Level Has a New Level Lock
Level Home introduced Level Lock, which it claims is the “smallest smart lock ever made.” This is the third lock from Level, sitting in the middle at $249 between the Level Bolt on the $199 lower end and the $329 Level Lock – Touch Edition on the higher end. Like the other locks, all of the electronics and battery are hidden in the bolt of the lock itself, so you can’t tell that the lock is smart just by looking at it. New to all of Level’s locks is the fact that they are now certified to work with Alexa (and also work with HomeKit).
The NPD Take:
- Level locks continue to cater to consumers who don’t want to advertise the fact that they actually have a smart lock – which helps somewhat to justify their higher-than-average pricing. That said, the price point for this new Level Lock is more in line with pricing for some of the best-selling locks from other companies like Schlage and Yale.
Alexa... Is Someone There?
New Amazon Echo Show smart displays (Echo Show 8, Echo Show 5, Echo Show Kids) now have person detection – the ability to sense the presence of people and react when people enter or leave the room. The displays cannot distinguish between different people (like Google’s Face Match or Apple’s FaceID) but, with the ability to detect the presence of people in general, Alexa can initiate routines like turning lights or an air conditioner or music on or off.
The NPD Take:
- Unlike motion sensors, the displays use the camera to figure out whether the room is occupied, so it probably wouldn’t work in the dark, to say turn lights on at night. This is a definite drawback, but nevertheless this addition will still come in very handy for other routines.