The web camera is one of the most useful components of a laptop. It allows you to communicate with a person located in different country or state as if you’re standing in front of him/her. Web cameras are used by security software.
If you’re using a picture password to keep your laptop data secure, a user won’t be able to login to his windows account unless he verifies the account ownership via the webcam. Some people use this device to record video tutorials. When the tutorial is complete, the user will upload it to YouTube or any other video streaming website.
Web cameras are not as powerful as DSLR cameras as they’re equipped with a 720p or VGA sensors. It is useless if your PC doesn’t have a software that records videos via webcam. Most laptops come pre-installed with the web camera software which offers limited features. If you are searching for a webcam application with plenty of features, go through the below list of the best free webcam software for 2017.
The applications we’ve shared below allow users to specify the location where the recorded content will be saved. They allow you to apply many cool effects on the videos and give you an option to select the output file format output.
Top 6 Best Webcam software for 2017
1WebcamMax
With this web camera software, you can easily add scenes, animations, frames or beautiful backgrounds, doodles to your videos. The free version of Webcammax features more than 100 cool effects and the videos captured through it will have a watermark.
If you don’t like the default skin of WebcamMax, you can change it by navigating to the options utility. This software has an option to upload recorded video to Facebook and YouTube.
Requirements: 50MB free space, Windows OS
2CamStudio
In my perspective, this is one of the best webcam software for Windows. To get started with CamStudio, you’ll have to install the application. To do so, download its offline installer file and run it.
If your PC is connected to the internet, the application’s important setup files will be downloaded automatically and Camstudio’s installation will complete else Windows will throw an error that internet connection is not available.
To activate your laptop’s webcam and begin the recording videos, open CamStudio tools menu, and select video annotations. To change the frame rate of videos or to add text to your snapshot, right-click on any area of the recording. Camstudio saves videos in AVI or FLV formats. It features an AVI to flash converter. You can use this software as a screen recorder.
Size: 10 to 20 MB
Must Read: Best free FTP clients for MAC, Windows 7, 8 OS
3MyCam
MyCam is a freeware and you can easily get it from sites like CNET or Softonic. It includes a utility to capture a snapshot in JPG or BMP file format. It supports recording of high-resolution videos. You can easily change the output settings or select the default device with MyCam.
This software allows you to change the video output quality and the frame rate at which it will be captured. Pictures and videos recorded by this program will be saved to the C drive. Using this free web camera software is an easy task. You just have to:
- Download the zip file containing MyCam.
- Extract its content.
- Double click on the .exe file.
Size: 3MB
Download MyCam from Softonic
4Yawcam
YawCaam is one of the most advanced webcam software on this list. It can be configured to record videos at 1280 x 720 pixels resolution. It supports image and text overlays. This freeware allows you to change output image quality. It can transfer captured content to other computers via FTP.
Yawcam can detect and capture videos from surveillance IP cameras too. It has motion detection feature, inbuilt scheduler, and many more useful tools.
Size: 25 megabytes.
5CamUniversal
Unlike the above applications, CamUniversal can detect and record video/image content from several cameras at a time. It features an AVI creator tool. Camuniversal can convert your normal PC to a video streaming server. It allows you to send captured videos via FTP or SMTP protocols.
CamUniversal supports more than 10 international languages. It features a media file viewer utility. This webcam software allows users to configure motion detector.
Size: 5MB
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6ManyCam
This webcam software is compatible with Apple Mac and Windows OS. It has a very good user interface. It includes many interesting effects to improve the audio and video quality.
ManyCam supports various chat applications which include MSM, Skype, etc. It supports broadcasting of videos on YouTube. You can use your mobile device as a video source with ManyCam.
Requirements: 256 megabyte RAM, Windows or MAC OS.
PS: I had downloaded 10 most used free webcam software. 4 of them were removed automatically from my computer by the Kaspersky Antivirus. Thus, I’ve shared details on just 6 applications. The above free webcam programs have great features. They are secure. Install any one of them if you’re searching for a web camera application for your PC.
Thank you so much. I was going nuts. I’ve had my Laptop for a few years now and never had a need to use the camera until now so I didn’t bother with it. You saved me a headache. Thanks again.
Lifeframe is not on my Asus G750JM. Also the Function key V does not produce a result. However I asked Cortana “”take a photo”” and it let me click on something called Camera, which filled the screen. And there I had the choice of snapping a photo or making a video. So I did not have to install anything. I did right-click on the Camera icon and said “”Pin to Taskbar”” so I could find it later.