The current state of “smart keyless” door locks is pretty depressing. All products I’ve researched have glaring issues with security or user experience. I don’t want to stand there in the rain while my phone struggles to send a wireless signal and the “smart” lock thinks for eternity whether I’m in its geofence or not. I just want a simple door lock that quickly opens when I tap it with a key fob or key card (like a hotel, subway, or large employer), or when I press a button on a remote control (like a car, garage, or tv), or when I walk up to it (like the future). There must be an affordable solution, right? Right??
The answer is no. Here’s a brain dump. I hope this helps someone.
First, my thoughts on the types of technologies used by smart locks and their usefulness. All current “smart keyless” door locks use some combination of these technologies.
Physical key
Tried and true. This will be our baseline.
Unlocking speed: normal (take out your keychain, insert and turn)
Reliability: normal (works almost everytime, jams are rare, unaffected by battery power loss)
Security: normal (lock picks, pin tumblers)
Sharing: normal (hand it over, easy to duplicate)
Comments: Most smart locks keep a backup keyhole. This is good for many reasons — your door lock and/or phone can run out of batteries, your wifi network may be down, or the tech may be flaky due to weather / temperature / poor engineering. It can also be bad because intruders can pick your keyhole, which tend to be less secure in these “smart” products than in a dedicated product.
* All technologies below are battery powered. The obvious reliability issue can be mitigated by an external 9v terminal, which is an included feature on just about all products I’ve seen. Yea it’s possibly annoying up to once a year, but not fatal.
Key fob / key card (RFID or NFC)
Pretend you’re at a hotel.
Unlocking speed: excellent (take out your keychain or wallet, tap and go. Even faster if it works through your wallet)
Reliability: excellent (works almost everytime, mis-detections are super rare)
Security: excellent (I have yet to see any practical security issues with RFID or NFC. The most common vector of attack is still through the actual keyhole)
Sharing: poor (hand it over, provision a new fob / card seems like a PITA)
Comments: There’s a reason why hotels and luxury multi-family apartments use this. It’s just so much better in every way. So all “smart keyless” door locks should support this right? Nope, not at all.
Phone NFC
Like Apple Pay or Android Pay. Everything is about the same as a key fob / key card. Unlocking speed and reliability is potentially negatively affected by your phone’s hardware and software.
Remote control
This doesn’t exist, as far as I know. If it works for my car door, why can’t it work for my home door?
PIN (touchpad or keypad)
Beep beep beep. Usually 4–12 characters long. Usually allowed to enter digits 1–4 or 0–9.
Unlocking speed: normal (keep everything in your pockets, might take a while to enter all the digits)
Reliability: ideal (works everytime)
Security: very poor (fingerprints / smudges, high possibility of short/weak PINs, susceptible to shoulder surfing)
Sharing: excellent (usually remembers 15+ PINs, can add temporary PINs)
Comments: This is the most common and practical “smart” technology. It’s not exactly hands free, but you can expect it to work reliably.
Short-range bluetooth token (fob or phone)
Wake the door lock, it searches for a short-range bluetooth token, unlocks if it detects its presence.
Unlocking speed: poor (keep everything in your pockets, takes at least 2–3 seconds and at most 10+ seconds for the bluetooth handshake to complete)
Reliability: poor (super unreliable, may have to move closer or hold it up to the door lock, sometimes have to try 2–3 times)
Security: good (products usually will not unlock if it detects the token is inside rather than outside, no practical security issues)
Sharing: good (fobs have to be ordered and provisioned, phones may be added)
Comments: This would be ideal, if it worked. Have your hands full, touch the door lock with your elbow, it recognizes the token in your pocket and lets you in. Unfortunately, the reality is that it takes at least several seconds where you’re standing there wondering if you have to try again for the 5th time.
Long-range unlock command (bluetooth or wifi)
Pull out your phone and hit a button. Or use geofencing to auto-unlock when you’re near. Unlock your door in SF while you’re traveling in NY.
