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Tough as nails, professional-grade security cameras for home use.
All of our content is written by humans, not robots.
Aliza Vigderman, Senior Editor, Industry Analyst
Editors Rating:9.6/10
What We Like
What We Don't Like
Bottom Line
Lorex makes good, solid cameras. Period. With video resolutions ranging from 1080p to 4K HD, superb night vision, and on-location video storage through DVRs and NVRs, you’ll enjoy professional-grade home security equipment without the high monthly fees.
Recent Update: 1 month ago
Lorex is offering steep discounts up to 50-percent off this Fourth of July week with their annual Independence Day sale. Get an eight-camera DVR or NVR system for as low as $300.
Lorex has established itself as an elite security camera brand with its advanced, durable, and robust security cameras. It also continues to impress with new cameras that promise top-shelf features, like AI-powered person detection, stunning 4K video quality, and long-range night vision.
Lorex is one of the best home security camera brands. With literally hundreds of products available, Lorex offers every security camera type there is. That being said, Lorex really isn’t for everybody. While it offers tons of options, it leans toward local video storage rather than cloud storage, which comes with the risk of losing valuable footage in the event of a damaged recorder.
Is Lorex the best security camera brand for you? Let’s take a closer look at its products and offerings and see if Lorex has what it takes to protect your home.
Pro Tip: With stunning video quality, see how our #1 pick SimpliSafe Outdoor Camera is a better alternative to Lorex.
Lorex Camera
Lorex cloud storage features
Free cloud storage
10 GB
Recording type
Motion-activated recording
Free plan extra features
3 RapidRecaps per month
Lorex Cloud Premium monthly plan
$3.49
Lorex Cloud Premium yearly plan
$34.99
Editor's Rating
Gabe Turner
Chief Editor
Overall Rating
9.6/10
Our Video Review
For this review, we chose to test one of the most advanced Lorex security systems, which comes with 4K outdoor cameras. And of course, writing about a camera’s video and audio, especially if the resolution is as high as 4K, doesn’t really do it justice. So here’s a video review showcasing the Lorex 4K’s video display day and night.
Check out another camera system from Lorex; this one shoots in 2K instead of 4K.
The Beginning of Our Process
When it comes to home security, we like having options, but when we checked out Lorex, we felt a bit overwhelmed by the number of options available — there were thousands! We thought you might feel the same, so before scouting Lorex, we recommend familiarizing yourself about security cameras in general. You should, for instance, know the difference between wireless, wire-free, and IP cameras. Our security camera guide is a good place to start. We also recommend reading up on the worst security cameras you should avoid, just so you know what NOT to look for.
Fortunately for us, we have lots of experience with security cameras, so once we figured out what type of camera we wanted to test, we were able to filter through Lorex’s options. In the end, we decided to go with the Lorex 4K Ultra HD 8-channel security camera system. It was being offered at a bargain price, so we wasted no time and bought it.
The checkout process went smoothly, and it shipped out within the next day. The package arrived about a week later and it contained:
We unboxed and tested it out, and here’s what we thought of the system’s features.
Storage With The One TB Hard Drive
Most Lorex cameras come with a recorder – a computer box with a hard drive in it that stores continuous footage streamed from connected cameras. That’s good news if you want to avoid monthly fees, since local recording is free. However, without cloud backup, you should have another backup storage ready for important videos about to “expire.”
The videos technically don’t have a time limit, unlike with cloud storage. However, Lorex’s DVRs are configured to erase the oldest clips once they are full to make room for new videos. In our experience with the Lorex cameras, a one TB recorder can store about 20 days of continuous video from one camera. One hour of footage uses roughly two GB of storage space.
If you need more storage, you can actually expand the DVR storage space. Most DVRs have slots to which you can hook-up up to three more hard drives. Of course, hard drives aren’t cheap, so expanding your DVR’s storage can drive up the total equipment cost. Keep that in mind when studying Lorex’s pricing.
Aside from expanding the storage, you can also connect more cameras to the system. Ours came with four cameras, but since the DVR has eight channels, we could add four more to make it eight. Lorex also offers DVRs with 16 and 32 channels, but those are usually reserved for business security applications. For a mid-sized home, an eight-channel system is probably enough.
But is DVR storage the best type of storage for security cameras? That depends. Having your videos stored locally means there’s lower risk of hacking compared to videos that go to a cloud. There’s also no on-going cost associated with using DVRs. And of course, your cameras will record continuously, whether there’s motion or not, giving you a complete look at what goes on in your home when you’re not there. So if you want to avoid monthly fees and enjoy continuous recording, we’d definitely recommend Lorex for you.
