Thinkware U3000 4K UHD Single-Channel Dash Cam

I purchased another Thinkware U1000 to replace a malfunctioning U1000 I purchased back in 2019. The new (replacement U1000) works good, since it is new. I didn't need or want the radar, so I tossed that in the trash. Now that I have an older U1000 camera to disassemble, I learned that there was an internal button battery, MS920SE-FL27E, soldered onto the circuit board. The battery died, so I replaced it and got my original Thinkware U1000 working again. Now I have a spare Thinkware U1000, AWESOME!

I bought this March 2022 with a 3 year warranty for $690. It came with the rear cam, radar and obd cable for hybrids. The app is a pain. There was even a point where it recorded nothing but a black screen, had to uninstall and reinstall the app to 'fix' it. Trying to get the app to cooperate in general to get videos was a pain and near makes it not worth buying but when it did work it worked well. The quality of the videos is good but no where as good as advertised. Heat is the biggest issue for this camera. I bought an awning for my car.... for my camera so it would be out of the heat/light. I bought an exterior sunshield even though it defeats the purpose of it recording! I babied the camera to no end! But after LESS THAN TWO YEARS it just died, power is going to the cable but camera. A SEVEN HUNDRED DOLLAR CAMERA BRICKED ITSELF IN LESS THAN TWO YEARS!!!! So much had been going on in my life I forgot where I bought the camera! I went directly to thinkware but it remained a mystery. Then I just randomly came across this site and it all pieced together. I found my account and the reciept. Now I see that this camera is less than half the price!!!! Then I see I bought a 3 year warranty for it only to notice it has expired as of 4 months ago! DO NOT BUY THIS CAMERA! It is a delicate snowflake, this is northern california, not Arizona! I kept it covered all the time which made it pointless to have! This was a poor investment on my part. Do not buy this camera! I'm absolutely furious i spent this much on garbage. I've been so busy with life i vanet even taken it out yet. Would have been nice to get videos of the stalkers, bad drivers and the one car on fourth of July this year that pulled in front of me from a side road and came to a dead stop on the freeway which I had to dodge. Thanks for nothing.

I bought a U3000 because I wanted the one of the best on the market with the new generation STARVIS 2 sensor.
First of all, this Dashcam is smaller than I thought when I opened the package and It fit easily behind your mirror. I am really surprised about video 4K quality for sure, but I notice this Dashcam power consumption is very, very low in parking mode! With PowerCell8 dedicated battery pack 7500mAh, this Dashcam can be powered 8 days in radar parking mode! Amazing! Also there is a lot of settings you can adjust in fonction of your car, your set-up and your needs.
App on phone is fast, no issues, you can see and download your video easily, also computer App works fine, It's just perfect!

So.... I ordered the fuse tap kit. Thinking it would be just plug and play as I saw on the install videos. Not the case. Apparently have to file the fuse tap housing and the prongs thay fit into the fuse well. I have a 2021 F-150 Powerboost. So buyer beware. I have used the Hotspot feature and it did work very well. Now I have to pay for a professional installer to take full advantage of the U1000 dashcam.

So.... I ordered the fuse tap kit. Thinking it would be just plug and play as I saw on the install videos. Not the case. Apparently have to file the fuse tap housing and the prongs thay fit into the fuse well. I have a 2021 F-150 Powerboost. So buyer beware. I have used the Hotspot feature and it did work very well. Now I have to pay for a professional installer to take full advantage of the U1000 dashcam.

I chose the Thinkware U1000 over other cams due to the features and the form factor (style) it has. It fits beautifully on my 2021 F250 windshield just to the right of rear view mirror. Install was a breeze, wires were ran easily behind headliner and trim panels. I hooked my U1000 up with only power when ignition is on, it can be hooked with both ignition and constant power. Constant power is used for parking video protection, which I really do not need.
The video quality is amazing.
The one little thing that can be a bit annoying at times is, that when the U1000 is either hooked up to my start phone or is searching for WiFi, I can not use my mobile internet. There is no real reason that my phone needs to be connected via WiFi to the U1000 unless I'm setting the cam settings or reviewing video. Once I start my truck the U1000 will search for WiFi for exactly 10 minutes, during this 10 minutes I can not use my phones internet. Once it stops looking for WiFi my phones internet works fine.

Team was helpful in selecting right dash cam for my car. Went with Thinkware U1000. Easy to install, but if you want to do a pro job yourself then take your time. Test the unit before full install. Use the instructions from Blackboxmycar website. Once you test fit, secure the front cam and start routing cables. I have an SUV, so if you want rear cam wires hidden, take time routing cable through rubber grommet at lift gate/body hinge. I routed using a zip tie, taped to rear cam power cable,then pulled it through. Very clean and professional. You’ll have to remove plastic shrouds but it’s worth it. Get the removal toolkit...it’s definitely worth it. Then full send rear cam cable up front, tucking cables away neatly. Another tip...get some tesa tape, it’s black fabric tape used to tape cable together. Looks pro and keeps wires together when routing from front cam to either fuse box, OBD port, or battery. Black box team helped me in choosing OBD as best power option as my fuse box is in engine bay and too difficult to get to. Using iRoad and works great! Thanks again Blackboxmy car! Jos

A dash cam is definitely worth the investment, this I learnt after last year I got into a fender bender because a vehicle cut in front of me on a snowy day and if I had a dash cam I would not be held partially at fault due to a he said she said situation that it became. So this holiday I saved up and bought the U1000 after watching the reviews from blackboxmycar and Dail2Fast. The Dashcam is great, great image quality, works as expected and I bought it with the Radar accessory and BI750 battery. The build quality of the dashcam is great, I only hope they would make a 3ch model with 1 for the inside of the car.