Unlocking speed: abysmal (turn on your phone, open the app, navigate to the unlock button, press it and wait for 5+ seconds for the command to reach your door lock. Don’t be blinded to its coolness factor and fail to realize how annoying this would be for daily use)
Reliability: poor (depends on your phone, network, and/or GPS being in working order, may fail randomly due to packet loss, connection loss, or bad weather)
Security: good (no practical security issues, geofencing may auto-unlock too soon and allow an intruder to enter)
Sharing: excellent (almost all products have apps that allow you to grant access to others)
Comments: This is really meant for the away-from-home case, where you want to remotely let your mailman or cleaning lady inside. This is impractical for unlocking your door while you walk up to it.
Fingerprint
I’ve only seen this on one product, and I’d be concerned about its security issues.
Here’s a list of products that I’ve come across. I have not used any of them. All this information comes from research I’ve done online.
August Smart Lock
I’ve set the distance to the largest area and the door never unlocks by the time we get there.
This only replaces the interior side of your deadbolt, leaving your existing deadlock exterior plate and bolt intact so you can use your existing physical keys as backup.
It claims to auto-unlock as you approach, using your phone which you keep in your pocket. Presumably, it uses geofencing to trigger a long-range unlock command. Unfortunately, this is not reliable at all. Looking at the reviews for both the Android and iOS apps, people complain that auto-unlock does not work. “I’ve set the distance to the largest area and the door never unlocks by the time we get there.” “It stopped unlocking reliably… even unlocked my door as I was on the way OUT of the house.” Yikes.
The good news is, it seems to work OK with the August Connect, which lets you send a long-range unlock command and grant access to others over the internet. This seems to be its main practical use case. It may work well with the new August Smart Keypad companion accessory (not yet tested by anyone), and it does look pretty sleak.
For me, this is useless. If auto-unlock cannot work reliably then it does not help me get inside any faster.
Lockitron
(https://lockitron.com/)
This replaces your entire deadbolt. The exterior is never shown on the website or in any promo videos, which is really confusing. Presumably, the base version (Bolt) will have an exterior that is just a regular lock face with a keyhole, which makes me wonder why it has to replace the entire deadbolt. There is a Bolt Keypad companion accessory, which gives you an exterior PIN keypad. Neither have shipped yet or gotten any reviews yet.
It also claims auto-unlock as you approach, which I will similarly dismiss as unreliable. It has a similar Bridge companion accessory to allow you to send long-range unlock commands and grant access to others over the internet. In terms of features, it and August seem to be exact clones of each other. The original Lockitron has abysmal reviews on Amazon, citing unreliability and various shortcomings. Hopefully Lockitron will soon provide more information and less marketing videos.
Goji
They’ve been dark since last year. I purchased in march and never received anything. Have contacted them repeatedly but no response.
This is almost definitely vaporware. The company has taken money from pre-orders, but have essentially gone radio silent.
Kwikset Kevo
(http://www.kwikset.com/kevo/default.aspx)
This product is a great idea, but the execution is horrible. It only works about 30% of the time.
This replaces your entire deadbolt. The exterior is a regular lock face with a keyhole, but is touch sensitive and has a glowing ring. You can use physical keys as a backup.
The basic premise is that you would walk up and touch the door lock, which causes it to unlock if it detects the presence of your short-range bluetooth token. Kevo allows you to use both a fob and your phone. This is a very promising idea, except that Amazon reviews complain about its long unlock time. It takes at least 2–3 seconds, but sometimes 10+. That’s more time than it takes to use the regular key. Even worse, the physical keyhole in the Kevo is very insecure, according to many lock experts on Youtube.
The companion accessory Kevo Plus allows it to work in a similar way to August, but both the iOS and Android apps have abysmal ratings.
I would have really loved this, if it didn’t take several seconds to unlock, making the whole thing pointless.
Samsung Digital Deadbolt
(http://www.samsungdigitallife.com/DeadboltType.php)
I SHALL SING YOU THE SONG OF MY PEOPLE.
This replaces your entire deadbolt. The exterior includes a PIN touchscreen, a key fob / key card reader, and an optional keyhole.
This looks pretty sweet. So far it seems to include all the high priority features that make getting in faster and easier. Unfortunately, it has several head-scratcher issues according to Amazon reviews that make it impossible to use.
