Where to Place Home Security Cameras: An Installer's Field Guide

September 4, 2026 · Security Systems

Entry points, blind spots, mounting height, and how many cameras you actually need, from a Twin Cities installer who wires for the Minnesota cold.

# Where to Place Home Security Cameras: An Installer's Field Guide Most camera-placement advice reads like it was written for a warehouse. Cover every wall, aim high, done. That's not how a house gets watched well. We plan camera coverage across Plymouth, Wayzata, and the Lake Minnetonka lakefront, and the plan always starts the same way: cover the ways in, then cover the blind spots, then stop. A camera pointed at a blank fence is a camera you paid for and never use. Here's how we actually place them, and where the Minnesota cold changes the wiring behind the wall. ## Where to Place Security Cameras Cover the entry points first: the front door, the back or patio door, the garage, and the driveway approach. Roughly 70 percent of break-ins come through a door, so those get cameras before anything else. Only after every way in is covered do we add cameras for the yard, the side approaches, and the detached garage or shed. The order we work in on almost every home: 1. **Front door and porch**: packages, visitors, and the most-used entry, usually paired with a video doorbell for the close-up face shot 2. **Back and patio doors**: the quiet entry a burglar prefers because the street can't see it 3. **Garage and driveway**: vehicles, the overhead door, and anyone walking up the drive 4. **First-floor windows and side yards**: the low, hidden approaches between houses 5. **Detached buildings and the dock**: sheds, workshops, and the Lake Minnetonka shoreline runs that need thei