Proscenic Smart Lock L60 review: Big, loud, and basic

If you’re paying more than $100 to upgrade to the ol’ lock-and-key for your front door, your lock needs to be smart. Extending how this transaction takes place is one thing — allowing you to open your door using an app, a keypad, or a fingerprint, for example. But if that’s all you can do, you don’t really have much of a smart lock on your hands. And that’s the biggest issue with Proscenic’s Smart Lock L60: It’s slightly more convenient than a key, but that’s about it.

Price and availability

Absolutely wait for a discount

You can buy Proscenic’s Smart Lock L60 directly from the company for $109, though you’ll likely find it on sale (there or at a conventional retailer like Amazon). I’ve seen the price drop as low as $61 with stackable sales and coupons, but I still don’t think that makes up for the L60’s relatively limited feature set.

The “L60 W” version of the smart lock adds a Bluetooth gateway for an extra $30. This gateway lets you link the lock to your Wi-Fi network and control it from anywhere. It’s a little less than what you’d pay for similar functionality on other smart locks.

Design

You’ll always know your door is opening

Everything you need to set up the L60 comes in its box, including a small spare screwdriver. At 6.5 x 2.5 inches, the lock’s front half looks bulky on your door, but Proscenic gets a pass on that one, given just how much it packs into the device: a key slot with a handy cover, a full touchpad, and a fingerprint reader.

A built-in, volume-adjustable speaker gives you a solid, loud response when you tap on keys or lock and unlock your door, though the smart lock’s touchpad isn’t as responsive as I’d prefer. Occasionally, it can get a little fussy acknowledging whatever you’re finger-mashing. The rear of the lock only has a single turn piece and, thankfully, a large section for the device’s four AA batteries. Swapping fresh batteries into a dying lock takes a minute, and you don’t need special tools to remove the battery cover.

It’s worth knowing up front that the Smart Lock L60 requires a complete “door conversion” to install. You’re not just adding a smart lock over your existing setup. You’ll be removing the door’s hardware — the latch inside your door, the exterior housing, and the interior thumb turn — and replacing it with everything that comes in the L60’s box. It’s an easy process as long as your door is compatible, meaning all the drilled holes you’ve been using are the correct diameter and distance for the L60 to work.

The only issue I had installing the L60 was more my apartment’s fault than the lock’s: The door hole appeared to have a one-inch diameter, but it was actually a bit smaller. This fit my ancient lock just fine, but I had to bust out the drill and do some cleaning to squeeze the L60’s deadbolt mechanism into the door frame.

Annoyingly, you can’t look up all the required measurements yourself on Proscenic’s website, as it only shows support for the company’s L40 door lock, and the installation specifications don’t match the L60. Unless your existing door lock is incredibly nonstandard, you’re probably fine, but know that you might have to do a little extra work to get your L60 installed. Competing smart locks like the August Wi-Fi Smart Lock will be a better match for you if you don’t want to cut into your door.

Proscenic includes all the screws you’ll need for the installation, the four batteries that’ll power the entire contraption, and even a little screwdriver, so you don’t have to go digging for your tool kit. Minus the extra drilling, it took me around ten minutes or so to replace my existing lock with Proscenic’s Smart Lock L60.

From there, you have to download Proscenic’s app to connect your door and online. Pairing the door lock to your phone isn’t too difficult, but the entire process got annoying. To start, the verification code Proscenic sent to me to confirm my account’s creation went right into my Gmail’s spam folder — to be expected since it came from “data_component” with the generic subject line of “Email verification code for account sign-up.”

The app also failed to automatically recognize the nearby smart lock via Bluetooth. Tapping into a menu to pull up the lock’s setup routine manually wasn’t the biggest deal. More annoying were the app’s directions for getting the lock ready to pair with your phone, which I struggled with but succeeded with, as tapping “Next” through the menus in frustration caused everything to work out fine. As part of the setup process, you assign a 6-8 digit PIN for the lock’s keypad. You’ll then calibrate its locking and unlocking mechanism, and that’s it.

It’s a solid jump scare when your roommate comes home while you’re watching movies in your living room, but I wouldn’t say that’s a good thing.