This thing is brittle, installation is difficult, and instructions are written in broken english. Some guy broke two units while trying to install it. “It is a delicate flower that must be handled gently to avoid destroying it.”
It requires a magnet switch to be installed via adhesive on the door and door frame. It’s supposed to be for a security feature, but users often report that the sensor gets misaligned and causes an alarm to go off every time the door is opened.
“I SHALL SING YOU THE SONG OF MY PEOPLE.” You have to wait 2 seconds for it to play a little tune before it actually locks and unlocks itself. On a daily basis, this would be maddening. “Why can’t it play the little song AFTER it unlocks the door? You seriously have to stand there and wait while the lock plays its little song.”
Yikes. There’s so many other reported issues. I was really excited about the full feature set, but after hearing about all the issues I’ll pass.
Yale Real Living Deadbolt
(http://www.yaleresidential.com/…/resident…/yale-real-living/) a living deadbolt — heh
This replaces your entire deadbolt. The exterior includes a PIN touchscreen or keypad, and an optional keyhole. There are lots of models to choose from, but they all provide a simple PIN entry, rather than relying on unreliable gimmicks like auto-unlock. Though, Yale has a Assure Lock with Bluetooth product coming soon which lets you “twist” your phone to unlock the door, which sounds like another potential gimmick.
High reviews on Amazon across the board. If it had key fob / key card support, it would be perfect. But seems like a solid choice as is.
Schlage Keyless Deadbolt
(http://www.schlage.com/en/home/keyless-deadbolt-locks.html)
This is very similar to the Yale products. It replaces your entire deadbolt, providing a PIN touchpad and optional keyhole.
The models with a keyhole seem to have the highest Grade 1 security, which is great considering some reviewers have implied that most locks are Grade 2 or below.
High reviews on Amazon across the board. No gimmicks, no key fob / key card support, but also a solid choice.
Anviz Door Lock
(http://www.anviz.com/product/View/id/95294.html)
This replaces your entire deadbolt. The exterior includes both a fingerprint and key fob / key card reader.
The product seems like a stereotypical product from China. The website looks almost fake, Amazon reviews are abysmal, and users complain about poor build quality and issues with the battery. “Still cannot figure out for the life of me why someone would make the spindle out of two pieces tacked together?? The ‘weld’ — if you could even call it that — is obviously a weak point.” Everything tells me to avoid this.
Yale Keyless Connect Smart Lock UK-only
(http://www.yale.co.uk/…/smart…/keyless-connected-smart-lock/)
This is what I need!! This is exactly what I need!
Why is it UK only? Are they selling it in the US? Have anyone used it? Why is there no reviews for this product?
They’ve won some kind of design award, but actual information is sorely lacking. I’ve emailed them to see what’s up.
If this turns out to be a real product that I can buy, it might be perfect. It’s got the key card reader for fast and easy unlocking, and a PIN touchscreen rather than a keyhole for backup. Perfect.
Lime
(http://kck.st/1OMU0Ai)
This one I’m pretty excited about. It’s another full featured product that replaces the entire deadbolt. It’s similar to the Samsung lock — it supports PIN, key fob / key card, and a backup keyhole. It also adds support for your phone’s NFC and long-range unlock command with the Gateway companion accessory.
If it doesn’t have the crippling issues that the Samsung had, it’ll be perfect for me. Unfortunately, there are some slight issues. The PIN touchscreen only supports digits 1–4, which makes it a really weak backup — try not to forget your key card or backup key. It’s only available for pre-order, and ships in August. By then, other new smart keyless locks may have obsoleted it already.
Other products coming in 2016
2015 was the year of awkward smart keyless locks, but hopefully we’ll see more robust offerings in 2016. People are anticipating the release of new products like the Kwikset Kevo v2 and Yale Linus. I’m sure there are tons others that I didn’t come across in my research. Most of the products on this list already support some form of smart home platform like HomeKit, Z-Wave, or Zigbee. In 2016, we can expect more support for these and new platforms like Nest Weave and Google Weave. Honestly I could care less — I just want a door lock that works as easily as the one in my hotel.