Lorex Security Camera Review

Our Video Review

Want to see the Lorex cameras in action? Our video review shows you what these cameras can do. We tested their 4K resolution and night vision capabilities in real-world conditions, and honestly, seeing the footage will give you a much clearer picture than any description we could write. Take a look for yourself.

While 4K’s crystal-clear quality is impressive, there are trade-offs. You’ll need at least 25 Mbps upload speed for smooth streaming and roughly 40 GB of storage per hour of 4K recording. In comparison, 1080p footage requires 5 Mbps and uses about 1.5 GB per hour. Before grabbing a 4K camera, we recommend making sure your network and storage can handle it. Otherwise, you might need to make a few upgrades.

If you don’t want to make those upgrades, Lorex does have camera options with lower resolutions. In the video below, we tested a Lorex camera with 2K resolution. Click on the video and you’ll see that it is very high quality, and we didn’t have to completely overhaul our home network.

The Beginning of Our Process

As always, this Lorex review is based on our first-hand experience. The video review above shows our expert tester setting up one of the newest Lorex cameras and putting it through its paces. By the way, this is the standard process we use in all our reviews, including our latest Nest Cam (battery) review from the Nest Camera lineup.

Lorex has such a wide range of options, including professional grade cameras, that we had to tweak our process for this review. Instead of picking out mid to upper tier cameras like we normally do, we selected Lorex cameras that are suited to home use. That said, business owners looking for security cameras can definitely get a sense of what these Lorex cameras are all about.

>> Check Out: The Ultimate Guide to Home Security Cameras

Choosing Our Lorex System

We tested Lorex’s DVR systems because they offer continuous recording, unlike many of the home security cameras we test. For example, the Ring Spotlight Cam we reviewed only records video after it detects motion. By offering continuous recording, Lorex DVR systems give homeowners the option of a security system that’s similar to a commercial-grade setup.

The Lorex system we tested before the company split its commercial and residential offerings still had all the current capabilities with respect to video quality, video storage, smart home integrations, advanced motion detection, and more. Our Lorex system contained the following components:

• One 1-TB Hard Drive
• Four 4K Cameras
• Cables
• Mounting Kits
• Power Adapters

We unboxed and tested it out, and here’s what we thought of the system’s features.

Storage With The One TB Hard Drive

In addition to avoiding monthly fees, local recording via a DVR or NVR also means lower risk of hacking. With both local and cloud storage, which is available on some Lorex systems, you have an automatic video backup in the cloud. We cover all the details of their cloud storage plan in our Lorex pricing guide.

Keep in mind that a single 1 TB drive handles about 20 days of continuous 4K recording from one camera. We had four cameras running simultaneously and maxed out in five days.

We also had to manually transfer any clips we wanted to keep permanently to our computer since there’s no automatic archiving feature.

4K Video

Lorex has a wide selection of 4K security cameras. We’ve tested a lot of different Lorex models and rank some of them among the best 4K cameras you can buy.

While the prospect of having cutting-edge video quality is quite tantalizing, the current state of 4K video and the technology around it means some significant drawbacks, or at least factors to be considered.

On one hand, the crystal clear video quality lets you see snoopers and burglars in vivid detail. With such high resolution, you might even be able to zoom in on a face to identify a perp or see the license plate of a car that’s highly suspicious. Our Lorex cameras could zoom in up 25 times, which means a considerable range of detail.

As we mentioned earlier, 4K cameras are resource-hungry. They demand serious bandwidth (at least 25 Mbps upload per camera), powerful processing hardware, and massive storage capacity. If you’re still using a basic router from your ISP, your network will struggle with multiple 4K streams. This becomes a problem when you want continuous recordings from several cameras.

We recommend being strategic with your 4K placement. We suggest installing these high-resolution cameras at entry points and large outdoor areas where you need to capture details like faces or license plates. For hallways, indoor rooms, and secondary areas, 2K or 1080p cameras are fine and won’t overwhelm your network. You can skip 720p entirely. The quality drop isn’t worth the minimal savings.

