this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2026
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Hi, I am looking for libre solutions to buy for my home surveillance system.

I know that there are open source NVRs, but are there open source WiFi cameras? Cabled cameras just transmit an electrical signal so I don’t care about them.

Someone gifted me a Tapo C-210 but I don’t like the fact that it transmits videos to TpLink’s servers. I just want my self-hosted solution.

Thank you.

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[–] hendrik@palaver.p3x.de 3 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago)

I heard some people confine cameras to a seperate virtual network which can't talk to the internet.

I don't have any specific camera or manufacturer to recommend. But Frigate is a nice peace of software. Maybe their community or the Home Assistant users have some advise.

If you like coding and soldering, you can buy an ESP32-S3 camera and do the entire firmware yourself. I don't think they're as good as off-the-shelf cameras, though. And I think most of them come with a cheaper OV2620 camera, which is more close to potato camera quality. So if you go that route, spend a few $$ extra to get one of the better camera sensors.