Spent $800 on security cameras mounted perfectly under your second-story soffits? Congratulations—you’ve created expensive decorations that capture the tops of heads and baseball caps.
When someone steals packages off your porch next week, police will ask for footage showing the suspect’s face. You’ll have crystal-clear video of their shoulders and hair. Completely useless.
If you want to install security cameras on a two story house, mount them at 7-8 feet maximum—front door side-mounted at eye level, both driveway corners for dual coverage, back door with first-floor windows, garage entrance.
Plus one second-story overview camera with zoom lens. Height determines whether cameras catch criminals or just record crimes nobody can solve.
This guide breaks down exactly where each camera goes, why that specific height works optically, and which placement mistakes turn expensive equipment into worthless surveillance theater that looks impressive but provides zero protection.
Where To Install Security Cameras On Two Story House
Second-story soffits look so perfect for cameras. Clean. Professional. Twenty feet up where nobody can mess with them. Except that’s exactly where your $300 camera becomes a decoration that captures the tops of heads.
Some homeowners blow $600 on fancy PTZ cameras that pan and tilt, convinced one expensive roof unit beats five cheaper cameras at ground level. Others obsess over symmetry—cameras on all four corners because “it looks balanced.” Meanwhile, burglars ignore your camera-covered front door and just smash the first-floor window you forgot about.
Every one of these decisions produces the same result: expensive footage showing crimes happened without showing who committed them.
Strategic Placement That Actually Captures Evidence
Optimal camera placement on two-story houses follows one critical rule: identification cameras mount at 7-8 feet maximum, with only one second-story camera for property overview using appropriate zoom capability.
That 7-8 foot height isn’t arbitrary—it positions lenses at or slightly above average eye level, capturing frontal facial features instead of crown-of-head shots that baseball caps and hoodies completely obscure.
A Reolink camera at 8 feet on your front door corner captures every visitor’s face clearly enough for police to identify suspects from photo lineups.
That identical camera mounted at 22 feet under your second-story soffit captures the tops of heads. Shoulders. Maybe backs. Zero identifying features. The physics don’t change based on how much you spent on the camera.
Strategic placement prioritizes ground-level entry points—front door, back door, first-floor windows, garage—with cameras positioned to capture faces approaching those entry points.
Then add one second-story camera with varifocal or zoom lens focused on your driveway or street for license plates and approach monitoring.
That high camera isn’t for identification. Think of it as your “map view” showing what’s happening across your entire property while ground-level cameras provide “detail views” identifying specific people.
Why This Placement Strategy Works
Camera sensors need sufficient pixels on target for identification—industry standard sits at 100 pixels per foot for facial recognition.
A 4MP camera at 20 feet height viewing someone 15 feet away provides terrible pixel density because the steep downward angle compresses facial features into a smaller portion of the frame.
That same camera at 8 feet height captures faces with 2-3x more usable pixels because the shallow angle shows frontal features, not aerial views.
Learn>>>What Security Features To Look For When Buying Cameras?
Bank ATM cameras always mount at 5-7 feet maximum, angled slightly downward. Never 20 feet up. Banks spend millions on security research—they know high mounting makes identification impossible.
Real Evidence From Actual Cases
A homeowner in suburban Dallas experienced a package theft caught perfectly on their $400 4K camera mounted under the second-story soffit at 23 feet.
The footage showed exactly when the thief arrived, how long they stayed, and which direction they left.
Police couldn’t identify anyone because the footage captured the person’s back, the top of their baseball cap, and their car driving away. Zero facial features.
Their neighbor three houses down caught a similar theft the same week. Their $150 1080p camera mounted at 7 feet on the doorframe captured the thief’s face in perfect detail—enough clarity to see facial hair, glasses, and a visible tattoo on the neck.
Police identified the suspect within 48 hours using the neighbor’s footage, recovered both homeowners’ packages, and made arrests. The camera quality didn’t matter. The mounting height decided which footage was useful.
Best Camera Locations For Two Story House Security
1. Front Door Camera At 7-8 Feet (Most Critical Position)
Statistics show 34% of burglars enter through front doors, making this your single most important camera location. Mount it 7-8 feet maximum, positioned to the side of the door rather than directly above.
That side angle captures faces as people approach, before they’re standing directly under the camera where hats block everything.
Avoid the temptation to mount this camera under your second-story overhang or soffit. That puts it 18-24 feet high where it becomes an expensive decoration recording the tops of heads. Position it on the doorframe side wall or nearby wall section at the 7-8 foot mark.
Use a camera with a 100-110° field of view to capture both the porch area and the approach path. Position it so visitors’ faces are illuminated by your porch light, not backlighting the camera where the light source creates silhouettes. If your porch light sits above and behind the camera position, you’re set. If the light would backlight subjects, either move the camera or add secondary lighting.
