Kwikset Kevo 2nd Gen Bluetooth Smart Lock (2016) Release Date, Price and Specs – CNET

Tyler Lizenby/CNET

Pair the Kwikset Kevo Bluetooth Deadbolt with your phone or with a keychain fob, and you can unlock your front door just by tapping on it. It’s a cool, convenient, one-of-a-kind smart lock, and we liked it a lot when we first tested one out back in 2013 — but a vulnerability to a very specific kind of brute-force attack kept us from recommending it outright.

Now, three years later, Kwikset is back with a second-gen Kevo. Save for a smaller, sleeker interior design, it looks largely the same as before, but Kwikset is promising a host of subtle improvements — including easier installation and better defense against those kinds of brute attacks.

At a retail price of $229, the second-gen Kevo costs $10 more than the original Kevo did back in 2013. That’s the same price you’ll pay for the newest version of the August Smart Lock, so it looks like we’ve got a bit of a smart-home showdown coming to your front door.

We’ve already installed a second-gen Kevo at the CNET Smart Home, and we’ll have a full review in the coming weeks — including a look at how it holds up to the sort of torque attacks that defeated it before. For now, here are our first impressions.

The inside half of the second-gen Kevo is noticeably more compact than before.

Tyler Lizenby/CNET

Smart, subtle tweaks

The new Kevo isn’t much different than the old one. You’ll still pair it with your Android or iOS device, then touch the lock when you want it to open. If the Kevo detects your phone in close proximity outside the door, it’ll flash green, unlock and let you inside. You can still control it remotely using the app whenever you’re in Bluetooth range, and you can still pair it with the optional Kevo Plus Bluetooth-to-Wi-Fi plug-in bridge accessory if you want to control it from anywhere. From outside of your house, as before, the Kevo Kwikset second-gen still looks like a normal, everyday dumb lock.

The Kevo app does a nice job of walking you through the setup process. All you really need is a screwdriver and a tape measure.

Screenshots by Ry Crist/CNET

The key differences (sorry) are on the inside. Most noticeable among them: the interior design, where the battery housing is much smaller than before. It’s also a full metal enclosure now, an upgrade from the first Kevo, which had a plastic housing. There’s also a new screw that you can tighten to lock the interior housing shut — that’ll help prevent people from opening the lock and resetting it.

Kwikset worked to make the installation easier, too. You’ll still find a helpful, step-by-step walkthrough in the Kevo app, but now it’s beefed up with interactive graphics, animations and videos. Inside, the two halves of the lock now connect using a single wire that’s less finicky than before. The separate calibration process — an annoying but necessary part of the setup last time around — is gone now: the second-gen Kevo will automatically calibrate itself.

You can manage users and view each lock’s activity history in the Kevo app for Android and iOS devices.

Screenshot by Ry Crist/CNET

App-enabled entry

Something that bugged us last time around was that Kwikset charged $1.99 for each “eKey” you created to allow someone else to unlock your Kevo. That’s roughly as much as you’d pay to make someone a copy of your key, but it still felt pretty stingy, given that an eKey is really just an email from Kwikset that grants a user permission to access your lock in the Kevo app.

Three years later, Kwikset handles eKeys a little bit differently. They come in three types: Anytime eKeys, Guest eKeys, and Scheduled eKeys. Like the name suggests, Anytime eKeys will work indefinitely until you revoke access — you get two for free, and then you’ll pay $1.99 for each one after that.

Guest eKeys are just Anytime eKeys that only work for 24 hours, then expire. You get as many of those as you want for free.

Scheduled eKeys come with optional schedule restraints — you can give them an expiration date, or restrict them to work only on certain days or at certain times. They cost $1.99 each.

That’s a step in the right direction, but still, it’s disappointing that Kwikset sees fit to charge you for the luxury of using the luxury smart lock you already spent hundreds of dollars on. Full user management should be a default smart lock feature, not a pay-as-you-go add-on.

Kevo has also added some notable third-party smart-home integrations since last time around. You can sync it up with the Nest Learning Thermostat or with the Honeywell Wi-Fi Thermostat to trigger your HVAC system as you come and go. It’ll also work with the Ring and Skybell HD video doorbells, letting you use the phone to unlock the door for people who need to get in.

Let’s talk about the lock

Like with the first Kevo, the deadbolt at the heart of the lock is Kwikset’s SmartKey deadbolt, which comes with a special tool that allows owners to re-key the lock without need for a locksmith.

As far as security, the SmartKey deadbolt has a lot going for it. For starters, it uses a patented horizontal slider in place of the traditional key and pin tumblers, which means that would-be thieves can’t get in by “bumping” the lock. It also passes UL 437, the most stringent test against lock picking conducted by the independent researchers at Underwriters Laboratories. Even security expert Marc Weber Tobias, a vocal Kevo critic, told us that the SmartKey deadbolt was nearly impossible to pick.

Kwikset claims the Kevo’s SmartKey deadbolt is stronger than before.

Josh Miller/CNET

Tobias was the one who identified the SmartKey deadbolt’s vulnerabilities to brute-force torque attacks in 2013. No single lock is going to prevent someone from breaking into your home if they’re determined to do so, but we were concerned with what Tobias found, since it’s a SmartKey-specific attack that relies on common tools like a screwdriver and a hammer. When we tested it for ourselves, we were able to use the technique to successfully bypass the first-gen Kevo in less than a minute.

Now, Kwikset tells us that the SmartKey deadbolt in the second-gen Kevo is an updated model — and the company assured us that the same bypass technique won’t work this time. If that’s the case, it’ll be a legitimate security upgrade, and a useful addition to the lock’s existing protections against picking and bumping.

Of course, with smart locks, you have to consider security against hacking and other cyber threats, too. Kwikset deserves some credit here. A recent investigation into Bluetooth lock security found flaws with several smart padlocks and deadbolts, including the August Smart Lock (a hack we were able to verify). Despite their best efforts, those same researchers were unable to hack the Kwikset Kevo at all.

Outlook

Kevo’s unique touch-to-open approach sets it apart from other smart locks and makes it a tangible convenience upgrade for your front door. On top of that, Kwikset’s approach to handling eKey access, while still not ideal, seems easier to swallow than last time around. If it works as reliably as last time and also performs better against brute force attacks, it could be the new smart lock to beat. We’ll have the full verdict from the CNET Smart Home after we’ve had some more time to test it out.