Best way to unlock Schlage smart lock?

I have a Schlage lock that I tried to have auto unlock when I arrive. I first setup ST to unlock door when I entered wifi area. Problem is if I lock the door and go in the back yard out of wifi range and then come back in range, it will unlock the door which is not good if I’m in the backyard. I setup rule that I had to be out of wifi range for hour, but I am routinely in my backyard longer than that so that’s no good either.

Is there a device I can leave in my car so that the lock will use a proximity to the device that will unlock the lock? I’ve heard the Samsung one isn’t very reliable and drains battery very fast.

Or is there a fob that I can just put on my key ring and press when I want door unlocked.

Thanks!

I’m assuming you’ve already tried mobile phone presence? Are you in the USA or UK?

I have Samsung presence sensor and it is not that bad go to the dollar store for batteries and change them every aprox 3-4 months but I do prefer to use my phone as a presence sensor.

I use life360, you can set the geofence to cover your yard. It’s a free app and integrated into smartthings. Works great for me.

@johnosstyn
Do you find Life360 presence delayed in SmartThings? (is fine in the actual Life360 application)
I have it as well even upgraded to the premium but find it delayed by a few minutes when used a presence sensor in SmartThings .

using Auto location/tasker/sharp tools seems to be the most acturate for me but was a real pain to setup.

using SmartThings presence on my phone is fairly decent now but had to adjust my location and radius on the SmartThings map. pretty much the same as Auto location/tasker/sharp tools just can not have multiple geofence radius

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I know there was a minimote fob available that you could consider, but some of the reviews said it was poorly constructed and fell apart easily. I was considering setting up an RFID tag that I could hold the phone near that would issue the unlock from the phone using Sharptools and Tasker. I haven’t dove too deeply into that approach because I’m not sure it’s any less of a hassle than entering a code directly on the lock.

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I did have trouble with life360 delays for a short time till I made the geofence cover about 5 houses on either side of. My house. It’s been working great. I’ve read where webcore app has geofence locating with multiple zones, I think it even has elevation (can tell what floor you are on) or something of that nature. I just haven’t had time to look into that option yet. Tasker sounds like it’s been working good for people also. I also the Smartthing presence sensors which worked great but they are not constructed very well and eat the batteries. With my kids i use the connection to wifi method.

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thanks will give that a try didn’t even think of adjusting the geofence in Life360 set it to 1000 feet from the default of 500 feet.
If you meant the geofence in SmartThings though I had already did that to optimize using my phone as a SmartThings presence sensor and I am well past 5 houses comparing SmartThings map to the Life360 map SmartThings is aprox 1500 feet or more.
It is just very odd the actual Life360 application updates very well but does not update in SmartThings for several minutes.

I use these simply as redundancy to Auto location/tasker/sharp tools method as they tend to fail when android gets updated and I have to figure out how to make them work again.

In addition to adjusting the geofences, I also added a piston which locks my door after it’s been unlocked for a couple of minutes. This helps keep things secure when the presence sensors drop off and then come back in, either due to simply being flaky or due to me going out of range briefly.

If you still have issues after adjusting the geofences, then to answer one of your original questions, yes, there are key fobs with buttons you can press to unlock the door or run other routines. I was looking at this option myself, but never went through with it. I was mainly considering the Securfi and Iris fobs, but there are several other options as well, including the Fibaro fob, both single button and 4 button Aeotec fobs, and the Iris care pendant. FWIW I’m using one of the Aeotec single button fobs as a doorbell, and the battery cover is so flimsy that there’s no way I’d trust carrying it around in my pocket all day every day.

How would I add the piston? If ST performs “I’m back” when my phone enters home location (after being away an hour), how would I add a routine which would lock the door ten minutes after “I’m Back” is run? I looked in ST app and didn’t see any timers.

Thanks!

What is auto location/tasker/sharp tools? Is that a seperate Android app?

“Piston” is the name for an automation routine created in webCoRE or CoRE, which are community developed rules engine smartapps for SmartThings. The native SmartThings automations work for some people, but are generally pretty limited in what they can do. webCoRE and CoRE on the other hand are capable of extremely complex rules, and can be used to create pretty much any automation you can imagine. It’s well worth looking into IMO.

[FAQ: What is WebCoRE? (And what was CoRE?)]

Tasker is an android app that can automate various tasks on your phone, auto location is a Tasker plug-in, and Sharp Tools is another android app that links tasker with SmartThings. I’ve not used these apps myself so I don’t know a lot about them, but they seem to be pretty popular around here.

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@Chele they are 3 android programs that can run in the background on an android phone that basically create a virtual presence sensor and increase the gps polling time to every 3 seconds when you get within a set range of your location (android default polling is 2 minutes) and then turns off the increased polling once you arrive at your location.

for life360 application (not SmartThings) I ended up increasing the map radius to approx the same as that of SmartThings radius (not Tasker/SharpTools/AutoLocation) and they both are now arriving about the same as Tasker/SharpTools/AutoLocation virtual sensor.

Tasker/SharpTools/AutoLocation radius is much smaller so is more accurate but they are all now basically accomplishing the same thing.

I should have pointed out that Life360 and SmartThings because they are still using the Android default 2 minute GPS polling you can drive a fair ways in 2 minutes and if they happen to poll just outside of the set radius then Tasker/SharpTools/AutoLocation will still arrive long before Life360 and SmartThings unless their radius are very large. If Life360 and SmartThings polls just inside the large radius then Life360 and SmartThings will arrive before.

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Looking at it another way, is it feasible to provide wifi coverage to your yard so you won’t drop off while you’re there? Possibly more expensive depending on the size of your yard, availability of power, etc., but requires less tweaking in ST and has the benefit of having wifi while you’re hanging out by the pool or whatever you do back there.

Did anyone try to unlock with Samsung smartthings button

I haven’t found out a way to use a button to unlock the door. If I have guest come to the house I would like to just press a button to unlock the door to let them in but it seems like a button can’t be used. I would be curious if anyone has been able to unlock their door with a button.

It’s possible with the Classic app.

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As @Automated_House mentioned, it can be done easily with the V2 classic app but not with the new V3 app because of a change in design philosophy regarding security devices. See the following FAQ (the topic title is a clickable Link.)

And more about the two apps here:

FAQ: how to tell which version of the SmartThings mobile app that you have

I guess I need to get the V2 classic app then.