Yale Assure Lock 2 with Wi-Fi review: a smart lock for every smart home

There are three issues I need from a wise lock: a sexy design, greater than two methods to manage it, and the flexibility to attach immediately with my good residence, with no single-purpose Wi-Fi bridge taking on an outlet in my home. Yale’s latest good lock collection, the Yale Assure Lock 2, ticks all these bins. Plus, it really works with all the key good residence platforms when you add the appropriate networking module — and it might assist Matter, whenever that finally arrives. (Quickly, individuals. Quickly).

The Yale Guarantee Lock 2 begins at $159.99 for a physical keypad or $179.99 for a touchscreen, and you may get both model with or and not using a bodily keyhole for a similar worth. The bottom fashions all have Bluetooth inbuilt and may unlock with the keypad, through Bluetooth with the Yale app on a telephone or Apple Watch, and with Apple Dwelling (together with Siri voice instructions).

All of the locks additionally work with Yale’s auto-unlock characteristic, which makes use of your telephone’s location and the lock’s Bluetooth radio to unlock the door whenever you method. It’s fairly magical when it really works, although I’d slightly have a fingerprint reader. 

How we rate and review products

Like its earlier good locks, Yale’s Guarantee 2 Lock makes use of networking modules so as to add completely different connectivity choices. The distinction now could be, as a substitute of a complicated lineup of connectivity choices, there are simply three: Wi-Fi (to connect with Amazon Alexa, Google Dwelling and others), Z-Wave (for Ring Alarm, Samsung SmartThings and different Z-Wave methods), and Matter over Thread (coming quickly) to connect with the entire above (hopefully). There’s additionally (lastly!) no want for a separate Wi-Fi bridge. 

I examined the $259.99 Assure Lock 2 Key-Free Touchscreen with Wi-Fi, which comes with the Wi-Fi module included and provides out-of-home management by means of the Yale app in addition to Google Dwelling and Amazon Alexa integration (SmartThings Wi-Fi integration is coming quickly). In any other case, it’s the very same lock because the Bluetooth model. The truth is, when you get the Bluetooth base mannequin, you can buy the Wi-Fi module later for $80.  

The Yale Guarantee Lock 2 is probably the most discreet-looking keypad lock I’ve examined. From a distance, the matte touchscreen is barely noticeable towards my darkish entrance door, which was not the case for the hulking Eufy good lock I had put in beforehand.

Even higher, the rear housing is considerably smaller than the sooner Yale Guarantee fashions and far smaller than most different deadbolt good locks I’ve examined. It’s nonetheless not a glance I really like, however it’s much less of an eyesore. 

Whereas the keypad-only fashions haven’t modified dramatically from the unique Assure SL line, the keyed fashions have a totally new look, bringing them in step with the sleeker stylings of the keypad-only fashions.

Now, the distinction is simply that the keyed mannequin is barely bigger to make room for the keyhole. However, except you may have a selected cause for needing a bodily key, that is largely a waste of house that (ahem) may have gone to a fingerprint reader. 

In case you do go for the keyed mannequin, Yale sells replacement cylinders for Schlage and Kwikset keyways and may key them to your present locks — although in case you have a number of exterior doorways, you don’t really want a keyhole on the one with the good lock, do you? 

I’ve been testing good door locks for over a decade, and I can’t bear in mind after I final used a bodily key to get into my residence. My teenage youngsters have by no means used one, as I discovered with some embarrassment after I dropped my son off at a school dorm for summer season camp.

The one state of affairs I can consider — past some catastrophic mechanical failure — is that if I managed to let the lock run out of battery. Even then, the key-free model allows you to jolt it again to life with a 9-volt battery lengthy sufficient to enter your code.

Whereas protecting a 9-volt battery available feels weirder than sticking a spare key beneath a flower pot, it’s undoubtedly safer, and 9-volt batteries are simple to get ahold of in a pinch.

The matte keypad on the touchscreen mannequin is so unobtrusive that it’s type of a shock when the keys gentle up. The draw back is that it doesn’t gentle up with only a contact. I found this at 6:30AM after I was rudely awoken by a loud banging on the door.

My husband was again from work, and I hadn’t but skilled him on the brand new lock. In his post-24-hour-shift exhaustion, he couldn’t work out learn how to get the keypad to indicate up. 

As I ought to have informed him earlier, he needed to both press the Yale button (which I’m not a fan of; I don’t like branding on my entrance door) or put his complete palm over the lock to get the keypad to indicate.

That is how the sooner Guarantee locks work, too, and it’s an pointless further step. Simply let me faucet the display screen. If this is a matter for you, go for the usual keypad model, which has bodily buttons. It’s much less discreet however simpler for everybody to make use of.

As soon as we acquired the dangle of the keypad, although, unlocking was simple and dependable. Not as fast as a fingerprint reader, however quick sufficient. As talked about, the auto-unlock feature is my most well-liked methodology when there isn’t a tap-to-unlock possibility (there’s no Apple Home Key, sadly).

I’ve used auto-unlock on August locks (August and Yale are sister corporations and the locks share the identical apps), and whereas I find it irresistible in idea, it isn’t as clean as I’d like. 

