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Detailed theoretical and experimental investigations of mercury-based long-wavelength narrow-band-gap semiconductor photoconductors operating in the 2OC-300 K temperature range are reported. A generalized doping-dependent figure of merit of the semiconductor, which determines the ultimate performance of the high-temperature photoconductor, is proposed. This figure of merit has been calculated for various temperatures as a function of composition and doping. Hightemperature long-wavelength photoconductors from both HgCdTe epilayers and bulk HgZnTe crystals have been fabricated and characterised. It is shown that optimised uncooled 10.6 pm photoconductors can achieve a detectivity higher than 10' cm Hz"' W", approaching the performance of slow thermal detectors.