The goal: capture clear facial shots of everyone who approaches your front door, at a distance of 3-5 feet before they reach the doorbell. That gives you identification-quality footage before someone can turn away or pull a hood up.
2. Driveway Coverage With Dual Cameras At 7-9 Feet
Your driveway needs two cameras, not one. Position them on opposite sides of your garage door at 7-9 feet height. This dual placement eliminates blind spots and captures both sides of vehicles entering your property.
One camera focuses on the driver’s side, positioned to catch the driver’s face as they pull in.
The other covers the passenger side and vehicle approach angle. Both cameras angle slightly downward at 30-40° to capture license plates on vehicles while maintaining facial capture capability for anyone exiting vehicles.
This overlapping coverage ensures you can identify who’s entering your property, what vehicle they’re driving, and capture license plate details for vehicles parked in your driveway or street.
During the daytime, this setup catches delivery drivers, visitors, and anyone chasing your property. At night, it captures vehicle details under your driveway lighting.
Position these cameras where garage lighting or nearby porch lights illuminate the driveway area. Night vision alone often struggles with license plate reflectivity—ambient lighting significantly improves capture quality.
3. Back Door And First-Floor Window Coverage At 7-8 Feet
About 22% of burglars enter through back doors, specifically because homeowners focus security budgets on impressive front-door installations while leaving rear access points poorly monitored.
First-floor windows adjacent to back doors become secondary entry points when doors prove too secure.
Mount one camera at 7-8 feet on the wall adjacent to your back door, positioned to capture both the door and nearest windows in a single frame. This typically requires a wide-angle lens (120-130°) for adequate backyard coverage.
Angle the camera to capture faces of anyone standing at the door or attempting window access.
Back door cameras face unique lighting challenges. Most backyards lack the lighting infrastructure front yards receive.
Consider adding motion-activated lighting or using cameras with built-in spotlights. The Reolink Duo series works well here—dual lenses provide wide coverage with good low-light performance.
Test the camera angle before permanent mounting. Stand where a burglar would stand attempting entry and verify the camera captures your face clearly. Adjusting the camera 6 inches can mean the difference between capturing a face or capturing a shoulder.
4. Garage And Side Entrance Coverage At 8-9 Feet
Nine percent of burglars enter through attached garages, accessing interior house doors from the garage. Tools, vehicles, and equipment stored in garages represent high theft value even without house access. Side doors often get completely overlooked in security planning despite being common entry points.
Mount a camera covering your garage door activation area—the spot where someone stands using the keypad or handle. Position it to capture faces, not just hands punching codes. This camera should clearly show who’s accessing your garage and when.
Side entrance cameras mount on your main house wall viewing the side door approach path.
These cameras need careful positioning because side yards often have poor natural lighting. Use cameras with quality infrared night vision or add motion-activated lighting. The goal: capture anyone approaching from the side before they reach the door.
Many two-story homes have side doors leading to basements, utility rooms, or direct interior access.
These doors rarely get security attention despite being easier to force than front doors with deadbolts and reinforcement.
A single camera at 8-9 feet positioned with a clear view of the door and approach path provides coverage most burglars don’t expect.
5. One Second-Story Overview Camera At 20-24 Feet With Zoom Lens
This is your only camera that mounts high. One second-story camera under the soffit with the clearest street and driveway view.
This camera isn’t for facial identification—it provides property-wide awareness and vehicle monitoring from distance.
Use a camera with varifocal or optical zoom lens (4-8mm minimum focal length). Standard 2.8mm wide-angle lenses at this height spread pixels too thin for any useful detail.
The zoom capability lets you focus on the street, capturing approaching vehicles before they reach your property and monitoring parked cars for suspicious activity.
Angle this camera toward the street rather than straight down at your property. It serves as an early warning for suspicious activity before people or vehicles reach your other cameras’ coverage areas. Think of it as providing context for what your ground-level cameras capture in detail.
This high-mounted camera also captures movement patterns across your entire property—useful for tracking which direction someone fled or identifying unusual activity in areas between your ground-level cameras’ focused coverage zones.
4 Common Two Story House Camera Placement Mistakes
Even with $1,200 worth of cameras on your two-story house, any burglar who robs you will be laughing—because you made these 4 placement mistakes.
1. Soffit Mounting Everything For Clean Aesthetics
Second-story soffits look like perfect camera mounting locations. Clean installation. Wires hidden in attic spaces.
Cameras protected by overhangs. Perfectly symmetrical on all four corners. Completely terrible for capturing identifying footage.
That 20-25 foot height captures the tops of heads and shoulders. People wearing hats become completely unidentifiable.
Even without hats, the steep downward angle compresses facial features into pixels too few for identification purposes. Police departments can’t use footage showing crowns of heads and backs. Your expensive 4K cameras become decorations.
The installation might look professional, but professional appearance doesn’t catch burglars or recover stolen property. Function over form every single time. Mount cameras where they capture faces, even if that means visible mounting brackets and exposed cables.
2. Using Wide-Angle Lenses From High Positions
Homeowners love wide-angle lenses (2.8mm) because they think wider coverage equals better security. From second-story heights, those wide angles spread your camera’s pixels across massive areas where nothing is visible in useful detail.
A 2.8mm lens from 20 feet height might cover your entire front yard in the camera view. Great for seeing everything happening.
Terrible for identifying anyone. Objects and people appear much smaller than expected. What looks like comprehensive coverage provides zero usable detail for identification.
Match focal length to mounting height. Ground-level cameras can use 2.8-4mm wide angles effectively. Cameras at 10-15 feet need 4-6mm focal lengths. Cameras at 20+ feet require 6-8mm minimum or varifocal lenses. The higher the camera, the tighter the focal length needed for useful detail capture.
3. Ignoring First-Floor Windows While Focusing On Doors
Most two-story security installations focus entirely on doors—front door, back door, garage door. Meanwhile, first-floor windows get ignored despite being common entry points when doors have visible cameras.
Burglars aren’t stupid. They see cameras on doors and simply break a window instead.
Ground-level windows become especially vulnerable on two-story homes where homeowners spend their security budget on impressive second-story installations that don’t capture useful footage anyway.
Your back door camera should include nearest first-floor windows in its coverage area. Side yard cameras should monitor basement windows and utility room windows.
Don’t assume window security only requires locked windows—cameras monitoring those windows deter attempts and capture evidence when deterrence fails.
4. Symmetrical Placement Because It Looks Balanced
Installing cameras symmetrically on all four corners of your house looks architecturally balanced. It also provides poor actual security coverage because threat assessment gets ignored in favor of aesthetic symmetry.
Not all sides of houses face equal risk. Front doors receive more traffic than side doors.
Driveways need more coverage than side yards without access paths. Strategic asymmetrical placement based on actual threat likelihood provides superior security using fewer cameras than symmetrical installations.
Assess where burglars would actually attempt entry on your specific property. Corner lot? The side facing the less-traveled street needs more coverage.
Fenced backyard? Focus cameras on fence gates rather than the middle of the fenced area. Trees providing concealment? Position cameras monitoring the concealed approaches.
Frequently Asked Questions
1. How Many Security Cameras Does A Two Story House Need?
Minimum 5-6 cameras provide adequate two-story coverage: one front door, two driveway corners, one back door, one garage or side entrance, one second-story overview. Large properties or homes with multiple exterior doors require additional cameras covering those entry points.
Prioritize quality placement of fewer cameras over quantity of poorly positioned cameras. Five cameras at correct heights outperform ten cameras mounted under soffits at useless heights.
2. Should I Mount Cameras Under Second Story Soffits Or Lower?
Mount identification cameras at 7-8 feet maximum height, never under second-story soffits sitting at 18-24 feet.
Soffit mounting captures only tops of heads, making identification impossible regardless of camera quality. Use only one second-story camera for property overview, equipped with appropriate zoom lens.
All entry point cameras must mount at ground-level heights for facial identification. This contradicts common instinct but follows police recommendations and optical physics.
3. What Camera Height Works Best For Facial Recognition?
Seven to eight feet maximum mounting height provides optimal facial recognition on two-story houses.
This positions camera lenses at or slightly above average eye level, capturing frontal facial features clearly. Industry standard requires 100 pixels per foot on the subject’s face for identification—achievable at 7-8 feet but impossible at 20+ feet.
Police departments consistently reject footage from cameras mounted too high because faces become unidentifiable regardless of resolution.
4. Can Wireless Cameras Work On Two Story Houses?
Wireless cameras work effectively on two-story houses if the WiFi signal reaches all mounting locations.
Test WiFi strength at planned camera positions before purchasing wireless systems. Two-story homes frequently have WiFi dead zones on opposite sides from router locations or on exterior walls.
Consider WiFi mesh systems or extenders for reliable connectivity. Alternatively, wired PoE systems eliminate wireless connectivity concerns entirely while providing more stable connections and not consuming WiFi bandwidth.
Conclusion
Effective two-story camera placement requires understanding one critical principle: identification cameras mount at 7-8 feet maximum, never at second-story heights.
Position cameras at the front door, both driveway corners, back door, first-floor windows, and garage at eye level where they capture faces clearly. Add one strategic second-story camera with zoom lens for property overview only—not identification.
Strategic placement at scientifically correct heights matters exponentially more than camera quantity, quality, or price.
Test angles before permanent mounting, prioritize facial capture over aesthetic appearance, and follow height guidelines strictly.
Proper placement transforms cameras from expensive decorations into actual security that captures evidence police can use. Mount cameras where they work, not where they look impressive.