How much does CCTV cost in the UK?

For a typical UK home, a professionally installed four-camera CCTV system with a recorder and phone viewing costs between £650 and £1,100, fully fitted. Two-camera systems generally start around £450 to £550. Commercial installations start around £1,200 to £1,500 for a small site and rise from there depending on camera count, recording retention and whether access control or ANPR is involved.

Those figures assume a straightforward property: reasonable cable routes, a loft or cupboard for the recorder, and no listed-building restrictions. The price moves when any of those assumptions fail, which is why a quote given over the phone without a survey is usually either padded or optimistic.

Camera count is the obvious factor, but it is rarely the biggest one. The three things that move a quotation most are cable routing, recording retention and image quality at night.

Cable routing matters because CCTV is a cabling job that happens to end in cameras. An easy route through a loft and out under the eaves takes an hour. A route that has to go through a solid stone wall, around a chimney breast and across a flat roof with a waterproof gland takes most of a day. Anyone quoting without looking is guessing.

Recording retention determines hard drive size. Four cameras recording continuously for 30 days needs roughly 2TB to 4TB depending on resolution. A commercial site needing 90 days across 16 cameras is a different order of storage entirely.

Night-time image quality is where cheap systems quietly fail. A camera that produces a clear colour image at 11pm costs more than one that produces a grey blur, and no amount of installation skill fixes a poor sensor.

These are guide prices for fitted systems in West Yorkshire, including labour, cable, recorder and setup.

• 2-camera HD home system: £450–£550
• 3-camera HD home system: £550–£650
• 4-camera HD home system with phone viewing: £650–£850
• 4-camera 4K system with colour night vision: £850–£1,100
• Small commercial site, 4–8 cameras: £1,200–£2,500
• Access control, single door with fobs: from around £950
• ANPR camera for a yard or gate: £700–£1,200 per lane
• Annual maintenance visit: £120–£300 depending on system size

The most common problem we are asked to fix is a system installed with no thought to sight lines. Cameras end up pointing at a wall, at a hedge, or straight into a streetlight, and the footage is useless in the one situation it was bought for. The second most common is a recorder on a shelf in a hallway, which is the first thing taken in a burglary.

We would rather lose a job than fit a system we know will disappoint. If your budget is tight, fit fewer cameras that are correctly placed and add the rest later — most recorders have spare channels.

A proper quote should include a survey, the camera and recorder specification, cable and containment, labour, configuration of phone access, a short handover, and a workmanship warranty. Ours carries a two-year warranty on the installation.

Be wary of quotations that exclude VAT without saying so, or that list 'installation' without stating who provides the cable and fixings. Those are the quotes that grow.