Enlarge (credit: Google)

Google has been raising the price of nearly all its subscriptions lately, and the latest service to get a price boost is the Nest Aware subscription for Nest cameras. 9to5Google reports prices are going up 25–33 percent, depending on which tier you're currently subscribed to. Judging by the (very unhappy) posts in the Nest subreddit , many users are getting emails detailing exactly how the price increase is affecting their current setup.

Nest Aware, if you're not aware, is a monthly subscription attached to Nest cameras that allows them to save video to the cloud. Most camera packages would consider this a core functionality, but with a Nest camera, a lot of basic recording functionality is locked behind a monthly subscription. If you're not paying the monthly fee, Nest Cams will only livestream video and allow you to view three hours' worth of "event" video—that's video where motion is detected, not 24/7 recording.

The basic "Nest Aware" tier is going from $6 a month, or discounted to $60 annually, to $8 a month/$80 annually, for a 25 percent increase. This gives you 30 days of event video history and facial recognition but still doesn't include any form of 24/7 video recording. For that you'll need "Nest Aware Plus," which is going up from $12 a month/$120 annually to $15 a month/$150 annually, or a 33 percent price increase. This gets you 60 days of event history and, finally, 10 days of 24/7 video recording.

Enlarge / The Dropcam line was eventually replaced by Nest Cam. (credit: Dropcam)

In a post on the official Google Nest Community page , Google announced it is shutting down the service for several old Nest smart home products. Most of these have not been for sale for years, but since this is all hardware  tied to the cloud, turning off the servers will turn them into useless bricks. The good news is that Google is giving existing users deals on hardware upgrades to something that is supported.

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Nest replaced the Dropcam line in 2015, so these cameras are all around 8 years old. Nest promises five years of support for its own products. Google isn't just cutting these users off, though; it's offering discounts on new Nest Cams if they want to keep rolling with the Google ecosystem. Google says if users are currently subscribed to Nest Aware, they'll get a free indoor, wired Nest Cam (a $100 value). Nest Aware is a $6 or $9 monthly subscription that lets you record video from the camera and store it online. Since that subscription fee will match the price of a Nest Cam in a year or two, it makes sense for Google to try to keep that subscription revenue flowing. If you don't have a Nest Aware subscription, Google is offering a 50 percent discount on the wired, indoor Nest Cam.

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