Best home security camera 2024: The smartest security cameras, tried, tested and reviewed

Security cameras used to be something only businesses could afford, but thanks to the explosion in affordable, internet-connected technology, that’s no longer the case. Now, you can purchase a smart home security camera for as little as £20 and keep an eye on your home, pets and children from an app on your phone.

If only it was that simple to buy a smart security for your own home. With hundreds of cameras available, all with different features and limitations, the choice can be overwhelming. Don’t worry, though, we’re here to answer all of your questions: do you go for a battery-powered or mains-powered camera; one with cloud or local storage? What about AI? You’ll find all the answers below in our buyer’s guide, along with our list of favourite security cameras, selected from products we’ve tested, used and reviewed.

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Home security cameras: The basics

Home security cameras mostly share the same features. They’re internet-connected devices that allow you to check in on your property from your smartphone.

It’s important to note that these cameras are different from commercial CCTV systems in one key way: most don’t have the option to record video continuously, that you can then scrub back over; instead, they simply record short clips triggered by motion, which is usually detected by an infrared sensor.

Otherwise, home security cameras come in two distinctly different flavours: indoor cameras and outdoor ones:

Indoor cameras tend to be cheaper (typically £50 or less), small and light, and they typically rely on mains power. You can find our pick of the best indoor cameras at the top of the list below.

Outdoor cameras are usually more expensive and can cost as much as £200 each but they will typically be more advanced, they will have some form of weather-proofing and are often battery powered to allow for easier DIY setup. Our favourite outdoor cameras are listed below the indoor cameras.

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Best home security camera: At a glance

The best indoor home security cameras you can buy in 2024

1. Yale Indoor Camera: Best indoor security camera overall

Price when reviewed: £60 | Check price at Yale | Toolstation

Key specs – Size (WDH): 70 x 70 x 115mm; Field of view: 154 degrees; Video resolution: 1,920 x 1,080; Night vision: Yes; Motion detection: Yes; Local storage: Yes; Subscription required: Optional

Yale’s Smart Indoor Camera is a high-quality unit and we just love how simple it is to use. It captures good quality video and its app, in particular, makes setting up things like motion zones an absolute breeze, using easy-to-understand English throughout, instead of jargon. It’s a standalone camera and connects directly to your Wi-Fi network, so you don’t need extra hardware to get going.

The most important thing to know about this camera, however, is that you don’t need to pay for a subscription to use its core features. It can store triggered video clips internally and provides download and viewing access to these for up to two days after recording. There is a £3.50/mth subscription that provides cloud storage for your videos for up to 30 days, and unlocks AI-powered person and pet detection but you can get by without it.

Yes, it’s a fair bit pricier than the Blink Mini and the Yi Home Camera, but in our view it’s a better-quality product and well worth paying the premium for.

Read our full Yale Smart Indoor Security Camera review for more details

2. Blink Mini 2: Best budget security camera

Price when reviewed: £35 | Check price at Amazon

Key specs – Size (WDH): 51 x 51 x 40mm; Field of view: 143 degrees; Video resolution: 1,920 x 1,080 at 30fps; Night vision: Yes; Motion detection: Yes; Subscription required: Optional

The Blink Mini 2 might not be the outright best-value indoor security camera you can buy, but in terms of the number of features it crams in for the price, it’s the best we’ve tested. You can use it indoors or outdoors, thanks to an IP65 dust- and water-resistance rating. You can run it with a subscription or without (if you add a Sync Module 2) and you can even use it as a chime unit for the Blink Video doorbell.

It even comes with an LED spotlight, so you can use it as an outdoor security camera. And, finally, image quality is sharp at 1080p – a big improvement over the original Blink Mini in both good light and poor.

With great performance, good usability and flexibility, the Blink Mini 2 represents solid value for money – and it being an Amazon product, it’s highly likely to see heavy discounts during Amazon sales events, such as Prime Day and Black Friday.

Read our full Blink Mini 2 review for more details

3. Nest Cam Indoor: Best premium indoor security camera

Price when reviewed: £90 | Check price at John Lewis

Key specs – Size (WDH): 98 x 54 x 57mm; Field of view: 135 degrees; Video resolution: 1,920 x 1,080 at 30fps; Night vision: Yes; Motion detection: Yes

If cheap, plasticky products aren’t for you, the Nest Cam Indoor is the way to go. Not only did it produce superb image quality in our tests – with HDR capture recording clear images during the day, whatever the light – it’s also smarter than the average indoor security camera with the ability to detect people, dogs, cats and vehicles built right in. And we love the overall build quality: this is a beautifully built product, with a smoothly adjustable stand that stays put once you’ve set it down on a surface; other, lighter cameras can shift position if you jog the cable even slightly.