To use the lock to the fullest, you need to register your fingers with the fingerprint reader. The two NFC tags that ship with the lock allow you to lock and unlock it without any setup whatsoever — useful, but I’m not exactly sure how you would disable them if you were ever to lose one, which isn’t great for your home’s overall security.

My biggest issue with the lock’s design is one you won’t be able to fix: It’s loud. To confirm I wasn’t being overly sensitive, I had a few friends listen to me enter and leave my apartment. Their observations matched mine. The Proscenic L60 sounds like someone’s powering up a drill from behind the door. Sure, smart locks have moving parts, but the L60 is irritatingly loud for daily use. It’s a solid jump scare when your roommate comes home while you’re watching movies in your living room, but I wouldn’t say that’s a good thing.

Software and features

Basic modes in a bulky app

I’m not a fan of the Proscenic app that controls the L60. In addition to its general clutter, which includes shortcuts to content, “recipes,” and “after-sales” you can’t get rid of, as well as advertisements for new Proscenic products, it’s really designed for an entire smart home full of Proscenic devices. You won’t use the app’s “scenes” with your door lock or its “community,” which wouldn’t even load for me and is likely not the permanent, external link to its online store.

You’re limited in what you can do with the door lock using the app. It’s easy to set up a temporary code to grant anyone access to your home, and a feature I love is that you can mash it between a series of random numbers without any setup required. This is an excellent tool to keep nearby people from sleuthing out any codes.

It’s similarly easy to add new users and assign them their own permanent door codes, fingerprints, and NFC cards. Though the app appears to present you with an option to schedule when their access is valid, you can’t actually tap on that option to edit it at all, which is befuddling.

The only other option you can really play with is the door’s auto-lock. It’s not geofenced in, and the door won’t automatically unlock when you’re nearby and lock when you’re away. You just get a plain ol’ timer, ranging from seconds to a full minute’s worth of time. It would be nice to have a larger range in case you foresee yourself taking an extra minute or two when taking the trash out, for example.

However, the lack of any way to open your lock automatically is the biggest flaw, even given that you can unlock the device using three different techniques. When your hands are full of groceries, a fingerprint and a keypad aren’t as useful as a geofence.

The door lock does not tell you if your door is actually open, which would have been useful paired with its auto-locking capabilities. There’s also no way to send notifications to your device when the door locks or unlocks, which is more a result of its Bluetooth-only connectivity than anything else. You can control the lock by connecting it to Google Home or Amazon’s Alexa app, but HomeKit isn’t supported.

Competition

You’ll wish you had a geofence

Plenty of smart locks can do what Proscenic’s L60 can do — and then some. Though devices like August’s Wi-Fi Smart Lock (4th Generation) can cost nearly double, if not more, I think their extra features, simplified installation, and much quieter operation are worth the investment. With August’s smart lock, you don’t have to remove your internal deadbolt equipment. Unscrew the existing door knob, install the Wi-Fi Smart Lock, and you’re good to go with a device that’s leagues friendlier to use than Proscenic’s L60.

Even if budget is an issue, August’s more conventional smart lock (with bridge) will cost about as much as the L60 (with bridge), and you’ll at least be able to tell when your door is open or shut. You won’t get a fancy keypad or fingerprint sensor to press, but you can use your existing key if the auto-unlock capabilities fail (or you’re too lazy to pull up your phone). There’s also the highly rated Ultraloq U-Bolt Pro, which gives you back keypads and fingerprints, but costs more than the L60 and has nearly an identical installation process.

Should you buy it?

Proscenic’s Smart Lock L60 is an inexpensive way to replace a dumb deadbolt with a slightly savvier, Bluetooth-based smart lock. Its combination keypad, fingerprint reader, key slot, and app-based locking and unlocking are handy but not flawless. The installation process is mildly annoying, but not nearly as much as the cluttered app that controls one, which restricts you to fairly basic operations since it’ll cost you extra for an “always-on” version of the smart lock.

Once you’ve done that, and I highly recommend it, you’re within spitting distance of better-designed smart locks: easier installations, quieter operation, better features (and geofencing), and useful notifications. The L60 isn’t a bad smart lock, especially if you can get it at a great discount. I don’t think many people are going to want to fiddle with their doors more than once if they can avoid it, so it’s worth holding out for something that’s a great upgrade, not just a decent one.