Are smart locks less secure than regular deadbolts?

Not mechanically. Most smart deadbolts from established lock manufacturers use the same bolt, cylinder and strike hardware as their keyed equivalents, and many carry the same ANSI/BHMA grade. What a smart lock adds is a second way in — an account, an app and a radio — so it has a larger attack surface even though the physical lock is unchanged. Whether that is a net loss depends almost entirely on how the account is secured.

Can someone unlock my door from outside with a phone?

Not through any normal function. Bluetooth-only locks require pairing and proximity, and Wi-Fi or bridge-connected locks route through the manufacturer account, so remote access needs your credentials. The realistic version of this attack is not technical at all: it is someone getting into your account through a reused password or a phishing message, or being given a guest code that was never revoked. Both are prevented by account hygiene rather than by anything about the lock.

Should I use a smart lock on a rental property?

They are genuinely useful there, because per-guest codes with expiry dates remove the key handover problem. The risk shifts to code management: revoke every code at checkout, avoid patterns like the last four digits of a phone number, and turn off any auto-unlock feature. Also check your local landlord-tenant rules — some jurisdictions have requirements about tenant access, notice and data collection that apply to connected locks, and that is a question for a local attorney rather than a product page.

Do smart locks still work in a power outage or when the Wi-Fi is down?

Yes. Smart locks run on their own batteries, not household power, so an outage does not affect them, and Bluetooth control from a phone standing at the door works with the internet down. What stops working is remote access, notifications and any integration that routes through the cloud. Most models also keep a physical key cylinder or an emergency contact terminal for a 9V battery — check which yours has before you need it.

Which is safer, a keypad code or a phone app?

A code is simpler and has no account attached to it, but it can be observed, worn into the keys or shared and forgotten. An app is only as strong as the account behind it, which means a unique password and multi-factor authentication turn it into the stronger option and a reused password makes it the weaker one. The practical answer for most households is both: an app for daily use with MFA on, and a small number of well-managed codes as a backup.

Can Smart Locks Be Hacked? An Honest Look at the Real Risk

Written & researched by Derek Holt Home & Appliances Editor

Updated October 2026

Low-angle view of a person mounting a small camera beside a front door, in soft overcast light

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Yes, smart locks can be compromised — but almost never in the way people imagine. Documented failures have overwhelmingly involved the account and the software rather than someone defeating the lock at the door: reused or phished passwords, guest codes that were never revoked, and vulnerabilities in a manufacturer app or cloud service that were later patched. Meanwhile the weakest part of nearly every residential entry is unchanged by the electronics — the door frame and strike plate. For most households, a smart lock with a unique password, multi-factor authentication and current firmware is not a downgrade in security.

What is the realistic threat model?

Break the risk into four categories, because they are not equally likely and they do not have the same fixes.

Risk	How likely	What prevents it
Account takeover — reused password, phishing	Most common by a wide margin	Unique password plus MFA on the lock account and the email behind it
Codes given out and never revoked	Common	Time-limited guest codes; a quarterly audit of active users
Unpatched firmware or a vulnerable vendor app	Occasional, and usually patched	Auto-update on; buy from vendors with a track record of fixing things
Local radio attack at the door	Rare, requires proximity and skill	Choose current models; keep firmware updated
Physical attack on the door and frame	By far the most common real burglary method	3 in strike screws, reinforced strike plate, solid door

That last row is the one that gets skipped in every discussion of smart lock security. Residential entry doors are typically defeated at the frame, not at the lock cylinder, and it is why the cheapest meaningful upgrade to any front door — smart or not — is replacing the short screws in the strike plate with 3 inch screws that reach the wall framing behind the jamb.

Over-the-shoulder view of a person mounting a small camera beside a front door, in warm late-afternoon light

Have smart locks actually been broken into?

Yes, and the published cases are instructive because of what they involved. At DEF CON 24 in 2016, researchers Anthony Rose and Ben Ramsey presented testing of 16 Bluetooth smart locks and reported that 12 of them could be compromised, largely through basic implementation failures such as transmitting passwords in plaintext and accepting replayed commands. That research is a decade old now and the industry response was substantial, but it established the pattern: the flaws were in software engineering, not in lock design.

More recently, in April 2024 CISA published an advisory covering a smart lock access system in which hardcoded credentials could allow unauthorized remote access to affected units, tracked as CVE-2024-2197. Again the failure was in the vendor's software and account handling. The consistent lesson across a decade of disclosures is that the manufacturer's security practice matters more than the mechanism on your door — which is why we weight brand track record heavily in our smart lock picks.

Three-quarter view of a person mounting a small camera beside a front door, in soft early-morning light

How do you make a smart lock genuinely secure?

Seven steps, ordered by how much risk each removes.

Use a unique password on the lock account and on the email address behind it. Credential stuffing — trying passwords leaked from other breaches — is the single most common route into any connected home account.
Turn on multi-factor authentication wherever the app offers it. CISA's guidance for consumers puts MFA among the small number of steps that meaningfully change account outcomes.
Enable automatic firmware updates, and check the app once a quarter if it does not update itself.
Audit access codes and users quarterly. Delete old guest codes, contractors, former housemates and anyone you cannot name.
Use time-limited codes for deliveries, cleaners and guests rather than permanent ones.
Reinforce the door frame. A reinforced strike plate with 3 inch screws into the stud, and a solid-core or metal door, does more than any electronics.
Turn off features you do not use — auto-unlock on approach, remote access, and third-party integrations you no longer run.

What we will not publish is anything about how to defeat a lock, and any page that does is not a security resource.

Low-angle view of a person mounting a small camera beside a front door, in bright midday sun

Which types are more resilient?

The connection method changes the exposure. It is a genuine trade-off rather than a ranking, because the safest configuration is also the least convenient.

Type	Remote access	Exposure	Best for
Bluetooth only, no bridge	None	Lowest — nothing is internet-facing	Anyone who does not need remote unlocking
Z-Wave or Zigbee to a local hub	Via the hub	Low — the lock itself is not on the internet	Existing smart home setups
Matter over Thread	Via a local border router	Low, with modern encryption and local control	New installs
Wi-Fi, direct to the cloud	Full	Highest — depends on vendor security	Rentals and remote access needs
Keypad only, no radio	None	Lowest — no account exists	Keyless convenience with no app

Also check the physical grade independently of the electronics. ANSI/BHMA grades deadbolts from Grade 3 (residential basic) to Grade 1 (highest), and a smart lock built on a Grade 1 or Grade 2 deadbolt is a serious piece of hardware regardless of the app attached to it.

If a lock is one part of a wider setup, pair it with a camera covering the door rather than relying on the lock alone — video doorbells and security cameras cover that, and smart lock battery life covers the far more common way a smart lock ruins your day.

We never buy, install or physically handle the products we rank. Every recommendation is drawn from aggregated owner reviews, star ratings, review volume and published expert consensus — see how we rank.

Can Smart Locks Be Hacked?

Affiliate Disclosure

What is the realistic threat model?

Have smart locks actually been broken into?

How do you make a smart lock genuinely secure?

Which types are more resilient?

Frequently Asked