When auto-unlock works shortly sufficient, it’s fairly magical, unlocking a number of seconds earlier than you get to the door. However when it doesn’t — about two instances out of 10, in my expertise — you find yourself standing in entrance of your door like a doofus for a number of seconds ready for it. 

The Yale Entry app can also be fairly clean. It’s nicely laid out and has all of the options I search for. I can lock and unlock the door in Bluetooth vary or remotely utilizing Wi-Fi (with the Wi-Fi module put in).

I can see if the door is open or closed within the app (the lock comes with a magnetic sensor you placed on the door body) and consider a log of each interplay with the door. 

That log consists of who opened it and the way — manually, remotely with the app, with a code, or utilizing a wise residence platform like Apple Dwelling — and I can arrange good alerts to inform me when these items occur.

I can add visitors to the lock and permit full app entry or simply give them a code and schedule the time they’ll use it. There’s no restrict to the variety of codes, and I can revoke them anytime.

The built-in Apple Dwelling integration means I can add the lock to a Goodnight Scene or a Leaving or Arriving Automation. Leaving will lock the door (the Yale app additionally helps you to set an auto-lock for any interval), and Arriving can unlock the door. Though, in contrast to Yale’s auto-unlock characteristic, I’ve to faucet a immediate on my iPhone or Apple Look ahead to the automation to run.

Apart from having the ability to lock and unlock the door whenever you’re away from residence, every thing I’ve mentioned to date pertains to the Bluetooth base mannequin, with no further networking modules.

The lock I examined had the Wi-Fi module put in, and whereas it’s nice to see a lock with Wi-Fi inbuilt, I don’t suppose it’s the model most individuals ought to get. 

The Wi-Fi module provides out-of-home management with the Yale app, in addition to integration with extra good residence platforms. The out-of-home management labored nicely within the app, however each Google Dwelling and Alexa integrations didn’t work in my testing.

I may add the locks to the platforms and add them to Routines, however after I tried to manage them — by means of the Alexa and Google Dwelling app or with their voice assistants — the motion timed out.

That is seemingly some form of connectivity situation; Garrett Lovejoy, VP of product administration at Yale, says they’re engaged on a repair, and an replace must be obtainable subsequent week. I’ll replace this assessment if I see an enchancment.

One other draw back of built-in Wi-Fi is poor battery life. I’ve solely had the Yale put in for per week however primarily based on my testing of Wi-Fi locks usually, the 4 AA batteries the Yale runs on ought to get round six months. Altering your lock batteries twice a yr is extra tiresome than it sounds.

The Guarantee 2 is a strong good lock. Its design will slot in with most houses, it guarantees broad compatibility (though there are some bugs to work out with Alexa and Google), and it gives a number of simple and dependable methods to entry your door whereas ditching your keys. 

At $260, the Wi-Fi model of the Guarantee 2 is dear, though barely cheaper than the earlier Guarantee SL. However you may not want the Wi-Fi model.

The $160 to $180 Bluetooth mannequin (keypad or touchscreen), in distinction, is an actual cut price: it’s the least costly good lock that works with Apple Dwelling, you get out-of-home management if you have already got an iPhone and Apple Dwelling hub, and it’s upgradeable when you determined you needed so as to add Wi-Fi later. 

In case you are all-in on Alexa or Google Dwelling, I don’t advocate getting the Wi-Fi model but. Wait till they get the bugs labored out with the good residence integrations, and even higher, look forward to the Matter over Thread module, which Lovejoy says will arrive quickly after Matter is prepared for producers later this yr.

The new smart home standard ought to assist connecting the lock to all the identical platforms the Wi-Fi module does, with much less latency and higher battery life. Plus, it additionally provides Wi-Fi connectivity. I’ll check it when it’s obtainable and replace this assessment.

The Matter module, just like the Wi-Fi and Z-Wave modules, may be purchased individually, so there’s no worth penalty for getting the Bluetooth model now and including a module later, however when you don’t use Apple Dwelling, you will not be capable to management the lock whenever you’re not at residence.

Keep in mind additionally, you will want a Thread border router for the Matter model. As this may be something from a Google Nest Hub Max to an Echo 4th gen smart speaker to an Eero Wi-Fi router and extra, hopefully it will not contain a separate buy.

It’s a disgrace Yale couldn’t have simply constructed Thread proper into the system and successfully achieved away with the necessity for modules in any respect. However Lovejoy informed me they have been too far alongside within the growth course of to attend on Matter.

Yale isn’t the primary good residence firm to be put in a clumsy spot by Matter delays — some, like Nanoleaf, shipped Thread devices they assumed would work with Matter, solely to be left within the chilly as {hardware} necessities modified. 

Yale’s modular method to connectivity — which dates again a minimum of a decade to the Yale Actual Residing deadbolt — is a superb asset right here because it means the corporate can ship the lock with out ready for a ultimate Matter spec. And the entire Guarantee 2 modules might be backward-compatible with Yale’s older Guarantee locks. That’s intelligent and user-friendly, and extra corporations ought to comply with Yale’s lead. 

Images by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge