It’s Black Friday time, if you didn’t already know. Know what that means? DEALS! And savings, and SALES! Prep yourself for the holiday season with gifts for those you love, or gifts for number one (you), with us over here at good old Windows Central.
Whether you’re rocking a windows laptop for work and web conferencing or streaming video games on your beefy gaming PC rig, you might find yourself wondering if there’s a decent webcam worth buying this Black Friday. My answer to that is, YES! Yes there is. And here it is, my favorite, my beau, the Elgato Facecam.
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What makes the Elgato Facecam so great?!
I’ve been using this webcam for a few years now, and despite having reviewed numerous competitors since, I always come back to the Elgato Facecam. As I outlined in my Elgato Facecam review, this thing is just kind of awesome, although back then, I decried its $200 RRP. Now in 2023 with a successor launched and Black Friday here, its new $119 price tag is far, far more what I would’ve liked to have seen. Although, since I’ve been using it pretty much non-stop since then without any issues, maybe I was a little too harsh on the price too?
For a sample, head over here for a showcase what the camera is like in practice. Yes there are some compression artifacts on YouTube, but in an ideal scenario, you’re looking at 1080p resolution with 60 FPS recording. That’s great for streaming, and it reproduces incredibly sharp images if you need it to do so. The only downside is that this is a raw peripheral with no real configuration software that I’m aware of at least, but it’s not really needed. Your streaming or conference software will allow for the general tweaks, but even then, I haven’t really had to touch this thing at all. I stream games in pretty low light conditions generally speaking, and this webcam handles low lighting far better than most I’ve used, with minimal graininess and maximum clarity.
In the video above, you can see how the lighting conditions on my TV change how the camera reacts to light balance. Out of all the “gamer” webcams I’ve used in this price range, only the Elgato has been quick to react to flickering lights on games which can change the overall white balance of your set up. Additionally, the Elgato Facecam is cleverly tuned to offset the flicker generated by RGB lighting, since Elgato very much knows its audience.
On other webcams I’ve used, RGB lighting produces a strobing effect if you have some RGB installation in the background, since the refresh rate of the light doesn’t line up consistently with the camera. It’s a pretty niche scenario I admit, but the fact Elgato accounted for this shows a great attention to detail.
The lens is huge and really easy to clean, complete with a cover for those times it’s not in use. The foot it’s boxed with is great for hooking onto virtually any monitor or laptop screen, and it comes with a standard screw socket and an adapter for placing on tripods and the like. I love this camera, and I highly recommend you consider it!
