ZDNET’s key takeaways
- Ring’s first-ever smart lock addresses a real weakness in the device category with a hand-powered energy dial.
- The lock also supports PIN, fingerprint scanning, Alexa, and the Ring app to unlock.
- The jury is out on whether this form of energy backup is more reliable than a physical key.
For as much as Ring has carved itself a spot in the home security market, the brand still doesn’t have a smart lock — though that’s about to change. A new Ring Smart Lock was just announced this week, expanding the Ring ecosystem and Alexa devices.
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The Ring Smart Lock attempts to safeguard against power loss with a unique dial that generates electricity by manually turning it. This is useful if your smart lock dies, since you can simply power it long enough to open your door and get inside.
Imagine coming home from an extended vacation, only to find that your smart lock’s battery died while you were gone. Instead of carrying a physical key in an emergency like this, you can turn the dial on the external smart lock body until the pad lights up to enter your PIN or scan your fingerprint. This totals four different ways the lock can be functional: a fingerprint reader, the keypad, the Ring app, or via Alexa.
Once you get inside, you can pop out the lock’s Quick Release Ultra battery pack and recharge it at home without worrying about replacing batteries. As for different ways to unlock, the Ring Smart Lock supports fingerprint scanning, PIN codes (including temporary codes), Alexa commands, and the Ring app.
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Why this smart lock is useful
The idea of a smart lock you can still open with a dead battery sounds quite attractive and is something I’d prefer over carrying a backup key. The underlying idea here is that you have a lock that won’t ever be inoperable — if it dies, you can instantly power it up again.
Aside from the fact that I don’t like carrying a physical key, a hand-crank smart lock that you can quickly use if the battery dies is great for kids and family members. My oldest kid likes unlocking the door every day after school, and having a backup they can use to still unlock it if the battery dies is better than me having to rescue them with a key.
Other locks let you use a 9V battery or a portable battery plugged in via a USB-C port, but that can be far from helpful in an emergency. I don’t carry around 9V batteries, and I don’t always have a portable one with a cable.
Questions remain
We’re still missing a lot of information about the Ring Smart Lock, including battery life estimates, Matter compatibility, and third-party integrations. We also don’t know how many turns or how much you need to turn the power dial, but that’s something we’ll test when the lock is available. I’d like to see some of these integrations in the final product.
Though we only know the Ring Smart Lock will launch in early 2027, there isn’t a set date for availability yet. Amazon says it’ll come in three finishes: black, silver, and brass. In terms of pricing, it’ll cost $250. You can sign up to be notified when the smart lock becomes available for purchase.