The touchless smart locks are here

Smart lock companies have spent 2024 crafting nifty ways for you to gain entry into your front door, including iPhone-tapping Home Key ones from Aqara, a palm scanner from Philips, keypad and fingerprint options from August, and even a Face ID-style one from Lockly. These all sound pretty futuristic already… but does it feel like magic?

I’m talking magic like how my car’s driver door unlocks without me needing to do or touch anything other than pulling the handle. I’m talking about smart home locks that see me approaching and take action — so I don’t have to pause and interact with anything when I really just need to run inside to use the bathroom.

Image: Ultraloq

Luckily, at CES 2025, many smart lock makers are poised to launch models that offer touchless, passive entry support. That means you won’t need extra steps like pulling out an RFID fob from your pocket or smacking your Apple Watch against a pad to unlock your door. (That’s so last year!)

One of the most promising locks from the show is Schlage’s new Sense Pro Smart Deadbolt, which comes equipped with an ultra wideband (UWB) chip that will sense your paired smartphone’s trajectory and motion to know when to trigger an unlock for you.

Schlage isn’t the first to announce UWB in a smart lock; that credit goes to U-tec’s Ultraloq Bolt Mission, which was revealed last year. The Ultraloq was announced with a lack of support for the new Aliro smart access standard backed by Google, Apple, Samsung, and others (meaning no Apple Home hands-free unlocking support).

Now the Bolt Mission is here at CES with a “Q1 2025” launch timeframe, a $399 price tag, and a promise that Aliro and Apple Home hands-free are coming. There’s also the Lockly Secure Pro that too promises Apple’s touchless feature, costs $379.99, and will arrive in Q4. While it’ll still be a moment before a lot of these devices are on the market, the UWB-powered smart lock options are clearly arriving soon.

Image: Schlage

Of course, plenty of companies are still sticking to other unlock technologies instead of UWB. That includes palm scanner locks such as TP-Link’s Tapo PalmKey and TCL’s Smart Lock D1 Pro, both of which claim they use AI to scan for vein patterns in your hand. Meanwhile, others like the Lockly Styla are just here to look nice. Heck, if you’d rather have everything but UWB, you can look at SwitchBot’s new Lock Ultra, which literally has 16 different hands-on-something unlocking methods.

Smart lock makers are pretty much trying anything right now, including adding digital peepholes to deadbolts like on the new Lockly Vision Presige and TCL Smart Lock Ultra. But what’s really missing from smart homes today is that new car feeling: where you finally drive off the lot no longer needing to think about age-old ideas like lock, unlock, and push to start. We still have to see these locks in action to see whether they can reliably and securely pull off their hands-free feat. But the opportunity is coming. I hope the smart lock companies have that transformative feeling in mind as they launch products with UWB this year.