HaloCollar 4, All New GPS Wireless Dog Fence & Dog Training Collar with GPS Tracker, Waterproof, One Size (4 Colors)

We got the halo collar about 2 moths ago. I wanted to use it a while before doing a review. We have a seven month old dog. He was starting to wander to the neighbors acreage and also go Into the road. We didn’t want that and we live on a farm so an invisible fence is expensive and we didn’t want to keep him from being able to go into our field and have room to roam. We found the halo collar and decided to try it. It seemed pretty expensive and I didn’t like the idea of a subscription but we also want to keep our boy safe so we gave it a try. I got the most basic subscription and work great for us. It is the most amazing product! It is so easy to use and it worked immediately for us! Our boy is a pretty compliant dog and we had used a shock collar for him ( only on beep and vibrate) so he was familiar with beeps and vibrate for obedience. As soon as we started using the collar he got a beep that he was approaching the virtual fence and he came right back. A couple times he pushed it and got a vibrate or a shock but the shock is so mild it didn’t seem to hurt him at all. Just get him headed back inside the fence. I’m 56 and had no trouble at all figuring out how to set up the fence on the app and have since adjusted it to allow him even more freedom to explore our fields. At first I wanted him relatively close to home so I could watch it work but now I’ve expanded his fence so he has close to 100 acres to roam. I 100% recommend the halo collar and have already recommended it to some friends. Also, a perk is that our dog knows his fence well so when my daughter comes over with her dog we put the collar on him and it works great on him too. The dogs run and play together so it keeps them both inside our fence.

I've played around with these GPS collars for a couple of years especially the cheaper ones and even though this one is definitely not cheap at 599 the price is a bit ridiculous but I got to say it works very very well. Like I said I've had experience with the GPS colors in a 200 dollars or less and they pretty much are trash because the GPS loses its function when your pet comes into the house. And that usually means buzzing beeping and or shocked to your dog. They also don't track so well outside but with this collar you have GPS Wi-Fi and Bluetooth tracking your truck so it covers your bases when your dog's inside and covers your bases when the dogs outside. I have five acres and I've got to say the setting of the fences on this collar is ridiculously simple. You can really do this fence in like a minute or two and then you can adjust it at will on the Fly and it works flawlessly. Right now I'm getting about 36 hours from the collar per charge I have a Britney Spaniel and she's very active I did have a wireless system through PetSmart which worked well but because of the battery situation on those you generally will get a dog that escapes the boundaries and in the case of my Brittany Spaniel she just didn't care about the shock she just ran as hard as she could got past it and she was free. She has tested this system and you have the ability to ramp up the sound the shock and the vibration and I'm pleased to say that she's learned her lesson the other thing that's really nice is that if your dog's outside or you see them doing something you don't want this system allows you to push you a little button and I usually just give her a little sound and she comes right back to the house. Like I said other than the pricing the system works very well. Now I do like the app I do think that it could use you know a little bit of tweaking very simple almost too simple and you know the monthly subscription just comes along with this it's also more pricey but if you love your pets I have two other dogs and I will be buying two more callers

