The Best Indoor Security Cameras For Keeping Watch At Home

Most people know Ring for its video doorbells for the front door, and the Indoor Cam brings the same app and alerts inside the house. It's a compact unit that plugs straight into a standard UK socket, so the job is finding a spot with a clear view of the room and joining it to your Wi-Fi.

Video comes through at 1080p with a 140-degree field of view, which is wide enough to take in most of a living room from a corner shelf. Infrared night vision keeps the picture usable with the lights off, and two-way talk lets you speak to whoever is in the room, whether that's a cleaner at a rental or a dog barking at the post. It's sold in white or black and works with Alexa, which helps if you already have Echo devices around the house.

The Blink Mini is the small white camera in our testing photo, and its night vision was clearer than other similarly priced cameras we've used. That counts for a lot, as plenty of the times you check a room it'll be dark or the curtains will be drawn.

It records HD video with a 110-degree field of view, a little narrower than the Ring, so it works best on a shelf facing into the room rather than squeezed into a corner. Two-way audio is clear, alerts come through whenever motion is detected and setup through the Blink app is easy. A stand and mounting kit come in the box, so you can sit it on furniture or fix it to a wall. Cloud storage of clips is only available with a Blink subscription, so factor that in if you want to look back at recordings.

The Arlo Ultra2 sits at the top of this list for picture quality and price. It records in 4K with HDR and zoom, so you can crop into a clip afterwards and keep far more detail than a 1080p camera gives, and colour night vision keeps the picture in colour after dark.

It's wire-free and weather-resistant, which means you can use it indoors now and move it outside later using the mounting kit in the box. A 180-degree viewing angle covers a large open-plan room from one spot, an integrated spotlight lights up the scene when motion is picked up and two-way audio is clear. The catch is that it connects to the internet through an Arlo SmartHub rather than straight to your router, so budget for the hub if it isn't in the kit you buy.

TP-Link is better known for routers and networking kit, and this camera works with any standard Wi-Fi router. The big difference from the fixed cameras here is the motorised head, which pans a full 360 degrees and tilts through 114 degrees vertically from the app, so one camera can sweep a whole room.

It records at 1080p, and TP-Link quotes night vision up to 30 metres, which is far more reach than a living room needs. Motion detection lets you set activity zones so a ceiling fan or a busy window doesn't trigger constant alerts. You get a choice of cloud or microSD storage, and it works with Alexa. Digital zoom isn't on offer, so you can't crop into footage the way you can with the Arlo.

The Nest camera in the photo under the title is the wired indoor model, a black camera on a round stand that looks at home on a kitchen worktop or bookshelf. Its strength is the alerts, with separate motion and sound notifications sent to your phone or smartwatch and personalised alerts you can tune to the things you care about.

Video is 1080p with a 130-degree diagonal view, and Google lists advanced night vision for dark rooms. Continuous cloud recording is on offer, so check what Google's current Nest plans include before you rely on it. Google says all footage and communication are encrypted, with security improved through software updates. It works with most smart devices, and it fits best in a home already set up around Google Home or a Nest speaker.

The Hikvision HiLook is a different kind of camera from the rest of this list. It's a ceiling-mounted turret built to plug into a wired CCTV recorder, so it suits a garage, workshop or small business more than a living room. It comes with a 2.8 mm or 3.6 mm lens, or as a vari-focal version you can adjust after fitting.

The 2 megapixel sensor records at 1080p, Hikvision quotes up to 40 metres of night vision and the IP66 rating means it'll cope in a damp garage or under an outdoor soffit. Everything for fitting comes in the box, including a self-adhesive drilling template, wall plugs and screws. You'll need a compatible recorder and cable runs to each camera, so it's a bigger job than plugging in a Blink or Ring.