How accurate is counting with CCTV cameras?

It depends far more on the setup than on the model. A camera looking down on a single choke point in steady light counts reliably; a camera looking across a crowded floor does not. The way to know for your site is to count a few hundred items by hand alongside the camera during a pilot.

Can it count stacked or overlapping items?

Not reliably while they sit in a stack. That is why the count is taken where items pass one at a time, such as a truck’s tailgate, a dock edge or a conveyor, rather than from a picture of the pile.

Do I need special cameras for counting?

Usually not. Most existing CCTV cameras can count if one of them looks down on the choke point. Sometimes a camera has to be moved, or one added above a door or a dock.

Can vehicles or large equipment be counted the same way?

Yes. Trucks, forklifts and large items are counted as they pass a line at a gate, a dock or a bay entrance. Large items are often easier, because they are seldom hidden behind one another.

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Counting

Count things as they cross a line, not where they pile up.

Boxes onto a truck, pallets off a dock, bags out of a warehouse, people through a door. Cameras can count all of them, but the count is only worth trusting if it is set up around one idea: count the crossing, not the pile.

8 November 2026 · 5 min read · Tarsyer team

How do you count objects with a CCTV camera?

A model finds each object in the picture, follows it from one moment to the next, and adds one to the count when it crosses a line drawn at a choke point such as a dock edge, a doorway or a conveyor. Counting crossings, rather than everything visible, stops the same box being counted twice and keeps working when items are stacked. The footage behind any number can then be pulled up to check it.

Most requests we get for counting start the same way: point a camera at the stock and tell me how much is there. It sounds like the natural approach, and it is the one that produces numbers nobody trusts.

The same boxes, counted two ways. Only the second gives a number you can put next to an invoice.

1. Count the crossing, not the pile

A picture of a pile hides most of what matters. The boxes at the back are covered by the ones in front. Bags on a stack look like one shape. Anything that stays in view for an hour is seen thousands of times, so a count based on what is visible has to guess which sightings are the same box.

Counting crossings avoids all three problems. Each item is followed as it moves and counted once, at the moment it crosses a line. Items cross a tailgate or a doorway one or two at a time, so nothing is hidden at the point where the count is taken.

2. Pick the choke point first, the camera second

The best place to count is wherever everything has to pass through a narrow gap. Find that first, then put a camera on it.

For goods: the dock edge, the truck’s tailgate, a conveyor, or the door of a store room.
For people: the entrance, the billing queue, the door to a restricted area.
For vehicles and large equipment: the gate, the dock bay, the entrance to a yard.
Mount the camera high and looking down where you can. From above, items do not hide behind each other.

Often an existing camera is already close. Moving it a metre, or turning it to look down, matters more than a new one. There is more on that in where you put the camera matters more than which camera you buy.

3. Decide what counts as one

A number is only meaningful if everyone agrees on the unit before the first count.

The unit. Is it a box, a carton of boxes, a pallet, a bag? A pallet on a forklift and the same boxes carried by hand should not count differently by accident.
The direction. A box carried in and then back out is not two boxes loaded. Count in and out separately, and report the difference.
What to ignore. People walking through the line with nothing, a trolley parked across it, a box moved and put straight back.

4. Check the count against something

A camera count on its own is a number. Next to another number it becomes a finding. The useful comparisons are the ones a business already has:

Boxes counted onto a truck, against the box count on its gate pass or invoice, matched by number plate.
Bags counted out of a warehouse, against what the inventory system says left.
People counted into a store, against the number of bills: that is conversion.

The gap is where the money is. It is also how you test the camera: count a few hundred items by hand alongside it before relying on it, and look at the clips behind any number that looks wrong.

Warehouse dashboard with dock activity gauge, pallets handled, safety violations and theft counts — Counts are only useful in context: pallets handled sit next to dock time and safety on one screen.

Where Tarsyer fits

We count on the cameras a site already has, using a small device on site, so nothing new goes up and no video leaves the building. At warehouse docks that means boxes and pallets counted per truck and matched to the number plate, with each truck timed from arrival to departure. In stores it means footfall and queues alongside the day’s bills. Before going live we look at each camera’s angle with you and say which one should count, and whether it needs to move.