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The Best Home Security Camera System

Last updated on August 14, 2024
Categories Electronics, Home Tags , ,
Best Home Security Camera System

Our Review Process

Don't Waste Your Money is focused on helping you make the best purchasing decision. Our team of experts spends hundreds of hours analyzing, testing, and researching products so you don't have to. Learn more.

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Our Picks For The Top Home Security Camera Systems

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Product Overview
Key Takeaway
  The Best Overall

SimpliSafe Wireless Smart Home System, 8-Piece

Don't Waste Your Money Seal of Approval

SimpliSafe

Wireless Smart Home System, 8-Piece

Supporting 24/7 monitoring, this system comes with a base station and various accessories with alarms that notify you of potential intruders. You get the assurance that comes with battery backup and cellular internet options.

Overall Take

For Peace of MindIf you're concern is protecting your house, this system has enough components to get you started.

 Best Seller

Tolviviov Wireless DIY Smart Home System, 8-Piece

Tolviviov

Wireless DIY Smart Home System, 8-Piece

Rather than offering a professional monitoring service, this system uses your Wi-Fi and features an app to keep an eye on your home when you're away. It focuses on sensors and alarms and is Google and Amazon Alexa compatible.

Overall Take

Convenient for Monitoring If you'd like a basic smart security system with mobile alerts and virtual assistant compatibility, consider this option.

 Also Great

Arlo Wireless Pro HD Camera & Doorbell Smart Home System

Arlo

Wireless Pro HD Camera & Doorbell Smart Home System

This system includes an outdoor camera, chime and doorbell so that you can handle visitors when you're away. These devices connect to the manufacturer's base station and work with a supported app.

Overall Take

For Handling VisitorsYou might choose this small system if you just want to keep an eye on who comes up to your door while you're not home.

  The Best Value

Hiseeu 8-Channel Remote Home Security Camera System

Hiseeu

8-Channel Remote Home Security Camera System

Whether you need an indoor or outdoor security camera, this camera has you covered. It's equipped with night vision and provides consistent coverage when you need it most. The unit is weatherproof and able to withstand temperatures as low as -13 degrees and as high as 122 degrees Fahrenheit.

Overall Take

Sees In The DarkYou'll get crystal-clear high-definition live video with this home security camera system.

Buying Guide

Home security cameras are currently more affordable than they ever have been, and they are becoming a fixture in many homes, where they are helping to thwart home invasions or thefts, as well as generally helping the homeowner feel safe and comfortable when it comes to the security of their home.

Security cameras can be a single stand-alone product, perhaps pointed to the front door or porch area, where it can capture things like your mailman or solicitors as they approach your door. Other systems involve many cameras that you place strategically around your property to capture any entry points to your home or even interior areas of your home where important and valuable items are stored.

The difficulty in setting up a camera system can vary from extremely easy, with wireless and battery-powered options, to more involved installations where you will find yourself drilling holes to run solid wires for power or communication, making a more bulletproof security system. The right system for you will be determined by your specific needs, and if you find a few differentiating qualities of the current security camera systems that make them the right product for you, you can narrow your selection down to a product that will be ideal.

A one-camera security setup is often used as a smart doorbell system. The camera can sense motion and alert you when something triggers it. The alerts will go directly to your phone through an app and you can immediately see who is at your door. Some cameras allow you to talk through the camera as well. This feature can be handy if your neighbor or a friend drop by while you are out and you can simply tell them you’re out of the house, but it can also allow you to scare off a would-be thief who might be eyeballing a package that was delivered to your front stoop.

For a more robust home security system that covers a larger area of your property, you will want to look at multi-camera system, says our home expert Vicki Liston, writer and producer of the award-winning home improvement show, “On The Fly…DIY.”

“Since a system includes cameras at multiple heights, angles, and locations around (and/or inside) your home, you’ll need to consider how they are powered, how many you’ll need, and how they store video footage,” Liston says.

These factors and considerations can seem daunting or complex, but they don’t have to be. Some cameras have an easy-to-setup camera system. The cameras don’t need wiring run to them, as they are powered by batteries and use your home’s wireless network to upload their footage to the provided smart-base. The biggest effort you will face in mounting these is having to maybe climb a ladder to install them up at the best vantage point for each area.  These systems typically offer two-way audio so you can communicate through the camera with whomever it has captured, but they may also have a high-decibel siren that can scare off intruders. Combine these features with a useful app that allows you to operate the camera’s features with your smartphone and you have a fully functioning, weatherproof security system ready to help keep you protected with only minimal setup effort.

