The main purpose of smoke alarm is to protect you and your home when you sleep. Therefore, the alarms should be located between sleeping people and the rest of the outside bedrooms or sleeping areas. But this is not the only safety rule.

In multi-storied residential buildings, fires on the ground floor without a smoke alarm can result in dangerous circumstances before the sufficient amount of smoke can rise in a stairway to set off the upper floor alarm. Because of this most codes require the location of additional smoke alarms on each floor level of the building.

A closed door prevents the smoke from reaching the alarm. This is particularly a problem in bedrooms. If your bedroom door is usually closed when you sleep, add a smoke alarm in the bedroom; especially if you often smoke or watch TV there, if there is an air conditioner, or other major appliances that might cause a fire. If your bedroom door is open when you sleep, the smoke alarm in the hall will detect a fire in the bedroom or anywhere else.

There are also some places where you shouldn’t put a smoke alarm. These include kitchens and garages (cooking smoke and car exhaust are likely to set them off), unheated attics and packed places (where it can be too cold or hot for the electronic devices’ proper work). Fires that start in such places are usually detected by other smoke alarms in enough time to escape safely. If these places require an alarm, heat detectors are available. But don’t forget that smoke alarms must be the main safety devices in any home protection.