However, local storage is not fool-proof. Since the videos are stored on a device, there’s a possibility of losing important clips if the recorder is damaged or stolen. With cloud storage, on the other hand, you’ll pay a monthly fee to store videos; and yes, there have been instances of videos stored in the cloud leaking. However, you’ll have access to your videos 24/7, and cloud storage also serves as backup in case your camera is stolen.
Pro Tip: While hacking security camera cloud storage isn’t rare, most cases can be attributed to poor password habits. Some users don’t change the default password of their security cameras, which enables hackers to access their cameras and storage without much difficulty.
Our recommendation is to have both: A DVR for your main storage and cloud storage for backup. Fortunately, Lorex offers such an option. The cloud cost depends on the DVR used, but generally, it’s about $10 per month. And with both cloud backup and local storage, we recommend Lorex if you want flexible, safe, and secure video storage.
4K Video
4K video is all the hype these days, and Lorex is riding the wave. Of all the brands we’ve reviewed, Lorex seems to have the widest selection of 4K Ultra HD cameras. So if you want your cameras to capture near-cinematographic videos, we highly recommend checking out Lorex’s 4K camera lineup.
What exactly does having 4K security cameras mean for our security, though? Well, the most obvious significance of 4K cameras has to do with their video quality. Images from a typical 1080p HD camera consist of about two million pixels, while with a 4K camera, that figure quadruples to about eight million. Usually, more pixels equals greater picture quality.
From a security perspective, a better image quality results in more detailed videos. You know how in movies they can zoom in a camera’s feed and read license plates of fast-moving getaway cars? It’s kind of like that with Lorex. Since the 4K camera contains more pixels, you can digitally zoom in several times and still identify smaller details.
We’ve proven that in our tests. Unfortunately, the 4K resolution didn’t fully translate when we snapped the screenshot below, but during our live testing, we could zoom in up to about 15 times and the image was still HD quality. The camera itself can actually zoom in up to 25 times, but at that point, the picture will start looking blurry. We find that 12 to 15 times zoom is the sweet spot.
Video Quality
That being said, 4K is not for everybody. Higher-quality videos take up more storage space, and with Lorex’s limited storage, you’d only be able to store a couple of days’ worth of video in 4K. Cameras with 4K resolution also consume bandwidth like crazy, so use 4K cameras only if your DVR or NVR, router, and internet connection can support its bandwidth and storage requirements.
Fortunately, Lorex has a wide selection of cameras with great picture quality despite having less than a 4K resolution. There are lots of 2K and 1080p cameras available. Just don’t go with the 720p ones; in our opinion, 720p cameras fail to provide the picture quality required to capture detailed videos, especially outdoors.
Additional Features
We’ve been singing the praises of Lorex. Now it’s time for a little bad news. There was really no way to get these security cameras to blend in with our home. While that didn’t bother us, it is important to note the design of these cameras was very bulky; think street corner or storefront cameras. That’s typical with Lorex security cameras, but there are quite a few with nicer aesthetics. We suggest looking at Lorex Wi-Fi cameras if design matters to you, or some of Lorex’s newer bullet cameras with security lighting, as these cameras offer color-changing lights for extra aesthetic points.
One good thing about the cameras we bought, though, was that they could withstand harsh outdoor weather elements, working in temperatures anywhere from -40 to 131 degrees Fahrenheit. Basically, they could work in the coldest of winters and hottest of summers, which was a great feature for us since we wanted eyes on our entire property throughout the seasons. We don’t ever have to worry about bringing the cameras indoors even during rain or snow, as they were completely protected from dust and water jets. When we got our system we sprayed it with our power washer to test this feature out. To our satisfaction, it held up perfectly!
Some of our other favorite features of the cameras were:
Night Vision
Color Night Vision
Installing Our System
As bodybuilders often say, “No pain, no gain.” In order to gain access to Lorex’s top-shelf features, you’ll have to go through the installation process, which isn’t exactly painless. It’s doable, of course, but you’ll need a little patience. Here’s why.
Most Lorex security camera systems are built around a DVR (digital video recorder) or NVR (network video recorder). Both are central devices that need to sit within Wi-Fi or Ethernet cable range of your router. Those devices process videos from the cameras and then store them in a built-in hard drive.
While we love the local storage, setting up a DVR or NVR adds a few steps to the installation process. We recommend starting by clearing out some space for the DVR or NVR, as they aren’t exactly small. They are about the size of a DVD player, and again, they need to sit close enough to the router.
Setting up the recorder is easy, though. In most cases, you just have to plug it in, connect it to your router, and then boot it up. That’s the case with the DVR we received, and it started up nice and smooth.
