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After a new round of testing, we’ve found that the Logitech Brio 505 offers the best balance of image quality and features, and it is available for a reasonable price. Web Cam
If you own—or plan to buy—a top-of-the-line laptop, you probably don’t need a separate webcam. The cameras built into new machines such as recent MacBook Pro models are more than good enough for everyday Zoom calls.
But if you’re making do with an older laptop, working from a desktop computer, or simply looking for more advanced features than your built-in webcam provides, the Logitech Brio 505 is your best option.
Its image quality is excellent right out of the box—no adjustments necessary—and it has features that are usually found only in more expensive models, including subject tracking.
This webcam offers subject tracking and other features that are typically found only in more expensive models. The image quality is excellent, as is the included software.
The Logitech Brio 505 captures sharp 1080p video with accurate automatic white balance and speedy autofocus. It’s easy to set up and use, and it includes several sophisticated features, such as subject tracking and a Show Mode (for presenting items to the camera), that are usually reserved for webcams twice the price.
If you need a webcam but don’t want to spend a lot of money, this model is a great option. It's small and solidly built, and it delivered respectable footage without any fuss.
If you need a less-expensive option, we recommend the Anker PowerConf C200 2K. Its image quality doesn’t match that of the Brio 505—its auto exposure and white balance aren’t as accurate, and it doesn’t autofocus quite as quickly—but it is just as easy to set up and even provides 2K resolution, which produces slightly sharper results than the Brio 505’s 1080p resolution. Overall, it offered the best image quality of any webcam we tested under $70.
With its smart features, 4K resolution, and reliable exposure and white balance, this webcam can provide a flattering image in just about any situation. But it costs nearly twice as much as our top pick.
The Insta360 Link represents a clear step up from our top pick, as it offered automatic white balance and exposure that were rock solid right out of the box. Its subject tracking is smooth, and that feature and others are easy to turn on and off thanks to hand-gesture commands that work even when the desktop software isn’t open, as the camera can still recognize hand gestures in Zoom and other video-conferencing apps.
In our testing, the Link beat the competition in overall picture quality, and it also provided the smoothest background blur in Zoom. But at a typical price of $300, it’s probably overkill if you don’t plan to use your webcam all the time.
This webcam offers subject tracking and other features that are typically found only in more expensive models. The image quality is excellent, as is the included software.
If you need a webcam but don’t want to spend a lot of money, this model is a great option. It's small and solidly built, and it delivered respectable footage without any fuss.
With its smart features, 4K resolution, and reliable exposure and white balance, this webcam can provide a flattering image in just about any situation. But it costs nearly twice as much as our top pick.
Arriana Vasquez is an updates writer for Wirecutter who also works as a professional product photographer, for which she shoots everything from rings to raincoats. For Wirecutter, she has worked on several camera-related guides, including our guides to instant cameras, instant photo printers, and tripods.
The current version of this guide builds on the work of Wirecutter senior staff writer Melanie Pinola, who has written about technology and home-office topics for more than 12 years for sites such as Lifehacker, PCWorld, Laptop Magazine, and Consumer Reports. She has tested and reviewed various gear for Wirecutter for more than four years.
We’ve been reviewing webcams since 2016. Back then, most people needed a USB webcam because the optics in most built-in laptop webcams were terrible. Sadly, things haven’t changed much since then. Some new laptops, such as recent Apple MacBooks, have pretty good camera hardware, but the majority of other laptops can still benefit from a dedicated webcam.
“I’d say most new laptops within the past year or so have pretty good webcams, but the trend is pretty recent. Most laptop makers were not focusing on it prior to remote work during the pandemic, and most webcams then were 720p and mediocre,” says Kimber Streams, a Wirecutter senior staff writer who works on our guides to the best laptops, the best Chromebook, and the best Windows ultrabook. “Also, this applies only to laptops over $1,000, for the most part. Models cheaper than that still largely have 720p webcams that aren’t great at challenges like low light.”
So, it might make sense to buy an external webcam in a few certain cases:
Whether you work from home or you need to nail a job interview via Skype, these are Wirecutter’s tips for looking and sounding like a pro on video calls.
A good webcam for most people should meet all of the following basic criteria, which we used as guidelines for our research:
We also identified the following as nice-to-haves, rather than features that most people need to worry about:
Once we narrowed down the field, we took multiple pictures and videos with each webcam under controlled conditions so that we could compare them directly. With each contender, we captured the following:
We then asked a panel of Wirecutter staffers to compare the images and videos from the different cameras, without knowing which was which, and to rank their quality from best to worst. We used that data, our findings from the previous version of this guide, and notes from other professional reviewers to arrive at our picks.
