Aqara Smart Lock U100, Fingerprint Door Lock with Apple Home Key, Keyless Entry Door Lock, Bluetooth Electronic Deadbolt Lock, IP65 Weatherproof, Supports Apple HomeKit, Alexa, IFTTT, Silver

I am actually pretty happy with this lock - definitely an upgrade from the U50 I first ordered and returned because the programming was impossible to figure out, and it was kinda ugly. So I upgraded to try again. This lock is much classier - and the only reason I gave this U100 a 4 is that this one is also very difficult to set up/program. First, though - the mechanics. My husband easily installed the lock EXCEPT, save yourself some trouble - first thing measure the hole in your doorframe that the deadbolt slides into, before you do anything else, and compare to the measurement of the deadbolt plunger. It runs a bit long and the lock will not work if the plunger is blocked from full extension. If this happens the numbers on the outside will flash red and an alarm will sound TEN times and embarrass you in front of your neighbors 😉 and the lock will automatically unlock. You will not be able to make it stay locked, even by manually locking it - it will unlock itself again and again until you remove a battery. So just scrape the hole in a bit further if need be, and you’ll be fine. Other than that, physical install’s a cinch. It’s the programming that will have you pulling your hair out, especially if you’re trying to sync with HomeKit (which is the ENTIRE reason I abandoned a perfectly good wireless door lock that didn’t have HomeKit integration). Let me say first, you do NOT need to buy a hub to use HomeKit with this lock. Your HomeKit hub will do the job BUT the Aqara set up instructions are not user friendly, and make things infinitely harder! By the time you somehow get it working, you will no longer remember how you did it! One reviewer (and you’ll get better info reading these reviews and YouTube videos than the manufacturers written or online help file) mentioned not installing the Aqara app until after the lock is installed, and I did that, but that didn’t seem to help. For many of my numerous attempts to quit and start over, I tried to set up HomeKit with the little HomeKit button inside the battery compartment, but the instructions weren’t clear about whether I should use that BEFORE the Aqara set up button, or AFTER the Aqara set up bottom, or INSTEAD of the Aqara set up button. I kept taking out a battery and doing a full reset, and then trying another combination, which got SO confusing - but I kept trying. I think I finally left the HomeKit button alone and just used the Aqara set up button which prompted me to pair the lock in the Aqara app using the outside keypad. After that somehow (maybe with the HomeKit set up button?) I stumbled on to a page in the Aqara app that asked me to pair with HomeKit, and that’s where you scan the Apple QR code and it syncs with HomeKit properly. At that point everything finally worked, including the touch with my phone and watch. BUT my husband and our grandgirl are also included in our HomeKit through Family Share. Our granddaughter wasn’t even here when we set up the lock, but it added it to her HomeKit. (It also started driving her crazy sending notifications to her phone every time we locked or unlocked the door). It also added a HomeKey to her Apple Wallet, and also to my husband’s, but neither of them has been able to do the touch open. It’s been weeks, and suddenly yesterday a prompt popped up on her phone to add the touch entry. It happened so fast I just clicked on it and followed the prompts, and it set her up to touch her phone to the lock, and it works seamlessly. And she doesn’t even HAVE the Aqara app! But my husband’s phone - still nothing. So, IN SPITE OF THE AGGRAVATION, this lock is actually great. There are numerous ways to unlock the door, so the touch thing isn’t a deal breaker and it’ll pop up one day for hubby as well, I guess. What I want to say is, don’t give up! This seems a solid lock as far as keeping the house secure, and it’s clever. Hopefully Aqara will go step-by-step through their instructions & FAQ and write up a concise process for setting up the programming, and they’ll be a serious contender for the VERY few, much more expensive, Apple-enabled door locks available. It really shouldn’t be so hard to explain the set up. That’s the only downside to this lock - and probably to the more feature rich options as well. Do better with your documentation and you’ll have a real winner.

Looks great and works great! Easy to install. Smart technology. One I figured out the extra hub required to connect to wifi ($25), it all went great. Really happy with my decision to buy this lock for my front door.