Google even throws in some cloud storage for free, though be aware: this only lets you access clips captured in the last three hours and is not remotely practical from a security standpoint. Still, the Nest cloud subscription is among the more reasonable out there, costing £6/mth to store video clips for up to 30 days and it unlocks facial recognition, which can tell if someone unfamiliar has been detected in your home.

Read our full Nest Cam Indoor review for more details

The best outdoor home security cameras you can buy in 2024

1. Eufy SoloCam S220: Best outdoor home security camera for most people

Price when reviewed: £100 | Check price at Amazon

Key specs – Size (WDH): 81 x 97 x 58mm; Weight: 313g; Field of view: 135 degrees; Video resolution: 2K; Night vision: Yes; Motion detection: Yes (with adjustable sensitivity and AI person detection)

The Eufy S220 is our favourite outdoor camera because it ticks three important boxes: you can run it without a subscription, image quality is good and it has a broad range of features.

The only catch is that some of the camera’s more advanced AI object detection capabilities are locked behind a monthly subscription. However, 8GB of local storage means you’ll be able to store hours of clips on the camera itself without having to spend a penny. Moreover, most of its core abilities, such as motion detection zones and a loud siren, operate right out of the box.

Add that to excellent 2K video quality and IP67 weather-proofing and you have a great all-rounder. What tips the balance in favour of this superb security camera, however, is its integrated solar panel. This means you can charge the camera once, mount it somewhere out of the way, making it awkward for would-be-burglars to access and it will keep itself topped up with charge. Indeed, once you’ve charged it the first time, you may not ever have to get out the ladder to reach it again. For £100, it’s also astoundingly good value.

Read our full Eufy SoloCam S220 review for more details

2. Yale Smart Outdoor Camera: Best outdoor security camera for ease of use

Price when reviewed: £110 | Check price at Yale

Key specs – Size (WDH): ‎34 x 55 x 146mm; Field of view: 154 degrees; Video resolution: 1,920 x 1,080; Night vision: Up to 6m; Motion detection: Yes; Free clip storage option: Local storage for up to four days

If you’d rather buy your security camera from a trusted British brand, Yale has you covered with its Smart Outdoor camera. It records video at 1080p resolution, comes with an integrated battery so it can be mounted anywhere you want, there’s two-way audio and it connects directly to your wireless network, so you don’t need to run any extra hardware.

We love the easy-to-use app, which makes accessing the video and setting up the camera super easy and you can even add a solar panel to keep the battery topped up automatically.

The best thing about this camera, though, is that it comes with its own integrated storage, which means you don’t have to pay for a monthly subscription to access recorded video clips. These can be viewed directly in the app or downloaded to your phone, and the camera will hang on to them for between two and four days.

It lacks a siren and the built-in LED spotlight needs to be activated manually, which is a bit silly, but overall we love the simplicity and effectiveness of this camera.

Read our full Yale Smart Outdoor Camera review for more details

3. Google Nest Cam: Best home security camera for use in a larger system

Price when reviewed: £180 | Check price at John Lewis

Key specs – Size (WDH): 83 x 90 x 83mm; Field of view: 130 degrees (horizontal); Video resolution: 1080p at 30fps; Night vision: Yes; Motion detection: Yes; People detection: Yes; Package detection: Yes; Facial recognition: Yes

If you’re thinking about investing in two or more cameras to secure your property, or you’re buying a camera to complement your Nest Doorbell, the new Nest Cam (battery) is a great choice.

You need to pay a subscription for cloud video clip storage to make the most of its features but this is quite reasonable for a multi-camera setup at £6/mth for 30 days of video clip history, and as many cameras as you can afford to install.

With that done, the Nest Cam delivers class-leading AI-based object detection (people, familiar faces, animals, vehicles and packages), good image quality and a very flexible motion zone setup.

Combined with integration via the Google Home app, IP54 weather-proofing and very easy installation, it’s a mighty fine security camera. Just watch the battery life – if you have motion sensitivity turned up, you’ll have to charge it as frequently as once a month.

Read our full Google Cam review for more details

4. Nest Cam with Floodlight: Best floodlight security camera

Price when reviewed: £270 | Check price at John Lewis

Key specs – Size (WDH): Floodlight – 315 x 165 x 93mm, Camera – 83 x 83 x 83mm; Field of view: 130 degrees; Video resolution: 1,920 x 1,080; Night vision: Yes; Motion detection: Yes

The Nest Cam with Floodlight takes the standard Nest Cam and adds a mains-powered base and a pair of LED spotlights to provide the ultimate burglar deterrent. As with most mains electricity jobs, you will need a professional electrician to install it for you, unless you’re replacing a pre-existing security light – in which case, it’s a doddle to install.

