At a GlanceExpert's Rating
Pros
- Easily the new champ in smart lock unobtrusiveness
- Quick installation and app setup
- Near flawless operation in daily use
Cons
- Specific hardware must be purchased based on the length of your door’s backset
- Geofencing didn’t work
- Activity logging is minimal
Our Verdict
Level’s “invisible” lock lives up to its promise, giving any deadbolt smart features with no change to your exterior hardware.
Best Prices Today: Level Bolt (now marketed as Level Bolt+ Connect, which includes the Level Connect bridge)
The smart locks that have preceded the Level Bolt are ugly. All of them. Even the ones that try very hard not to be ugly. I mean, the August smart lock was developed in collaboration with Yves Behar’s upscale design company, and it looks like something that fell off a Cylon cruiser. And that’s pretty much the best the industry has been able to do. (Editors’ note: We had an opportunity to review the new August Wi-Fi Smart Lock in July 2020, two months after this review.)
Update, October 20, 2023: With the addition of Level’s new Level Connect Bluetooth-to-Wi-Fi bridge ($79), Level Bolt users gain remote access over the internet and compatibility with all three of the major smart home ecosystems: Amazon Alexa, Apple HomeKit, and Google Home. From here on, Level will only sell the Level Bolt in a bundle with this bridge, as a $219 SKU it’s calling the Level Bolt Connect.
Well-aware of this reality, Level Home surrendered. If smart locks will always be hideous, why not just get rid of the part you can see? And, well, they managed to do it. By truly becoming completely invisible, the Level Bolt is about to change the smart lock industry as we know it.
How does the Level Bolt do this trick? By wedging the hardware completely inside the hole that’s cut out for your existing hardware. The Level Bolt replaces the interior deadbolt assembly, but you keep the exterior and interior escutcheons you already have, ensuring your door looks the same when you finish as when you started: no monstrous keypads, no giant chrome handles.
The Level Bolt has zero impact on your front-door aesthetic, because the hardware installs solely inside the door.
Level Home was founded by mostly ex-Apple employees, and the Level Bolt hardware certainly feels like something Steve Jobs would have made—although I can’t imagine he would have set his sights on anything as jejune as a doorknob. Unboxing reveals just two main parts, a deadbolt assembly and a circular motor unit. These are separate simply because there would be no other way to install them otherwise. After dismantling your old deadbolt, these two pieces slide easily into the door. A single screw binds them together before you reattach your old deadbolt escutcheon hardware on either side.
Much like most other retrofit lock hardware, you choose from three included adapters, depending on the shape of your tailpiece, so the motor will turn. As you screw everything back together, your deadbolt’s original bolts pass through two channels in the motor assembly, keeping everything nice and tight. With a little trial and error, it’s a quick and painless procedure, and when you’re done, everything looks just like it did before you started. The only hint that anything has changed can be found on the end of the bolt, where the Level Home logo is visible.