The Best Places to Install a Light Bulb Camera (and Where Not To)
Placement decides whether a camera is useful or annoying. The hardware barely matters by comparison. Here is how I choose positions when I install these for clients.
Start with the entry points, not the rooms
Burglars use doors and ground-floor windows. Map every way into your home, then rank them by how hidden they are from the street — the hidden ones get cameras first, because those are the ones that get used.
The front door is the most photographed and the least burgled entrance in most homes. Cover it, but do not stop there.
Garage and side passage
Garages usually already have a bare ceiling socket, no window and something worth stealing. It is the single best bulb-camera position in most houses.
Side passages are dark, narrow and out of view, which is exactly why intruders like them. A bulb camera in an existing passage light both records and deters.
Covered porches, not exposed fittings
A lantern-style porch fixture with a glass surround is ideal: the camera stays dry and gains a wide view of the approach. Fully exposed sockets in wind-driven rain will eventually kill the unit.
If the fitting has heavy patterned glass, check the view in the app before you commit — glass distortion can blur the exact detail you wanted.
Indoors: hallways beat living rooms
A hallway camera sees everyone who moves between rooms. A living-room camera mostly films your family watching television and gives you a privacy problem in exchange.
Stairwell landings are the second-best indoor spot for the same reason: everything passes through them.
Height, angle and framing
Aim for 8–10 feet with a downward tilt of roughly 15–30°. Higher than that and you record the tops of heads; lower and the camera is within reach.
Frame so that faces enter the shot before people reach the door. A camera pointing straight down at a doormat captures excellent footage of a hood.
Motion zones: the step everyone skips
Draw the detection zone to exclude the road, the pavement, a tree line and any neighbour's property. This single step removes the majority of false alerts.
Re-check zones after a seasonal change. A branch that was bare in February will trigger alerts every windy evening in July.
Places to never install a camera
Bathrooms, bedrooms occupied by guests or tenants, and any position whose main view is inside a neighbour's window. Beyond the legal risk, it destroys trust the moment somebody notices.
Also avoid pointing a camera directly at a bright light or a west-facing window — the exposure will crush everything else in the frame.