We also downloaded and used each webcam’s software, where available, for the cameras we tested. All of these webcams are automatically detected by Windows 10, macOS, and other modern operating systems, but fine-tuning certain settings such as the field of view is easier with the help of each camera manufacturer’s software.
This webcam offers subject tracking and other features that are typically found only in more expensive models. The image quality is excellent, as is the included software.
The Logitech Brio 505 is the best option for most people who need a standalone webcam, thanks to its superb image quality, ease of setup, and helpful (but optional) software.
Its video—which can stream at up to 1080p at 30 frames per second—was crisp and clear in our testing, and the autofocus and auto white balance features worked better than those of any of the other webcams we tested in the sub-$200 price range.
It produces sharp, natural-looking 1080p-resolution video. Whether you’re recording video locally (say, for a presentation) or streaming through Zoom, footage from the Brio 505 looks crisp and clear. In our image-quality evaluations, it beat out all the other webcams in its category—including several with 4K resolution—by a long shot for the best skin tones and the best overall picture quality.
Its autofocus works quickly, and its exposure and white balance are very accurate. Even in rooms with a mix of sunlight and warm overhead light, or where we sat in front of a bright window, the Brio 505 delivered a more color-accurate image with snappier autofocus than the higher-resolution Logitech Brio 4K.
Subject tracking works well, too. When the Brio 505 had to work to keep us centered in the frame, the results didn’t look quite as natural as similar footage we captured with our upgrade pick.
On the plus side, however, subject tracking works in Zoom, even if you don’t have the desktop software open. (If you don’t want this feature, you need to open the software to disable it, unlike with our upgrade pick, which allows you to turn the function on and off with a simple hand gesture.) The tracking itself looked similar to Apple’s Center Stage but with less zoom-in, which we prefer.
It works right out of the box on Windows, macOS, and Chrome OS. Simply connect the Brio 505’s USB-C plug to your computer and launch your software of choice.
Logitech’s software gives you nuanced control over many camera settings. If you need more control, you can manually adjust exposure, gain, brightness, contrast, color intensity, white balance, and focus using Logitech’s Logi Tune software. In addition, you can toggle options such as RightSight, which tracks your face to keep you in the frame, and Show Mode, which quickly refocuses on an object you’re holding up to the camera before returning focus to your face.
You can also customize the camera’s zoom and pan, if you prefer not to use RightSight. Alternatively, you can physically tilt the webcam up or down or swivel it left and right to control what’s in the frame.
It clamps securely to most monitors, and it works with tripods, too. A fold-out foot braces against the back of your laptop or monitor, while a large plastic tab sits in front to hold the camera in place. The base of the clip also has an adhesive lip that you can use to stick the camera to a surface (including the back of your monitor, for extra stay-put-ness). Lastly, you’ll find a tripod mount at the bottom of the camera, hidden under the magnetic button that grabs the monitor mount.
We love the integrated privacy shutter. Using the shutter—which you activate with a simple dial on the right side of the camera—is easy and satisfying, since it closes with a light magnetic pull and a little click. When you aren’t using the camera, you can rest assured that you’re not inadvertently recording video, and you don’t have to resort to taping the lens to protect your privacy.
If you need a webcam but don’t want to spend a lot of money, this model is a great option. It's small and solidly built, and it delivered respectable footage without any fuss.
If you want to spend as little as possible on a decent webcam, we recommend the Anker PowerConf C200 2K. Its sharpness, autofocus, and auto white balance aren’t as good as what you can get from the Logitech Brio 505, but it’s just as easy to set up, and it offers the best video quality of any webcam we’ve tested under $70.
It’s no match for our top pick in image quality, but it’s still a step up from a built-in webcam. In our tests, the C200 2K’s images and video were darker than the Brio 505’s, and its autofocus wasn’t as smooth. But overall, its image quality was still superior to the results from a 2023 Apple MacBook Pro’s built-in webcam.
The software is basic but works without issue. You can make adjustments to exposure and white balance, and you can control how zoomed-in the picture is.
Its design is simple and straightforward. You can perch the C200 2K on top of your screen, on your desk, or on a separate tripod, depending on the angle you prefer. Though it can tilt up and down, it can’t swivel from side to side like our top pick. On top, it has a switch to hide or use the privacy screen. We like that Anker chose to make the lens cover bright red; it was easy for us to see when the lens was covered.
With its smart features, 4K resolution, and reliable exposure and white balance, this webcam can provide a flattering image in just about any situation. But it costs nearly twice as much as our top pick.
If you spend most of your time in video meetings and want to look your best, be in focus, and stay in frame even if you move around a lot, get the Insta360 Link. In our testing it had the best combination of image quality, white balance, subject tracking, and smooth background blur (in Zoom). In addition, for privacy, it automatically faces down and turns off when you close your video-conferencing software. But be aware that best-in-class tech comes with a considerable price tag—this model is twice as much as our top pick.