Hardware Specs and Design

Lorex cameras are built for the long run. The outdoor models we tested can handle extreme temperatures from -40 to 131 degrees Fahrenheit. They’re also weatherproof with an IP67 rating and have a tamper-resistant design.

But that hardiness of Lorex cameras often comes at the cost of the design. Most Lorex cameras are bulky and heavy; think street corner or storefront cameras. They don’t exactly fit in that well in a residential setup.

The Smart Home Wireless lineup offers sleeker, more residential-friendly designs that blend better with home decor. The devices remind us of Ring and Arlo. These models are on the Smart Home Security section of the Lorex website.

Read More: The Best Outdoor Security Cameras of 2025

Additional Features

Security cameras are becoming more advanced. Nest Cams integrated into ADT security systems use facial recognition to identify regular visitors and unlock smart locks to let them in. Lorex cameras aren’t there yet, but they have a few tricks of their own, such as:

• Smart Home Integration: Our system worked with Alexa and Google Assistant. We could control them with voice commands through our smart speakers and displays. Some devices also connect to Android smart TVs, Apple TVs, and Chromecast-enabled TVs through the Lorex Secure App. While you can connect your DVR directly to your TV via HDMI, the wireless integration options mean you don’t have to sacrifice a port. You just need reliable internet speeds.

• Night Vision: In our opinion, Lorex offers the best night vision cameras. The outdoor cameras have color night vision and a range of up to 200 feet in complete darkness, though some ambient light is needed. If it’s too dark, infrared night vision kicks in with visibility up to 120 feet, which is still impressive.

• Storage: We primarily used DVR storage, but some Lorex cameras support cloud storage. Current pricing is $2.99 per month for one camera with 30 days of event history, or $10.99 per month for up to 10 cameras. For comparison, Arlo’s pricing includes cloud storage for unlimited cameras at $17.99 per month. Arlo also offers more advanced features, which you can learn about in our Arlo home security camera review.
• Motion Detection: Lorex offered something called RapidRecap, an easy way to locate motion from the camera. Essentially, this was our event history compiled into a quick and easy time-stamped video. The fact Lorex provided RapidRecap made it incredibly easy to sift through cloud history and saved us a ton of time when we were looking for specific movement within videos, like one time when a friend from out of town arrived on our doorstep unexpectedly.

Installing Our System

Installing Lorex cameras can be complicated if you’re unfamiliar with mounting and wiring cameras, which most people aren’t. To help, we’ll get into the installation of our DVR-based system that includes a DVR, cameras, wired connections to those cameras, and wired power. If this is all starting to sound too complicated for you, we highly recommend paying for a professional third-party installation.

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.

When we ran into issues connecting our system to the mobile app, we contacted Lorex support. Unfortunately, the experience was disappointing. The representative was rushing us and didn’t seem interested in helping us. While we eventually got the information we needed, the interaction left us wanting better customer service, especially given the premium price of these systems.

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.

There are plug-in Lorex cameras that use Wi-Fi to transmit video and audio. There are also battery-powered Lorex cameras that are completely wire-free. They aren’t featured as prominently on the Lorex website. We suggest going to the Smart Home Security section of the Lorex website to find these devices.

After installing the cameras and DVR, we had questions about connecting our system to the mobile app. Lorex offers customer support over the phone and online. When we called, the representative was short with their answers and seemed disinterested in helping. To be fair, we got the information we needed, but it wasn’t a great experience.

The Lorex Secure App

We appreciate the fact that the Lorex app works on all our devices, including both Apple and Android products. The app includes push notifications, livestreaming, and recorded video. We could also group multiple livestreams in a single view. The ability to have eyes on multiple places simultaneously makes self-monitoring a lot easier.

Lorex Pricing

We think you get what you pay for with Lorex. Its extensive catalog means prices vary widely. 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.

One of our favorite things about Lorex, though, is that they do not require a monthly fee. We paid for our equipment upfront to avoid a long-term financing contract and opted to store our video footage on their DVR to avoid a cloud subscription. Most providers, such as the Ring cameras we reviewed, require a $10 per month subscription for video storage.