The battery pack is where the not so great part of purchase experience comes in. I ordered it on cyber Monday expecting it to be delivered in 1-3 business days as advertised. but 5 days after the order the battery showed up as backordered even though it was not when I ordered it. I was told it was due to their inventory mix up and I had to wait 20+ days for it to arrive. Also due to the rush I guess the quality control on the battery pack wasn't that good, the back sticker was falling off when it arrived. About the internals only time will tell as it's new and currently working as expected. If I would have known all this I wouldn't have ordered the battery. Also, the additional CPL filter I ordered did not have the filter in the box. It had everything else like the pamphlet, the microfiber cloth also an empty plastic which I assume should have the filter. Blackboxmycar is investigating the matter. I know these are minor things considering the holiday season and and with the pandemic but overall it took the fun out of the whole experience for me hence I took one star.

Overall I can chalk it up to it being 2020 :(. I would come back for another purchase. I have my eye on the BE-750 :) and will mostly get it if I have a good experience with the battery in the coming months.

I got my first dashcam from Alex of Blackboxmycar, I got the Blackvue DR650GW-2CH way back in 2014. I just recently upgraded to the Thinkware U1000-2CH. 4K video quality is really great, the upgrade is really worth and Im really happy with it. My U1000 is paired with the Cellink NEO which I also got from them last year. Blackboxmycar Team is always been great on helping me everytime I needed a Dashcam upgrade for my car.! All the best to the Team!!!

The best quality and good design

Fantastic people to deal with and support a local business.

Had this u3000 2ch installed in both my cars let me just say it's the easiest to use and best I've ever had. The app is very user-friendly and it even updates the camera for the red light camera locations

This company is a complete SCAM! Do NOT buy there products! It’s been an absolute nightmare for me since day 1!! I spent nearly 1000$ on the u3000 back in September 2024. Right out of the box I had SO many issue, but one part of the unit worked as promised. The entire dash cam was completely useless. I mean it wouldn’t record, wouldn’t work for any of the live monitoring, like literally useless. I initially thought it was me so I called Thinkware to get some help setting it up. I spent hours upon hours on the phone with them trying to troubleshoot it, in the end they also couldn’t tell me what was wrong with it and couldn’t get it set up. After some back and fourth (and over 3 months time) they finally agreed to exchange the unit. I wish this is where this nightmare ended, but it’s not. I wait a couple weeks finally got my new camera went to hook it up and yet again had the exact same issue. Got back on the phone with Thinkware spent another 6 plus hours trying to troubleshoot it with them, and again at the end of it all they could not get it set up or tell me what was wrong with it. They then stated they were escalating it to their “level 2 team” and to give them a week and they would have the level 2 team call me. I waited and waited. I got a call from them about 10 days later. The guy on the phone did 0 troubleshooting with me. Asked me to confirm the issue, I did. He then said ok I’ll be in touch. This was January 17,2025. Nearly 4 full months after buying this unit. Here we are now at February 7, 2025. I have been emailing them and getting no response. I have asked multiple times to refund me my money as the unit had not worked since the day I bought it. They continue to ignore my request. Here I am now with a 900$ paper weight and no farther ahead then I was the day I bought it. Do yourself a huge favor and stay away from any products made from this company!!

My thinkware U1000 front camera and rear cvamera died recently after 3 years. I suggest another companys product

Lots of issues getting unit setup, front camera has a blue tint. Can't get it to live stream 99% if the time and the one time I was able to it had a 7 second delay. Had an incident and had trouble getting it off the camera. Cloud features I purchased this camera for are just not there. Maybe why it's free. Not a fan of the wiring placement , the large camera cord prevents it from mounting high and flush to mirror enclosure or roofline. Can't get a hold of support to resolve issues. Tempted to send it back but it is what it is for now.

I couldn't have purchased a better dash cam. Great value

Love it!

Great Cam!

After four years, both the forward and rear cameras have performed flawlessly. Connectivity and quality of video and audio are equal to first day of use. Haven't found a replacement for the money.

Camera itself works well, especially in the front. Camera in back seems to pick up nothing but glare off the back window which blinds most of the image. The WIFI/Bluetooth, when connected to the phone app, crashes and makes inoperative several of my other phone apps like food orders, etc. - you have to disconnect the Thinkware app from the phone to restore full service to all your apps. The camera has a chatty startup that runs annoyingly long. When your phone does connect to the camera, it is not a stable connection and it drops off and on with no particular pattern to it. It's not a plug and play system, and the passwords on top of passwords seems excessive and maddening at times.

First off, it's a dash cam and it works great as a dash cam. I'd put them in all vehicles if I could.
Things I'd fix... 1) It talks WAY too much every time it turns on.
2) Turning off the power-on conversation also mutes ALL notifications.
3) The mobile app requires far too many permissions... none which are needed.
4) The PC app and Mobiel app are poorly designed. Developers need to perform the action 50 times before committing to how it's done because it's very cumbersome.

The Thinkware U1000 as worked great for me for years now. The only problem I had with it was the micro SD card was corrupted at one point after a couple of years use. The U1000 kept telling me that. I replaced the SD card and never a problem again. I give it a 10+ score.

I just purchased a thinkware U3000 for a truck I ordered. I was debating between Blackvue and Thinkware. I immediately went to Blackboxmycar without even looking around. I know the prices are the best and the customer service is second to none. This review is on the Blackboxmycar rather than the unit which I will do when installed.
There is ONLY one place to buy, professional, prices and most importantly customer service. If I could give 10 stars on the service I would.
Keep up the great work!
Richard