Update at the bottom... I still stand by my original review (unedited here), but I've got updates (good ones) about my interaction with the company.-----------------------------------------------------Man, I really wanted to like this. I've used an old-school buried wire invisible fence in the past, and it worked great. I wanted something I could take to the in-laws' farm, though, and hoped this would work. I just kept running into problems, though.1) the first one I got locked up and wouldn't boot after about a week. Ran through all of the online steps. Then called tech support. He was very friendly, but he had me run through all the same steps again. Then sent it back for replacement. OK. Fine. These things happen.2) Indoor training went OK.3) Outdoor training was tough. Here's the BIGGEST PROBLEM. Feedback is uncertain in BOTH SPACE AND TIME. Details:3a) There are pretty big distance errors in WHERE the thing goes off. Sometimes 1 foot beyond the boundary. Sometimes 30. I know this because I carried it around myself to test. So, I don't really know how to align MY feedback with the collar's feedback while training. I can't actually tell when the thing is going off, you see. I can't hear it outside when he's 20 feet away. Wait... I know, the app notifies me when the dog gets feedback.3b) there are many seconds between when the collar gives feedback and when you get the notification. Again, I tested myself with the collar in my hand. So I have no way of knowing when my dog is getting feedback... not with enough precision to help with training. The training solution I finally landed on was to turn off fences completely and manually hit the feedback buttons when he got to the yard boundary. That worked OK for a while, but... I don't need so much tech and a subscription for that!4) the stupid collar just keeps loosening. I have to tighten it every stinking day.5) After training, the dog doesn't really understand the feedback because it seems to happen at random places and times. After about a week, this totally eroded the training. Also, the dog eventually decided that he doesn't CARE about the feedback. I don't blame Halo for that last bit. My dog is legitimately crazy.6) you really can't turn the thing off. I don't mean "you shouldn't". I mean "you can't". It does not have an "off" function. It must be on the dog or on the charger. If you leave it unused on a shelf, it will drain the battery just as if the dog were wearing it. You MUST put it on the charger every night if you expect it to work the next day. I get why they did this; so you don't have it on the dog thinking everything is good, when it's not. See note below about training philosophy. But come on... some family member will take it off because it looks so huge and uncomfortable (or we go out for a walk). Telling them to turn it off would be easier than telling them to run downstairs to use the...7) SINGLE PROPRIETARY CHARGER you get.... the one that magnetically attaches to the collar port that's usually covered up by the cloth wrap so you need to wiggle and twist it until the little light starts blinking. Or if you're like my kids, get it close enough for the magnet to attach, but not actually close enough to charge.8) OK, fine. So this isn't keeping the dog in the yard. I'll whip up a physical fence real quick. I'll keep it on him as an overpriced tracker because he's a new dog and it's a new fence, so... you know... lets set the Halo up to notify me when he runs off.... you know... out of the zone.9) oh, man, the notification situation is bad bad bad.... more sub-bullets coming9a) you don't actually get location notifications. you get FEEDBACK notifications. So, if I turn off the feedback (which isn't working for my dog), then I don't get notifications when he leaves the yard. Sigh... OK, I guess I can turn some of those back on.9b) there's no granularity with their notifications. Everything gets sent exactly the same way, so "your dog is in the highway" is the same as "we're having a sale on the thing you already bought and don't like!"9c) the only way to get notifications on other devices (like my kids' tablets) is to log in to the Halo app AS ME on their devices. Giving them full access to "shock him now at full power" capability. So... I guess if I'm not home, the kids will need to call me? And I'll look at the map on MY PHONE?9d) maybe I can get notifications some other way... if they had an API... or email... or text... or web interface, I could filter based on content, and flash a smart light or something. NOPE. The ONLY communication is between Halo Collar, Halo Servers, and Halo app. They DO NOT communicate with ANY OTHER SERVICE. No API, no email, no text... nothing. You will use the app notifications (including marketing BS) and you will like it.9) one of the stupid static pins fell out. The ones they told me to hand-tighten only? Yeah, that. It's gone. Probably in the yard somewhere. Not a big deal I guess, since I stopped letting it zap the dog randomly.All of their marketing and packaging is pretty slick and flashy. I actually think their technical engineering is pretty good, too. There's A LOT going on in that collar. They've got some good EEs. But man, everything else about it was just a hot mess. I'm switching over to a dedicated tracker that integrates with other stuff. Now that I built a physical fence, I don't really need the zappy zappy. Not sure about the farm solution, yet.Training philosophy: the idea behind this kind of collar is very very different from a traditional wire-in-the-ground collar. With the wire in the ground, you train the dog to NEVER GO WHERE they will get a shock. With this kind of collar, you train them to turn back at the beep BEFORE they get the shock. With the wire-in-the-ground style, what happens if you forget the collar? Nothing. The dog still doesn't want to go to the ouchy place. With this style, what happens if you forget the collar or the battery is dead? The dog never gets the "time to turn back" signal. I'm not blaming Halo. For the first style, you really do need very high precision, and you just can't get that with GPS. This is the only way Halo CAN do it. It's just fragile. You need the collar ALL THE TIME. If you forget the collar, forget to charge it, or the dog slips out the door, you're kinda out of luck.--------------------------------------------Update: After (like, pretty darned soon after) I left the above review, I was contacted by Halo. I was a little nervous about that.. it was a harsh review; fair, i think, but harsh. They were lovely. They thanked me for my "thoughtful review" (I did try to be thoughtful, so that acknowledgement was appreciated) and they invited me to talk to the engineering team. Not to help me troubleshoot my problems, but to give them feedback about how to improve their product. Unexpectedly fantastic.I did have that conversation with an engineer, and it was great. They chatted with me about some problems they were having trouble pinning down (collar loosening; those 1-in-a-thousand problems only show up AFTER you have thousands of users... I've been there), and acknowledged that some of my grumbles are on their "To Do List" (faster notifications of feedback via bluetooth vs internet) but, you know, they're prioritizing. All very reasonable. It really was a good conversation, and they clearly have an excellent culture about their product and their customers.In parallel, Halo reached out to me through Amazon and offered a refund. I had not asked for a refund in any form. I was past return windows. I was prepared to "eat it". So... that was a nice offer. I accepted.Bottom line, I REALLY like the company. I don't like the product yet. I know there's a newer version than the one I tried, but I'm going to wait a few more generations, and maybe let the insane puppy chill out a bit (one can hope). I will be more than happy to give them another shot in the future.Finally, this update is all me. They never suggested removing or changing this review. I was just so deeply impressed with the professionalism of the company that I wanted to share. They really are the kind of people I WANT to do business with :)