Last updated 2026-08-28
Mounting
Vinyl siding, brick and uneven trim
Backing plates are made for flat walls. Front doors rarely give you one. What you do about it depends on what the wall is made of.
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Vinyl siding: do not drill it if you can avoid it
Siding is designed to move. It expands and contracts with temperature and hangs loosely on its fasteners so it can. A screw driven tight through a panel pins it, and the panel then buckles or cracks as it tries to move against the fastener.
A hole through siding is also a hole through the weather layer. Water that gets behind it has nowhere useful to go, and you will not see the consequences from the front.
Brick and stucco: the mortar line is the target
If you must drill masonry, go into a mortar joint and not the face of a brick. Mortar is softer, it is what the wall is designed to have repointed, and a filled hole in a joint is close to invisible.
Adhesive on brick or heavy stucco is a poor bet, because the contact area is a fraction of what the tape needs. A mount that spans the texture and fixes into two mortar joints will outlast anything stuck to the surface.
Narrow trim, and the mount nobody mentions
Door casings are often narrower than the backing plate, which leaves the plate overhanging onto a different surface at a different depth. That is how a camera ends up mounted at a slight angle and pointing somewhere unhelpful.
A wedge or corner mount solves the angle. A narrow-profile plate solves the width. They're separate problems, and it's worth knowing which one you have before buying, because a wedge won't make a plate narrower.
Identify the surface before you buy a mount
Press it
Vinyl siding gives slightly and sounds hollow. Fiber cement and stucco do not move at all. That one test decides most of what follows, because the mount that works on a hollow overlapping surface is not the one that works on a solid one.
Find the flat part
Siding is a series of overlapping planks, so the surface a backplate meets is rarely flat. Look for the widest flat face on a single course, and note how much step there is between courses. That step is the number a mount has to absorb.
Check the trim beside the door
There is often a flat wooden or vinyl trim board next to the frame that is narrower than the doorbell. Measure it. A mount wider than the trim will rock, and that is the failure people blame on adhesive.
Only then choose the mount
A siding-specific plate spans the courses. A wedge changes the angle. A no-drill bracket avoids the surface entirely. They solve different problems and buying the wrong one is the common mistake.
Wedge and angle
RIOVO adjustable 30–55° angle mount
Turns the camera left or right, anywhere from 30 to 55 degrees, with a printed scale so you can set a known angle instead of guessing. This is the fix for a doorbell set back in a recess, or one facing along a wall instead of out at whoever is standing there. It does not tilt the camera down: if faces are cut off at the top of the frame, this is the wrong part.
Wedge and angle
Ring Wedge Kit
Three stackable wedges that tilt the camera down by 5, 10 or 15 degrees. That is the fix when faces are cut off at the top and the step is out of shot. The tilt is modest next to the sideways mounts, and that is the point. A few degrees is usually all a doorbell hung at the old button's height needs. Ring's own part, and it fits the Video Doorbell (2nd Generation) and Battery Doorbell only.
Surface
Vinyl siding mount plate
A contoured plate that bridges the overlap of 4-inch standard vinyl siding, giving the doorbell one flat surface instead of a ridge to sit crooked on. The listing is firm about two limits. It is cut for 4-inch standard siding only, so Dutch lap and other profiles are out. And it screws on, so expect to make holes. Compatibility is to specific Ring models, so check yours.
If that didn't fix it
Surface identified and the mount still will not sit right?
- Mounting without drilling: when the wall cannot be touched
- Your camera is pointing at the sky: if it is mounted but aimed wrong
Related
- Mounting without drilling at all (adhesive, frame and peephole options)
- The camera is pointing at the sky (wedges and angle mounts)