesn’t have the whole room to himself when alone. But while testing the Furbo I wanted to try out every feature, and didn’t want tossed treats to bounce tantalisingly off his crate, so left his crate door open during some of my testing.As well as the treat tossing, I tried out the Furbo’s clever AI tech, which can identify different types of pet movement and even promises to alert you if it spots signs of illness or a seizure. Thankfully, this function went untested during my review.I also experimented with Furbo’s calming sounds function and consulted the built-in AIO assistant, called Nanny, which can help answer questions any pet owner might have.Why you can trust usThe Independent is committed to providing unbiased reviews and expert shopping advice across a range of home improvement products. Our team of experts has spent years testing and rating the latest smart home tech in our homes, gardens and under real-world conditions, so you can be sure our verdicts are authentic and based on personal experience with each product featured. When it comes to security systems, our expert testers consider everything from app features and ease of setup to ongoing subscription costs.