If your camera happens to capture a criminal activity like a thief attempting to break into your home or steal a package from your front porch, you will be relying on the footage from this camera as your main source of identification of the perpetrator. This is when having a 1080p camera becomes a huge benefit to you. A security camera that records in 1080p can be the difference between having a blurry image of this criminal activity versus a clear image. If the image is clear enough, which is much more likely in a 1080p camera, it can be the most crucial clue in actually tracking down the person captured in the image. Saving a little money by using a lower-quality camera can actually end up being a big waste of money if the footage is never crisp enough to be usable.

“It makes no sense to spend considerable time and effort setting up a system if the picture quality is only ‘fair’ to ‘good,’” says Liston. “1080p quality will give you a great picture, even when recording in night vision mode (and night vision should be a given with any security camera system).”

Some security cameras are best used in an indoor setting where you hope to monitor something of value inside your house. Often times the most valuable thing in your home could be your sleeping baby and it is common to want to be able to keep a set of eyes in this particular room to ease your mind and help you ensure the safety of the child. A camera like the YI 1080p Home Camera really shines through for this use as a nanny-cam. The camera is programmed to hear the sound of a crying baby and immediately notify you through the app interface on your smartphone. This function lets you see what is going on in the baby’s room when they are crying, but there is also a live camera function on the app that lets you view the activities in the room at any point in time. This adds a level of comfort and ease in the mind of the users as they know they can remotely check in on their young child at any time of day, also a useful feature when you have a new babysitter at home as well and you would like to make sure they are giving the best treatment to your child.

Whether it’s monitoring your pets or children inside your home while you step out for an errand, or keeping tabs on your deliveries to make sure the packages are handled with care, there is likely a good security system suitable for your needs. Think of how much coverage you want from your cameras and how you plan to store your security footage and you can narrow down the field of products to a handful of contenders. From there, find one that has a handy app that you can use through your smartphone or one that can satisfy your need for two-way audio. The right product for you will be revealed once you really determine your priorities and choose the best options for you.

Our Expert Consultant

Vicki Liston 
Home Improvement Expert

Vicki Liston writes, produces, and narrates “On The Fly…DIY,” an award-winning home improvement and DIY show of unique project tutorials for the casual DIY’er.

Home improvement and all things DIY have been Liston’s passion since she bought her first house in 2007 and she started making video blogs in 2014. She’s performed hundreds of DIY projects, from small ones to major, wall-smashing renovations and can teach you how to make a trendy DIY barn door for cheap. The proceeds earned from “On The Fly…DIY” are donated to no-kill animal shelters and rescue organizations.

What to Look For

  • In a day where hackers can access many of your wireless cameras and devices, it is more important than ever to make sure you aren’t giving them easy access to footage of a camera that is recording the activities inside your home. Liston’s biggest tip regarding a new security system is to be sure you have a dual authentication setup for interior cameras.

“If you are monitoring any interior locations, it is absolutely necessary to have layers of security in the login process,” Liston says. “Don’t simply use a username and password alone as any skilled hacker will eventually be able to crack this. Use a password and a one-time code sent to your phone or created via an authentication app. Either way, you are making it extremely hard for a hacker to obtain access and monitor the camera feeds…and your day (and night) life.”

  • Think of how you plan to power your camera. A wireless camera that runs on batteries is ideal for an apartment or a rental unit where you aren’t allowed to drill holes in the wall. A wired camera, though, will never need to be charged or have batteries replaced, so the act of setting it up permanently will make the lifetime maintenance of the cameras practically nothing.
  • Security cameras can either save footage to a memory card that is stored locally at your home, or to a cloud service that will host the footage for you. Many of the memory card options can be set up to delete old footage while recording new footage in its place, which is a convenient way to save on storage while still having access to recent footage when you need it.
  • Some camera systems give you the option of adding cameras in the future. This means you can start with one or two cameras that are aimed toward the areas that you think are the most vulnerable and you can add more cameras over time if you find that there are still certain areas lacking in coverage. This modularity will provide a good value to your security system so you won’t have to worry about replacing every camera each time you want to upgrade.

More to Explore

Having any type of home security system visible to a potential intruder is often enough to stop them from trying. A study at UNC Charlotte shows that over 80% of burglars look for home security systems before trying to enter a home, and 60% admitted they would not attempt breaking in simply due to the presence of a security system. That means most of our security systems may work even when we don’t see them doing so, as they naturally ward off these intruders by their very presence. 

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