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Traditional motion-sensing floodlights provide a bright beacon whenever anyone steps up to your house. They’re also helpful for illuminating a clear path in the dark, along with security for scaring off would-be burglars. These smart floodlights take it a step further, operating in a similar fashion to doorbell cameras, while retaining all the benefits of the original ones that came before it. Here’s what you need to know when looking for the right light to brighten up your driveway and keep a constant eye on your front door, even when you’re away.
Smart Floodlight Security Camera Buying Guide
Storage: Video files from every day can quickly add up in size, and there are a few options when it comes to storage. Some services offer a cloud subscription, either included or extra, to keep your surveillance footage safe. Others have SD cards with limited memory, or use your DVR and continuously loop-record over itself unless you specifically want to save it.
Lights: These should be plenty bright, illuminating the entire area if they sense motion at night. An LED bulb with 2000 lumens will get the job done, with a motion sensing area of around 200 degrees or more. You can even set a specific area for motion detection, so you’re not constantly getting alerted each time a squirrel or a leaf enters the camera’s view.
Sound: Not all units have built-in audio, and even those that do may contain different ways of utilizing it. Some have a simple siren sound to scare off would-be intruders, while others feature an entire two-way communication system.
App: Unlike a regular floodlight, these will alert you through the accompanying app as to when it senses activity. The apps vary across the board, in things like the features they offer and how much detail and quality are devoted to them. While all of these provide a video feed to your smartphone or tablet, some are better than others at picking up sound, seeing at night (or in color), setting the exact area to monitor and keeping lag and latency to a minimum. These can also usually integrate with your smart home system, like Alexa and Google AI.
Durability: Because these will be outdoors, your camera needs to hold up to all types of weather. A rating of at least IP65-IPX7 means it should be protected from water, moisture and dust.
Installation: For the most part, you’ll need to hardwire these to your fuse box through the electrical wires of your existing floodlights, or get extension wires put in if you don’t already have them. If that’s not possible, there are still a few models that don’t require it. This will also need to be within range of your router to link up to your home’s WiFi, and a router extension can really boost its performance if you’re getting a weak signal.
Resolution: At this point, 1080p in HD is a pretty accepted norm. Having a blurry or pixelated picture kind of defeats the purpose of what these are meant to do, so seeing a clear visual feed is a dealbreaker when choosing the right one for your home.
What Are the Best Smart Floodlight Cameras?
From Ring to Arlo and Eufy, here are our top security cam recommendations to buy for your house.
