If you want to illuminate the area by your door, you’ll most likely want a light with a smaller detection range—this will decrease the number of nuisance turn-ons from animals but will provide enough light for anyone walking toward the door. The first thing you should consider is the range and angle that you’ll need for your property—and your property only! It’ll be highly annoying for your neighbors if they can easily trip your motion sensor lights from their yard or, even worse, from their home! So, if you live on tighter lots, a shorter range might actually be better, while if you live on a large piece of property, you’ll want something that extends a long way out. These solar-powered lights produce a focused beam of light for a spotlight effect and are the best motion sensor lights if you prefer a stake style. The lights are ideal for illuminating a pathway, whether it’s leading up to your front door or along the driveway.

In addition to the sensor range adjustment, this light also includes controls for sensitivity, the light timer, and a toggle switch for the three lighting modes. The sensitivity and range adjustments allow you to keep the light from activating due to the wind blowing through nearby trees or your neighbors walking around in the yard, and the timer adjusts how long the light stays on. The lighting modes allow you to keep the light on at all times, only activate when motion is detected, or remain on every night from dusk until dawn. The adjustable sensor unit provides motion sensing with a wide 180-degree detection angle and a range of around 69 feet. That range is adjustable via a convenient dial on the bottom of the sensor, and you can aim the sensor head itself to focus on the direction that any intruders are most likely to approach from. We love the straightforward setup, and the solid, well-made construction, although we found the included gasket a bit flimsy. If your house is pre-wired for a light, and already has a junction box, installation requires nothing more than a screwdriver, some wire nuts, and some electrical tape. We were also pleased that you can adjust the angle of the motion sensor, which has a 180-degree range. The light’s motion sensor is a bit limited, which is typical of battery-powered motion sensor lights, offering only 120 degrees. The range is surprisingly strong, besting our best value model by 4 feet. The spotlight is quite small, meaning it’s excellent for side doors, pet areas, or as a supplemental light when the main light is turned off.

In many cases, you can install outdoor motion sensor lights yourself. Solar-powered and battery-powered units are the best outdoor motion sensor lights to install yourself because you don’t need to hook them up to electricity. Some hardwired lights are also possible to install yourself, though it’s possible you’ll need an electrician. Outdoor motion sensor lights are hardwired, solar-powered, or operated by batteries. Installing a hardwired light may require the help of an electrician, which is something to keep in mind as it’s an additional cost. These lights are typically brighter and often have larger detection ranges/light beam angles.

Lumens are a measure of how bright the light is. More light is not always better, explains McGowan, as you want to make sure your light doesn’t shine into your neighbor’s window. The best outdoor motion sensor lights for your yard will feature lumens that suit the size of your space.Because it’s a Ring product, the Floodlight Cam can connect to your Alexa device. You’ll receive notifications when motion is detected, allowing you to respond. You can see, hear, and speak to visitors from your phone, tablet, or PC. Once you connect and set up your network of smart bulbs and motion detector(s), you’re going to have more options than you ever expected. You can change the color of your bulbs, creating ambient light or different lighting for different functions. That includes softer light when you arrive home at night and stronger light when you’re asleep to deter animals and criminals. You can use a phone app to adjust your settings, or turn your lights on or off at any time. The light fixtures are heat and frost-resistant, so they can keep working through all sorts of weather and in a variety of climates. A large solar panel helps make these lights more efficient, reducing the charging time needed and helping them to work better on cloudy, rainy days. The lumens of an outdoor motion sensor dictate how large an area it can light up. Lo recommends that, “up to 4,800 lumens should be sufficient.” Less is fine if you’re lighting a smaller area, while you may need more if you have a very large yard or driveway that you want to light up. The average residential street light puts out about 5,000 lumens, so keep that in mind if you have a large area to cover. The motion sensor is built directly into these bulbs, so they’re entirely self-contained without any additional hardware to install. The catch is that the detection angle is only 100 degrees. While that is a huge improvement over the previous version that had a 40 degree detection angle, you’ll still get the best results if you install these bulbs in an adjustable fixture that can be angled toward the ground. There is no way to adjust the sensitivity of the sensor or the shut-off timer, but they do have a decent detection range and stay on for well over a minute after they stop detecting motion.