Welcome to the future. Progress marches. Innovation blossoms. Bold people search for ingenious solutions to everyday problems. Our thermostats learn. Robots vacuum our homes. And, now, we don’t even need keys because we can open the door with our iPhone.
The Kwikset Kevo is a deadbolt. It comes with regular keys and can be unlocked like any deadbolt. But, that’s not why someone spends $219.00 on the Kevo. No, they buy it—the forerunning product in a new market—because it allows you to unlock your door via the magic of Bluetooth technology.
And, it works. Installation was uneventful and took about an hour. Afterwards, we setup the Kevo iPhone app and configured our “eKey.” When we approach the door from the outside, it senses us. And, when we touch the lock, it opens.
For those without iPhones, the Kevo comes with a fob. It attaches to a key ring and also uses Bluetooth to communicate with your deadbolt.
Keyless entry is convenient. We’d rather not have to set down our groceries. And it’d come in awfully handy if we were overserved and misplaced our keys. But, to us at G@H, the most valuable feature of the Kevo is the ability to send keys digitally to other people.
We’ve got both an awesome dog and a hectic job. Sometimes, the obligations of the latter interfere with our obligations to the former, and we must enlist a friend to let our poor dog out. We needn’t preemptively entrust him with a physical key. Nor must we share the location of our hiding spot. Instead, we can send him an eKey. And, after he completes his rescue mission, we can delete his key—protecting our precious stash of craft beer against a clandestine raid.
The Kevo isn’t perfect—as with any pioneering product. It currently works only with the iPhone. Some people complain about configuration hiccups, though we experienced none. We would like more control of sent eKeys. For instance, we should able to designate an expiration time and date.
The Kevo, though, delivers what it promises, and what it delivers is mighty neat.
