As a child and young adult, I distinctly recall starting a fresh new school year after a joyous summer break and receiving not only my books, but my locker to put them in.  A few of those, I was even allowed, if not forced, to bring my own padlock to secure my belongings.  Perhaps it was due to my relaxed summertime attitude or potentially even my uncontrollable excitement for learning, several times I forgot the combination to my padlock and inevitably had to fork out for a new one.  Fast forward a decade and I can remember having to bust out the bolt cutters to get access to a shed on a piece of property my dad owns because we couldn’t find the key.  In both of these cases, a smart padlock like the Smart Fingerprint Lock by Koogeek might have come in handy.  Let’s dive a little deeper into this unique HomeKit accessory and maybe help you decide if it’s the right choice for you.

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Features

• fingerprint sensor for quick and secure unlocking with 50 fingerprint maximum
• log the last 100 locking and unlocking actions through the Koogeek Home app
• remote control, notifications, and automations via Apple HomeKit (Home hub required)
• rechargeable Lithium Polymer battery with up to 1 year or up to 30,000 lock/unlock actions with battery status indicator through the Apple Home or Koogeek Home apps

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Need to Knows

• Bluetooth 4.2 (BLE) HomeKit accessory
• “outdoor” rated, but no IP rating is given
• HomeKit-exclusive
• Stainless steel / zinc construction

Pros

Considering this is a pretty unique accessory in the HomeKit realm, I was exactly sure what to think pulling it out of the box, but I have to admit that merely holding the device in my hand, it feels pretty solid.  Weight-wise it’s definitely heftier than your average padlock and this is likely due to the Bluetooth and fingerprint sensor hardware as opposed to being considerably more well-built than your average padlock.  Either way, it looks and feels quite well-manufactured.

In terms of functionality for a padlock, I really like the biometric access.  Let’s face it.  We all lose and forget things all the time and the fingerprint sensor kind of solves this issue.  Sure, technically fingerprints can wear away over time and good luck if you play a plucked instrument, but I think a fingerprint is a far superior to the more traditional means of unlocking a padlock.

Smart locks, especially HomeKit-enabled ones, can really be one of the pricier smart home investments that you can make.  Depending on where you find yourself on this planet, the Koogeek L3 may be a more cost-effective option for your HomeKit security needs.  That is if the form factor of the lock works in your situation.

Cons

As is evident as soon as you inbox this bad boy, you get an unusually thick user manual, especially for a padlock and even more especially for a HomeKit device.  Setup of this accessory is not as straight-forward as it could be as the instructions, while relatively clear, leave out some important information.  As I explain in the video below, I recommend adding this lock to HomeKit BEFORE adding any fingerprints.  The fingerprint sensor can be a little persnickety and might not recognize your fingerprint the first 45 times you try to unlock it.  Also, unless the lock is in an unsecured state, you cannot factory reset it.  So adding it to HomeKit allows you to unlock it in the event that you add a fingerprint and it’s not recognized.  Finally, the process for adding a fingerprint is a little cumbersome and finicky and doesn’t always take.  You’ll definitely want to see the user manual and the included reset tool handy for this accessory.  Alternatively, you can like the video below and subscribe to the YouTube channel for video reminders on how to set it up and reset it if need be.

The Koogeek Smart Fingerprint Lock does allow for up to 50 different fingerprints to be added which should be sufficient for most users.  However, if you plan on allowing another person access to unlocking this lock, you’ll need to have them there with you as you struggle through the cumbersome process of adding a fingerprint to the lock.  Also, there is no way to limit access or log or assign names to different fingerprints via the app.  So while we can look at the log of when the lock was opened and closed, but we have no way of knowing if a fingerprint or the app was used to unlock it nor do we know who did it.

Lastly, let’s introduce a worst case scenario here.  Imagine you forgot to turn on low battery alert notifications, they are not turned on by default by the way, you must go into the app and toggle them on manually.  Let’s also imagine that you use this padlock to secure entry into a storage facility that you don’t visit so often.  Let’s say you visit your storage to see what you can sell so you can buy more HomeKit gear, but to your severe disappointment, the lock has run out of juice and not only can’t read your fingerprint, but reads the dreaded “Not Responding” Home app message.  You are, in fact, up the creek without a paddle and it’s time to bust out the bolt cutters again.  I can’t say I have a solution for this, but there surely has to be some way to avoid this issue.  You can recharge the battery pretty quickly, however I’m not sure that at that point, I would trust that it would work as intended.  Moral of the story… turn on “Low Battery Alerts” from the “Status and Notifications” menu in the “Details” for the accessory in the Koogeek app.

The App

The Koogeek app is alright as far as HomeKit manufacturer apps are concerned.  But as far as manufacturer apps are concerned, the vast majority of them are relegated to a folder to be dusted off once a month or so to check for firmware updates.

In addition to firmware updates though, the Koogeek Home app gives us access to a record of the last 100 openings and closings of the lock with the odd indication of “On” and “Off” so I’m not quite sure how to equate the indications with open/close, locked/unlocked.  Going a step further, we also have a feature called “Lock Management Auto” with a slider labeled from 0 to 100.  But again, even through testing, I wasn’t able to figure what this actually adjusts and the label of the setting doesn’t help very much.  I initially thought it might be an auto-lock feature, but that doesn’t make sense as the padlock doesn’t have a motor and cannot lock itself.  Who knows?  If you do, let us know in the comments.

You can use the app and it’s relatively functional as a HomeKit app, but it’s not very intuitive and it’s fairly obvious that not a ton of thought was put into the user experience.

Final Thoughts

Koogeek has an odd, yet interesting HomeKit track record.  They were the first to break the seal on HomeKit-enabled WiFi smart lighting.  Their light strip is the only HomeKit light strip that I’m aware of that uses USB as it’s power source.  They have a very affordable and pretty solid contact sensor on the market.  And, they just released an attractive air quality monitor that sells for about double of similar products on the market.  I have to say that the Smart Fingerprint Lock sits at a similarly odd position in the lineup.  I’ll state it very simply and say that if you need a padlock and want it to maybe automate it or monitor when it opens and closes then this might just be the padlock for you.  It does what it says it does, but it does it in a sort of half-baked way.  The fingerprint sensor is pretty fast, but it definitely lacks in the accuracy department.  This perceptive is likely a result of being pretty accustomed to the speed, accuracy, and reliability of Touch ID, but nevertheless the fingerprint reader on this lock leaves a bit to be desired.  It’s a pretty good smart padlock, but I’m not convinced that one wouldn’t be better off saving a few bucks and just buying a traditional key or combination padlock.

Chris Young at homekitgeek came up with a really unique way of using this padlock as a key, what unique ideas do you have for a smart padlock or any smart lock?  Let your voiced be heard below.  Follow along with more HomeKit goodness on social media @myhomekithome.

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Links & Resources

Homekitgeek’s video of the Koogeek Smart Fingerprint Lock: https://amzn.to/2SSePFX

Check out all of Koogeek’s HomeKit compatible products at https://amzn.to/2SSePFX https://www.koogeek.com/smart-home-2418/

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