When you plug it in, it’s ready to go. The Link takes a second or two to properly adjust the exposure and white balance, but once it does, the results look great and require minimal further tweaking.
Its image quality was tops with our panelists. The vast majority of our testers rated the Link’s image quality highest overall, and several specifically called it out for having the best-looking skin tones.
The Link tended to darken the background more than other webcams, but not to the extent that it looked too dark or too distracting.
It has hand-gesture-activated smart features. For example, making a peace sign puts the Link into “whiteboard” mode, while making an L with your thumb and index causes it to look down at your desktop so that you can show off something you’re working on. In our experience, the Link didn’t look directly down at the desk—it aimed more at our tester’s lap than at our keyboard—but you can customize how much it tilts with Insta360’s software.
Hand gestures work right away, too: We were able to activate subject tracking moments after starting up Zoom, even before we installed the software.
It produced the smoothest Zoom background blur of any webcam we tested. One panelist noted that its “background blur quality was surprisingly great, nearly seamless.” But we found that this was true only when we used it in Zoom, with software assist, as the Link’s lens didn’t do a great job of blurring the background on its own.
If that’s something you’d prefer, check out our top pick. Alternatively, if you use Windows, the Razer Kiyo Pro Ultra’s lens has an f/1.7 aperture and can produce DSLR-like bokeh. (We don’t recommend that model, however, because it doesn’t offer the same suite of smart features and is three times the size.)
Insta360’s software opens up additional features and controls. You can manually adjust white balance, exposure, and contrast through the software, but for the most part we didn’t think any additional fine-tuning was necessary. Perhaps the best reason to install the software is so that you can download and install firmware updates, but that’s true of all the webcams we tested.
It feels more fragile than other webcams we’ve tested. Because of that, we don’t recommend it for people who travel with their work gear.
If our picks are unavailable, or you simply don’t want to spend money on a webcam, you have several ways to turn a DSLR camera, a phone, or a tablet into a webcam for your computer. The video quality can be even better than that of a traditional webcam, too, although you have to deal with some trade-offs such as difficulty positioning the camera and potential overheating depending on how long you use the camera.
Generally speaking, these options all work the same way: After you install software and connect the device (over USB or Wi-Fi in some cases, but USB is more reliable), you can select that device as the camera in web-conferencing and video-streaming apps. You should also have a tripod or some other way to raise the camera or mobile device to the proper height.
After two days of testing popular options, here’s what we recommend.
If you own a DSLR: Check with your camera manufacturer to see if it offers webcam software for your model. Software is available for both Windows and Mac.
If you use a Mac and have an iPhone or iPad: You can use your iPhone as a webcam via software from Apple. Your computer must be running macOS Ventura or later, so if you have an older machine, this method won’t work. (We plan to test this software for a future update to this guide.)
If you’re using an older Mac, you can use Camo. The free version offers 720p video and lets you use either the front or back camera, but it places a watermark over the video. To get even higher-quality, 1080p video and remove the watermark, as well as to unlock professional features such as color correction and zooming, you pay $40 a year.
Though such features are more than what most people need, Camo is a more affordable alternative to buying a DSLR. The software is simple to use, and we found the video quality excellent at both 720p and 1080p (tested with an iPhone XR).
If you use Windows and have an iPhone/iPad or an Android device: Use DroidCam. In contrast to Epoccam and iVCam, DroidCam was the only app that actually worked for us (tested with a Windows 10 Surface Book, a MacBook Pro, a Samsung Galaxy Note 7, and an iPhone XR).
The free version of DroidCam for Android provides only 480p video and shows ads. The free version for iOS offers 720p resolution but adds a watermark. For $5, you get 720p video on Android, remove the watermark on iOS, and unlock camera controls.
We found the quality of DroidCam’s video grainy and just barely acceptable in comparison with the results from a dedicated webcam or a laptop’s built-in webcam, but it will do in a pinch. Camo is also available for Android, but we haven’t tested it yet.
If you need a wireless webcam or require a setup that involves multiple camera angles: Check out the Logitech Mevo Start. The Mevo Start is different from the rest of the units we tested in that it’s a wireless camera with a mobile-first app experience, but it can work as a desktop webcam thanks to a companion app.
What sets it apart is that you can pair several Mevo Start cameras together using the Mevo app (iOS, Android) and use them to create a multi-camera setup for conference calls. Each camera also has a mic input so you can use a lavalier mic or small shotgun mic for better audio quality, as well as the ability to accept a microSD card for recording footage directly to the camera.
In our testing, this wireless camera performed just as well as our wired picks, offering snappy, accurate auto white balance and exposure. It was also our panelists’ second-favorite camera in image clarity—that’s quite a feat for a 1080p camera pitted against several 4K competitors.
