Best wireless security cameras of 2024

We love the convenience and flexibility of wireless home security cameras and we reckon it's hard to beat the Reolink Argus 3 Pro. Reolink sports 2K video quality, a bright spotlight, and a wire-free design—features it shares with Arlo Pro 4, our previous winner. But Reolink offers a smaller price tag, no monthly fees, AND offers a solar option.

Although Arlo offers better smart home compatibility, Reolink offers local storage, a longer warranty, and a very affordable solar panel add-on. These small improvements make a huge difference when the best wireless security cameras are so similar.

Find out which cameras on our list are truly wireless, which ones you can use indoors and outdoors, and what smart features each one offers in our comparison table and security camera reviews.

The Reolink Argus 3 Pro's 2K video resolution and larger battery give the Arlo Pro 5 a run for its money. This camera uses a rechargeable battery or solar power, so you have a lot of flexibility for camera placement. On the downside, the camera doesn't have a removable battery like Arlo Pro 5 and Ring Stick Up Cam, meaning you can't swap a spare in when needed.

We found it outlasted Arlo Pro 5 in long-term battery tests, which is another notch in Reolink's belt. The local storage helps reduce the camera's Wi-Fi usage (which chews through batteries) for better performance overall. This contrasts with our experience of batteries draining fairly quickly if you record or view videos often without a solar panel accessory. Our test wasn't exactly taxing on the cameras, so you can expect to drain the battery in a month or two under normal conditions.

Although the Argus 3 Pro has a narrower field of view (122º) than average, it's still one of the best choices for most people. It even boasts compatibility with smart home platforms like Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa.

Its starlight night vision gives you clear images up to 10 metres without any extra ambient light. Overall we found the setup easy and the camera outperformed our expectations, so we're enormous fans of Reolink.

Among the smart alerts you can use for free are person, animal, and vehicle detection, along with motion zones. The fact that you can use so many features without a monthly subscription is a big improvement.

You still need to pay to use facial recognition, but we're not as excited about that. We especially like that you don't need to pay a separate fee for each camera in your home.

To learn more, read our full Nest Cam (battery) review.

We've seen reports of short battery life on Ring products (some say it lasts about a month), and recharging the Stick Up Cam is a tedious process since you need to remove the battery each time. While there's a wired option for this camera—Stick Up Cam Plug-In—you lose the flexibility of installing it anywhere.

You can get a solar panel accessory so you don’t need to remove the battery as often, but it’ll cost you extra.

There are so many wireless security cameras to choose from—we barely scratched the surface of what kinds of cameras are out there. Still, the Reolink Argus 3 Pro is a standout option with 100% wire-free operation, local storage, solar option, and impressive video quality.

For more information about wireless security cameras, see our list of frequently asked questions below.

Contributing writer: Rebecca Edwards

To find the best wireless security cameras, we looked at price, image quality, reliability, ease of setup, smart features, night vision, and customer satisfaction.

We tested several cameras in our homes, read expert reviews, researched industry standards and camera specs, and consulted thousands of customer reviews.

• 200+ hours of research and testing
• 33 in-home tests
• 48 products considered

Battery-powered cameras that completely fall into the wire-free category, like the Reolink Argus 3 Pro, Eufy S340, Google Nest Cam, and Ring Stick Up Cam, got extra credit when it came to ranking the top wireless security cameras this year. But we couldn’t dismiss high-quality Wi-Fi cameras like the TP-Link Tapo range just because of a compulsory power cord.

Find out more about how we rank and review products in our full methodology.