The lights are much brighter than the Ring Spotlight Cam’s at 2,400 lumens and they can be directed wherever you like. Plus, image quality is decent, though it’s limited to 1080p. However, it’s the AI person, familiar face, animal and vehicle detection – and the highly flexible motion zone setup – that really sets the Nest Cam Floodlight apart from the competition. That, and the fact that at £6/mth the multi-camera cloud video clip subscription is cheaper than Ring’s offering at £8/mth.

We only awarded the camera three stars when we tested it initially, but that’s mainly because the initial purchase price is quite high at £270 where competitors offer similar products for less. If you can afford that, however, it’s a top-quality, and stylish security camera that’s packed with smart features.

How we test home security cameras

Home security cameras are becoming increasingly smart and have all sorts of fancy features built in, so it’s more important than ever to test them thoroughly. Every home security camera we review is given a workout in a real-world domestic environment, whether that be indoors or outdoors.

During testing we look at image quality in the following scenarios:

• Low light and night, evaluating how well the night vision illuminates the immediate area around the camera
• Daylight, paying close attention to how well the camera copes with high-contrast scenes, in particular backlighting. The example below shows how a good camera compares with a not-so good camera in tricky conditions:

We also try out the audio connection to see how loud the speakers are and how clearly the microphones pick up audio, and we evaluate how easy the camera is to set up using the various mobile and desktop apps.

We also take care to assess how effective the motion detection is. With so many companies now adding advanced object and audio detection – for instance person, parcel and package detection – this is another aspect we look at while reviewing these cameras to ensure that they actually do what they are supposed to.

Finally, we check how responsive the cameras are. It’s incredibly frustrating if it takes minutes to bring up your camera’s live view, so we check how long it takes for each camera to enter the live view from the app and how long motion events take to generate an alert.

Is video quality important?

Yes. If your camera isn’t capable of recording crisp, detailed video in all types of light conditions you may not be able to make out important details such as number plates or faces. Fortunately, most cameras will capture at 1080p or higher today.

What marks out the best cameras, though, is the way video is processed. The most important feature on this front is HDR. Cameras with HDR take the video signal from the camera and brighten up the dark areas while ensuring the bright areas of the image aren’t blown out and difficult to see. Cameras without HDR tend to struggle to balance areas of bright and dark with the result that it can be difficult to make out crucial details in captured videos.

Night vision is also a key consideration. Most cameras have a night vision mode these days using infrared LEDs to illuminate the area immediately in front of them so they can effectively see in the dark. One or two LEDs are usually enough to light up a small or medium-sized room but, for larger rooms and outdoor spaces, you may need a camera with multiple LEDs.

You should also consider a floodlight camera for large outdoor areas, which pairs bright white floodlights and cameras for the ultimate intruder deterrent. These often need mains power, though, and are therefore trickier to install.

How expensive is the subscription?

Once motion or audio has been detected, most modern home security cameras will store that clip online so you can view it in the app or download it to your phone or laptop. And while many home security cameras offer a basic free storage service so you can use your camera without ongoing costs, the free service is often limited in some way.

Some manufacturers – including, but not limited to, Ring – don’t allow any access to online storage at all after an initial trial period, effectively forcing you to pay a subscription or miss out on core features such as motion detection zones.

It’s also worth bearing in mind that what starts out being free or cheap may not continue to be in the future. Ring, for example, recently hiked its prices by 43% for single cameras, from £3.50 to £5/mth, though the yearly price does stay the same. Here’s a quick summary of what the big companies are charging for cloud video storage.

With this in mind, it’s worth looking for cameras that can also record video clips locally to a microSD card. While this isn’t as flexible as cloud storage, it gives you the option to keep using a camera if the company hikes prices beyond what you’re willing to pay.

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What other home security camera features should I look out for?

Pan and zoom: Some cameras have a motor and optics that allow you to move the camera around remotely. It’s a useful feature but not essential. Most home security cameras have a very wide field of view and, if positioned carefully, will be able to provide a view of your entire room.

Smart assistant/speaker integration: Many manufacturers boast of integration with either Alexa or Google Assistant in their specifications but while some aspects of these features are useful, they’re worth taking with a pinch of salt. In most instances, they refer to the ability to ask the digital assistant to display the feed from your camera on your smart screen speaker, which isn’t all that useful in our experience.

Object, person and pet detection: This sounds like a gimmick but being able to filter a long list of motion-triggered video clips by the type of motion detected can be a big time-saver. Some cameras even allow you to link names to faces so that you can be alerted when the camera spots certain people – if you want to know when your kids get home from school, this is an incredibly useful feature.