A people counter can be anything from a simple manual counting clicker to a highly sophisticated automatic counter.
- Manual counter – a person stands by an entrance and uses a clicker to count people in/out over a period of time. Expensive, time consuming and questionable reliability.
- Beam break counters – simple devices mounted on the side of entrances and count how many times a beam across the entrance-way is broken. Technically simple but very inaccurate when busy or counting groups/families.
- Thermal counters – use advanced thermal arrays to detect the presence and movement of people by tracking their body heat.
- Infrared counters – mounted above the entrance-way, these devices use infrared light to accurately count people moving in and out.
Video counters (mono video, stereo video) – these devices are mounted above entrances and use video analysis to count people. Accuracy is extremely high, in excess of 99%.