I bought this lock based on tons of online recommendations saying how amazing it is. Unfortunately, my experience was very different from those people hyping it up. When we received it, I immediately set it up in Apple Homekit. This enabled the use of Apple homekey and PIN codes set through the Apple Home app. Great.. perfect.. all is good. Until 24 hours later when the lock just stopped working completely. The keypad wouldn't respond AT ALL. You could still lock or unlock it manually, but locking it from the outside as we were leaving was impossible since the keypad just didn't work. The ONLY way we could get it working again was to set up the lock in Aqara's own app - which we didn't want to do. I literally only wanted this lock in Apple HomeKit. I DESPISE companies that want you to use their app (so they can track your product use). That is why I use Apple HomeKit - it's more secure and private and all activity and automations stay in-house and don't need internet access. Unfortunately, Aqara seems to have programmed this lock to just stop working completely if you don't use their app... they literally want to force customers to give up privacy by using their own app, even though they advertise this lock as being Homekit compatible. Second, perhaps this was my lack of knowledge at the time, but you CANNOT use fingerprints with this lock through Homekit. You are, again, forced to use their app to add users and fingerprints. So fine, I gave up and connected this stupid lock to my Aqara hub (used for other HomeKit sensors) and thought that by doing that, it would be more responsive in Homekit... But I was wrong again which is my third point... This lock has multiple personality disorder. You HAVE to connect it to HomeKit directly to use Apple Homekey, but this lock will ONLY connect to HomeKit via bluetooth - which is slow and sometimes takes ~5 seconds to respond to the home app (locking or unlocking remotely, automations, etc). I should note that there is a way to connect this lock to HomeKit via zigbee with one of their hubs; and that involves setting I tup on their hub/app first and then using Matter to connect it to HomeKit**. HOWEVER, this does NOT allow you to use apple homekey. You STILL have to use a Homekit direct connection via bluetooth to use Homekey. Fourth, my wife and kids REPEATEDLY had issues getting this lock to actually unlock with Apple Homekey. When it worked, Homekey is amazing. It is super fast and super convenient. However this lock, at times, would just decide to not recognize the apple homekey, requiring my wife or kids to fall back to using a PIN code. One could argue that maybe I just received a faulty lock in this aspect, but based on everything else about this lock's connectivity pushing users into the Aqara app, I question that assumption. I find it just as likely that Aqara programmed Homekit/Homekey functionality to be unreliable. Am I being excessively cynical about this? Maybe. But there are just too many things about the way this lock (and their app) work that just scream that they are intentionally trying to push people into their app and out of the security and privacy of Homekit. So I give this two stars. When it worked, it was great. The physical build quality is also very nice. If you don't mind the bipolar use between Apple Home AND their Aqara app just to use all the advertised features AND you don't mind giving up your privacy*** to Aqara to track everything you do with it, then fine - this lock may be just for you. However, if you are looking for a door lock that can be entirely managed in Apple home, securely, privately, and with fast response; this isn't it. I eventually gave up on this and returned it, partly due to some other issues with their hub causing other problems with HomeKit and this door lock. **Another notation in the Aqara desperately wants to make life miserable for customers using Apple home, is that, when their hub is added to Homekit as a matter bridge, this lock will show up twice - once for the direct HomeKit connection (bluetooth) and a second instance for Matter via zigbee/hub. There is no way to get rid of this second instance once the hub is added as a matter bridge. Now, when blocking the Hub from having internet access (IoT VLAN and firewall policies; again PRIVACY IS IMPORTANT), the Matter instance of the door lock now becomes unresponsive in Apple home.... But Matter devices are supposed to all work locally and NOT REQUIRE internet access. So yet again, it's another instance of Aqara wants to force users into their app and track what they do. ***when first setting up the Aqara app, there is a Homekit only mode that they even admit that they tried to get rid of, but decided to keep it due to overwhelming customer pushback. In the Homekit only mode, your lock is crippled though... you can't add fingerprints, or even update firmware as that fails. And as I mentioned, when the lock just stopped working after the first 24 hours, I was forced to create an account on their app anyway, so again, it seems like they intentionally want to force users who want HomeKit only to be as miserable as possible.

Overall, the lock works well, however… They need to put a lot more work into set up and configuration with their software. When initially installing the lock, the app would not configure/find the lock by scanning the QR code. The only way I could set it up, was to press the set up button and force it into pairing mode. I ran into similar problems trying to add the lock to Apple HomeKit . The standard method would be to open HomeKit, tap 'Add an accessory', scan the QR code and done. I tried this numerous times and they all failed the only way I was able to get it to work was to go into the app and then manually add the device. I had similar problems with the Aqara bridge. I also tried manually adding the product codes for the lock and the bridge to Apple Home, which also failed. If you are having similar issues, stand near the device so that the Aqara app is connected via Bluetooth. Select the device, press teh elipsis (...) in upper right corner of the app, scroll down to General Settings - 'Other Platforms' and pair it from there. I’m not a novice to technology having worked in the field for over 25 years and while I do have it working at the moment, I do believe the company should spend more time on user testing and integration.

The U100 was easy to install and I was able to program it to open with a code or my fingerprint! Now no key needed! Since it was also on sale it was a great value as well!U100