Next, we had to place the cameras and then connect them to the DVR. The latter was the tough part. All four cameras we received were indoor/outdoor types, but we decided to keep them all outdoors. After all, they looked too bulky for our interior design.
Each camera needs two types of wires: The first one is for power, which plugs into a wall outlet; the second one goes to the DVR for data transfer. We had to get creative, which meant drilling, snaking wires through the ceiling, and using an all-important tool of the trade to keep the wires out of our way: duct tape.
That said, not all Lorex cameras are as time-consuming to install as the one we had purchased. There are wire-free Lorex cameras that run on batteries and connect to Wi-Fi, so basically, all you’ll have to do is mount them. There are also cameras that do plug into a wall outlet but use Wi-Fi to transmit video and audio. Those cameras are called Wire-free and Wireless cameras, so check them out if they are more your style.
Lorex DVR
Eventually, we got things done but after installing the cameras and the DVR, we still had questions about how to connect our system to the app. That was when we decided to call customer support. We also had the option of live chatting with a customer service rep on the Lorex website, but we felt that would be more time consuming. We were hopeful our representative would answer our questions, but honestly, we didn’t get the kind of service we expected. The representative we spoke with was a bit short and didn’t seem interested in helping. He did eventually help us set our system up, but it wasn’t the most professional experience we’ve ever had.
App Motion Zones
The Lorex Secure App
Because our Lorex system was self-monitored, having a decent app was key, since that’s where we viewed our livestream and received notifications. The Lorex app worked on all devices, which was great because we used both Apple and Android products in our household. Once we downloaded the app, we got push notifications, saw both live and recorded video and grouped cameras together. For example, we grouped together our outdoor front cameras and outdoor back cameras which made it possible to livestream multiple cameras at one time. This made the self-monitoring portion simple when live streaming because we had eyes on multiple places simultaneously.
You Should Know: The mere presence of security cameras could deter an intruder, so install the cameras in a visible location.
Let’s Talk Money
We’ve all heard the saying “you get what you pay for” and that’s the case with Lorex. Because of the wide variety of systems, there are a wide variety of prices. Our system was on sale for $387.99 but normally costs $699.99.
Money Saving Tip: Take advantage of Lorex’s open box deals, which are gently used security systems at a discounted price with a one-year warranty.
One of our favorite things about Lorex was there was no mandatory monthly fee. While the initial investment may feel like shelling out a large chunk of change at one time, many other security companies require long-term contracts and monthly fees even after the initial equipment costs. Some don’t even store footage unless you pay for a cloud subscription. The Ring cameras we reviewed, for example, require a $10 monthly fee to store videos from the entire camera system. But not Lorex; once we paid for the product we were done. Of course, that wouldn’t be the case if we sprung for the unlimited cloud storage, which broke down to $3.49 a month, but we opted out.
Lorex has the most equipment options available on the market. Explore their packages.
Lorex vs. Other Brands
Compared to most security camera brands we test, Lorex is kind of unique. Take Ring, for instance. This Amazon-owned security camera brand offers mostly wireless security cameras that store videos in the cloud. And without local storage, Ring cameras need a subscription to be able to record. The same goes for the Google Nest Cam family.
That said, there are still brands like Lorex that offer local recording devices, or at the very least, security cameras with a microSD card slot for local storage. Swann and Wyze come to mind, both offering affordable video monitoring solutions.
Let’s take one product from each brand and compare them to the Lorex 4K camera we tested.
Our Final Thoughts
Lorex was a good option for us. We loved the clear video and lack of lengthy contracts and monthly fees. But because there was no professional monitoring option, this system’s best for someone who lives in a gated community, an apartment with a doorman or somewhere with other security measures in place. Otherwise, you may get stuck in a situation where you’re unable to call the police for whatever reason, but for someone looking to avoid monthly fees, Lorex is a great option.
Find out how Lorex compares to other security cameras
For a closer look at how Lorex performs, we compared it with other popular security cameras.
Once you pay for your Lorex equipment, there’s no more additional fees. Figure out your options here.
Lorex FAQs
Lorex cameras are secure because all of the footage is stored locally on a hard drive rather than in cloud storage. As long as you change your administrator password periodically and create long, complicated, and unique passwords every time, your system will be secure. Also, make sure to perform all firmware updates as soon as possible.
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Citations
PR News Wire. (2019). Smart Home Security Market to Grow at a CAGR Of 19.6% During 2018 – 2022.
prnewswire.com/news-releases/smart-home-security-market-to-grow-at-a-cagr-of-19-6-during-2018–2022–300927558.html
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