Security Camera Isn’t Working at Night is one of the security system Problems that are common these days for homeowners and business customers, problems such as lost video signal, CCTV Video Flickering, the camera showing a black screen, and more.
This issue is important to fix immediately as most crimes are committed at night when there are no lights.
Nowadays, most security cameras come with advanced features such as motion detection, live view, and Night Vision.
The Night Vision feature enables you to capture clear footage of burglars or thieves during the night, but the bad news is this feature may not work and cause Camera Isn’t Working at Night or the camera Shows Deteriorated Images at Night problem due to many reasons, for example:
- Power issues
- LEDs are damaged
- Sensors don’t work
- Camera Configuration
- Weather Conditions
These are the main reasons why the Night Vision feature doesn’t work, and as a result, leads to the security camera isn’t working at night.
Don’t worry in this article we cover each reason and solution. Here are the checklist and solutions
Security Camera Isn’t Working at Night: Checklist & Solutions
There are many reasons for this problem, but the good news most of them are simple and you can fix your security camera’s night vision within minutes without involving in hardware or software problems.
Here are the main reasons for solutions
Step1: Check Power Cables and Batteries
The first thing you should do to get rid of security camera problems, especially when the security camera isn’t working at night, is to check the Power source.
Sometimes low volts coming to the camera make a lot of trouble, so in troubleshooting ensure that every wire and cable is connected correctly to its place.
The same is also with wire-free or wireless security cameras that are powered by batteries, when cam battery indicators show low capacity signs you must recharge them.
Because when the LEDs turn on at night, the CCTV camera automatically requires more volts to power the LEDs.
Plus, the insufficient power supply causes many problems such as video signal loss, a Camera showing a black screen at night, and a cam flickering on and off.
Solution: To avoid Security Camera problems concerning power you should check the power source first, and if your camera battery or adapter has a problem make sure to replace it.
Step2: Test the LEDs of the Camera
The second step in troubleshooting to fix a “security camera isn’t working at night” problem is to check and test the LEDs or the camera.
LED (light-emitting diode) is used widely in electronic devices as a light source, and for security cameras, it’s used to enhance the camera capture pictures in dark areas.
Before the CCTV, PoE, or Wireless IP security camera records videos at night there is a small process.
When the light source becomes low or darker in the ambient area of the camera, the High sensitive sensors included in the camera automatically send a signal to the cam to turn on LEDs.
Once the LEDs are on the camera will start to capture footage and record everything that happens at night, so if you have a problem with the LEDs, the camera wouldn’t work normally at night.
Solution: Before you install the camera on your house, test the LEDs first in a low-light environment to see if the IR LEDs are on or not.
If the camera doesn’t have LEDs at all, you can purchase a Floodlight or external IR illuminators
to make your camera work at night without problems.
Step3: Scan Sensors
Another Reason that is related to LEDs and can lead to the security camera isn’t working at night issue is the IR image sensors.
As we mentioned above Night vision features depend on both LEDs and Infrared sensors.
If something wrong happens to this equipment, it will make your camera isn’t working normally at night.
Nowadays, every camera that has night vision has what is called IR cut Filter, this filter works to block or prevent near-infrared wavelengths and path only visible light.
The IR filter turns on manually or automatically depending on sensor signals. So, if your camera doesn’t work at night that means your camera sensors don’t work.
Solutions: put your camera in a room before you mount it in any place, and then turn on a light source and see if the Night Vision works or not.
If the problem is still the same you can check the night vision setting on your video recorder setting, contact your camera manufacturer support, or look at the camera manual guide included with the package.
Step4: Look at Camera Configuration
Camera or DVR/NVR Configuration may be one of the reasons for the security camera isn’t working at night, the camera doesn’t store recorded videos, and more.
CCTV customers have complained before that they have a problem when the outside area becomes black, the cameras and DVR/NVR doesn’t work at all.
They check to see if there are some objects in the optical pathway of the cam but they don’t find anything to stop the camera from monitoring during the night.
In the second step they looked at the video recorder settings to see how they set up the surveillance system, they found that the Camera configuration is adjusted to work during the day only.
So, if you have a Wired PoE Security System or Wireless system make sure to select the night vision to work automatically not manually.
Solution: Download the camera mobile app on your smartphone and look at the settings of features that are turned on/off.
Step5: Protect Camera from Bad Weather
Security Camera Problems can easily hit your surveillance cameras if you don’t protect them against bad weather conditions.
If your camera isn’t working at night, check if it has rain or dust inside it or not, as we know in some cities the weather becomes worse at night, especially in the winter.
Security cameras and electronic devices are damaged fastly if the water enters inside the device body, it affects the device connections and may disable some features.
Solution: to get peace of mind and make your surveillance system work continuously.
Pick a protecting case for your security cameras if you mounted them outside, or hide the camera wires and cables if you have a wired analog system.
Another way to fix this problem is to search for security cameras with weather resistance advantages, these cameras are designed primarily to work in bad weather.
Final Words
Security Camera Isn’t Working at Night Problem can be fixed easily if you do the right steps for troubleshooting, so in this article, we mention the 5 steps to check and fix one of the hardest security camera problems.
Make sure before you start any of the above steps that you have the suitable tools as you may need to install/reinstall cameras, or splice the camera wires and cables.
in case you have another security camera problem such as a camera shows black and white images, or noisy footage issues you can check or latest blog posts and know how to fix them.
Source: network-data-cabling, cctv42.
Very helpful and explained thoroughly for the not so technically minded people. Thank you
This really answered my drawback, thank you!
My camera works well during the day but at night they get real fuzzy I can hardly see a picture they’re plugged into 110 volts and they are Wi-Fi
Hello Duane,
To fix this issue, you can reset the camera to get the default settings, and if the problem still exists you can start the troubleshooting steps mentioned in this post.
Note: Make sure the camera location is away from the Light source to get the best quality for your camera Videos, From more you can read our latest blog post: How to Fix Night Vision on Security Camera