For homeowners who want to protect their front doors from bad weather, storm doors are a common fixture at the entrance of their homes.
What if you want to secure your storm door with a smart lock for keyless entry? I’ll get into the best smart locks for storm doors, as well as more details about storm doors and feature considerations.
If you’re in a hurry, here’s the comparison of the best smart locks for storm doors.
5 Best Smart Locks For Storm Doors
1. Best Overall – Yale Assure Lock SL, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth
The Yale Assure Lock replaces and upgrades the deadbolt on any existing door, in this case, your storm door.
Through cooperation with August Locks, this Yale smart lock utilizes Connected by August to take advantage of the Auto Unlock feature.
Auto unlock uses Bluetooth and geofencing to automatically unlock the door as you’re walking up. Super useful when it’s raining, you’re carrying a gym bag and a couple bags of groceries, and it’s tough to get to your keys.
If you’re constantly rushing in or out of the house and will forget to close or lock the door behind you, don’t worry. DoorSense technology through August will alert you if your door is left open for too long. If it’s unlocked, it’ll automatically lock the door behind you, so you don’t need to run back to the house.
2. Best Value – Schlage Encode Smart WiFi Deadbolt
The Schlage Encode from Schlage works out of the box with no extra devices required. It connects to your home Wi-Fi via a built-in Wi-Fi receiver. Installation is easy and you only need a screwdriver, no other tools needed.
Schlage also has the auto lock and unlock feature utilizing geofencing functionality. It’ll recognize when you’re getting home and unlock the door when you’re close to it.
If you don’t have your smartphone on you, you can use its capacitive touchscreen keypad to unlock the door. You’ll be able to create access codes for friends, family, and anyone else you want to have a permanent or temporary key code.
If you utilize a smart home ecosystem like Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant, the Schlage lock will offer compatibility with those and others. You’ll be able to continue using hands-free voice control to lock and unlock your storm door.
3. Best Budget Friendly – SimpliSafe Smart Lock
Security is one of the top features that the SimpliSafe Smart Lock offers. If you have the SimpliSafe Home Security System, you’ll want to look at their smart door lock.
You can lock the door and arm the security system at the same time on the app. Or you can even set an automatic timer for everything to arm and lock after a certain amount of time from when you enter or exit your home.
Notifications are sent to your phone whenever there’s any activity at the door. Maybe you’re at work and your kids just got off school, you’ll be able to know when the door’s unlocked by them.
The SimpliSafe lock has multiple access options such as a key fob, smartphone, or entry code access via the PIN keypad allows you to enter your home hassle-free.
As an additional safety measure, if anyone enters a wrong PIN 5 times, a notification is sent to your phone, so you know immediately if something fishy is going on. After 15 failed PIN attempts, the lock goes into full lockdown mode for 30 minutes. Giving you time to contact the authorities for help and hopefully stopping people from breaking into your home.
4. Nest x Yale Smart Lock
Yale produces great locks that’re trusted all around the world, that’s why Google Nest has teamed up with them on the Nest x Yale Lock.
It features remote access and auto unlock, which means that you can unlock your smart lock while you’re sitting in the car in the driveway during a heavy downpour. All you need to do then is to prep yourself to run to an already unlocked front door, saving you from being caught in the rain for longer than you need to.
By pairing with the Nest app through the Nest Connect WiFi Bridge (included in the box) device, you’re able to have remote access to the smart lock. You can control all its features through your smartphone with the wireless connection from the bridge adapter.
The tamper proof design on the lock means that you’ll receive a notification on your phone straight away if it detects anyone trying to tamper or break in.
5. Custom Storm Door
Not all door frames can accommodate a storm door, so some customization will be needed. Or maybe you want something more personalized and stylish from stock storm doors.
Storm doors can be customized by companies such as Champion. They offer all kinds of designs that will suit your home’s aesthetics.
Custom door installers can give professional advice on the smart locks and other hardware that works best with your customized storm door.
It can save you the headache of narrowing down a choice of smart lock for your storm door from the huge number of options on the market today. Or even trying to retrofit your storm door to fit a smart door lock on it.
Final Thoughts
Best Overall
The Yale Assure Lock SL is a great choice for storm door locks. It’s secure and packed full of features.
Best Value
The Schlage Encode Smart Lock offers great value for its features and the price.
Best Budget Friendly
The SimpliSafe Smart Lock comes in as the best budget model, but you will need a SimpliSafe home security base with this.
What Are Smart Door Locks
Smart locks are a brilliant upgrade from your lock-and-key mechanisms on your front door. It provides simple, easy to use keyless access options while giving you the kind of top-quality security you need for your home.
On top of that, you are also able to view all the activity that your smart lock has. Whether it is a family member entering their access code to get in the house or a potential door attack situation, you get notifications in real time.
Smart locks are also really convenient when you’re stuck in rain or a snowstorm. All you want to do is to get inside quickly without fumbling for any keys and getting wet or cold, and keyless entry smart locks will get you there.
With just a few taps on your smartphone, scanning your fingerprints or even using voice controls like “Hey insert-voice-assistant-here, Let me in!”, you trigger your smart lock to let you inside in half the time it takes to open the door with your keys.
What Are Storm Doors
Storm doors are built to protect your main front door from bad weather. It provides additional ventilation during the hot summer months while keeping pesky bugs out, and traps the chilly air outside from entering your home during the winter seasons.
It also ensures that your main door is safe from the common problems of deteriorating paintwork as it is exposed to rain, snow and shine all year round.
What Are The Requirements of a Storm Door to Install a Smart Lock?
Accepts a Deadbolt
Storm doors can be secured in many ways, but the best way to figure out if your storm door is compatible with a smart lock would have to be the presence of a deadbolt. This is because the best and quickest access smart locks available today are the deadbolt replacement types.
If you don’t have a deadbolt already on your storm door, you might have to bust out some power tools and get some experienced help to assist you in boring a deadbolt hole on the door.
Sufficient Room Between the Doors
The industry standard for the minimum range of separation between a storm door and your main door is around 2½” to 3”, so ensure that you have that amount of space in between before you install your smart lock onto your storm door.
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