The only way to use it is with a tripod, though, because it doesn’t offer any built-in way for you to mount it atop a monitor, as our picks do. Also unlike our picks, it’s not exactly plug and play: The only way to use it as a webcam is via a desktop app that connects to the Mevo app on your phone or tablet. It’s also notably expensive for just one camera, let alone the three-pack.
This is not a comprehensive list of all webcams we’ve tested. We have removed models that are no longer available or do not meet our criteria.
The Logitech Brio 500 is nearly identical to our top pick, except its USB cable isn’t detachable, and it comes with only a one-year warranty (as opposed to the three-year warranty of the Brio 505). The Brio 505’s features make it worth the extra $25 over this model.
Though the Logitech C920s Pro was our top pick for several years, it’s starting to show its age. Its footage looks grainy, and we’ve concluded that if you’re going to buy a webcam in this price range, you’d be better off getting our budget pick instead.
The Logitech Brio 4K Pro Webcam costs the same as our top pick and offers 4K video, but its image quality was not as natural looking as the Brio 505’s. In our photo evaluation for the clearest picture, it scored last, and in our video evaluation it didn’t get a single vote for overall picture quality.
The Logitech C930e is a more expensive version of the Brio 505 that’s aimed at group video-conferencing situations rather than an individual user. It has a wider, 90-degree field of view that can capture large meeting rooms, but that isn’t something most people working from home need.
The Anker PowerConf C300 shares a lot of features with our top pick, including subject tracking, but its output in our tests was over-sharpened. In our photo assessment, the C300 scored last for natural-looking images and second to last for best-looking skin tones. In our video survey, it didn’t score a single vote.
The Razer Kiyo was a popular option in its day, but now its footage looks outdated. Newer webcams, including our top pick and our budget pick, do a much better job of exposing for low light.
We first plugged the Razer Kiyo X, Kiyo Pro, and Kiyo Pro Ultra into a Mac to see how their image quality looked right out of the box, and it was especially rough, with blown-out highlights and white balance so cool that our test scene looked blue. The picture quality improved drastically after we plugged them into a Windows machine to install firmware updates (you can’t update them on a Mac), but we still needed to play with the settings to make them stop overexposing highlights, and the Synapsis software for the settings adjustments was glitchy. When we finally got the picture dialed in, it looked great, but we prefer our upgrade pick, the Insta360 Link, because we didn’t have to download or install any software to get excellent image quality on that camera. The Link is also a quarter the size of the extremely bulky Kiyo Pro Ultra and offers a host of smart features that make it handy for a wider variety of uses.
The Dell UltraSharp Webcam WB7022 shoots 4K video, but its out-of-the-box output was overly contrasty, to the point where dark areas were totally crushed into inky blackness and the overall image looked far too cool. Software for this webcam is available only for Windows, but even after installing it and playing with the settings, we still couldn’t find a decent balance of highlights and dark areas. In our evaluations, this camera failed to score a single vote in any image-quality category.
Footage from the Lumina was unimpressive out of the box, but what really turned us off was the long list of permissions required to use its software. Even after we installed the software and tried to calibrate the Lumina using the included color checker, it still produced footage that was too warm and too soft, especially for a 4K camera. It has other flaws, too, namely a cheap-feeling plastic build and a privacy cap that attaches to the camera with a weak magnet (which we lost just a day after opening the box). Overall, this is not what we expect from a webcam that costs almost $200.
Obsbot is a popular webcam line among certain reviewers, but the warranty oddly covers different parts of the webcam for different lengths of time. We think a company should be transparent about its products and offer clear warranty programs.
The Papalook AF925 lacks a privacy cover, and in our tests it constantly tried to refocus when we moved even a little, which was very distracting. This is likely due to the camera’s proclaimed AI facial-tracking technology.
The Microsoft LifeCam Studio ranked poorly with our panelists in video and image quality, as it produced terribly overexposed output with lots of motion blur. Although it’s an inexpensive webcam, you’re better off using your laptop’s built-in camera.
We considered webcams from AVerMedia but decided not to test them due to the volume of negative feedback about glitchy software or the webcams’ failure to work after just a few months.
This article was edited by Ben Keough and Erica Ogg.
Arriana Vasquez is a senior updates writer for powering, home office, cameras, and hobbies at Wirecutter. Her hobbies include reading and photography. Her photos have won several awards in various online competitions, and she is the producer and co-host of Old Books Podcast.
Melanie Pinola covers home office, remote work, and productivity as a senior staff writer at Wirecutter. She has contributed to print and online publications such as The New York Times, Consumer Reports, Lifehacker, and PCWorld, specializing in tech, work, and lifestyle/family topics. She’s thrilled when those topics intersect—and when she gets to write about them in her PJs.
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