Schlage Connect Lock goes offline in Smartthings… about two weeks ago my Schlage Connect Smart Lock which worked fine for the last 8 years started going offline and wouldn’t respond from the Smartthings app even when it was online. I read all of the posts from late 2024 and all of the advice about repeaters. I unplugged the hub. Moved it farther away, plugged in smart plugs to serve as repeaters, repaired the network. Nothing fixed it. I didn’t remove the lock from Smartthings because it still worked at the lock and I feared what might happen.Glad I didn’t. I was ready to buy a new Schlage WiFi lock and ditch Smartthings forever (not the first time I have wasted a day because of Smartthings). Decided to uninstall and reinstall the Smartthings app. Bingo. I have to say, if Smartthings is smart, why do you have to be an IT engineer (I am) to use it? Or maybe that’s the problem. Anyway before you waste your day, try uninstalling and reinstalling the app. Why? Beats me and kind of bugs me because the app didn’t need to be updated and this problem start out of the blue, However, reinstalling the app worked for me.
Out of curiosity: Apple or Android?
Hi, @centrallanding
It is strange that the issue got solved with the reinstallation of the app since it isn’t involved in the health check process.
When you saw the device being unresponsive/offline. Did you check their details in the Advanced Users App?
It might have been an issue with the app itself, not the communication with the device and reinstalling the app solved the issue.
Apple iPad Air
I did, but being unfamiliar with the site, I didn’t know what to look for. I was looking for an error log. I just looked again and didn’t see anything suspicious timestamped during the period of the problem (started about 2 weeks ago). When it was happening, the lock worked fine at the keypad, but the routine to lock each night if the door is unlocked wasn’t running. I didn’t get around to investigating until today. I just checked again and breathed a sigh of relief when I unlocked the lock from the Smartthings App on my iPad. If you tell me what to look for, I will look and if trouble returns it will be handy. I felt a little foolish after unplugging the hub, attaching a long ethernet cable, moving it two rooms aways from the lock, moving my Minoston outlet to the living toom (near the lock), refreshing the z-wave network, trying to exclude the lock by running z-wave exclusiong (didn’t work), thinking through the + & -'s of removing the lock (device) and then running out of logical things to try, uninstalling and reinstalling the app on my iPhone. I will add, that during the time of trouble, if I locked or unlocked the lock, the device would come online. But if I tried to add a guest access code, or lock/unlock the lock, it would go offline. Thanks for your interest!
Correction, not on my iphone, the app is only on my iPad…
This is interesting. Generally, when a device goes offline, routine events are still sent, and other users have reported seeing the device offline in the app, but Routines keep working. This makes me wonder if the device was actually unreachable at the time.
In the Device’s list, there’s a column called “Status” which shows the “offline”/“online” value. Since this value comes directly from the API, it’s a good way to compare it with whatis shown in the app.
When there’s a communication issue, the suggestions are:
- Taking note of the date and time when you noticed the event happened
- If the device is connected through a repeater, check its status. If the repeater is faulty, it will bring all its child devices offline as well.
- If the device is connected directly to the hub, put it closer to the device and force an event in the physical device (lock/unlock) so it sends a report to the Hub.
- If this doesn’t bring the device back. Performing a Network repair for Z-Wave can force a change in the device’s communication path.
- Restarting the hub doesn’t always check the status of all devices, especially if you have many of them. And also, the logs of the offline event get lost making it impossible for the engineering team to look at what happened.
So, if you already checked steps 1-3, then submit the hub logs as instructed below and share the timestamp you noted so we can open a report for the engineering team.
- In the Advanced Users app, enter the “Hubs” section
- Enter the corresponding Hub and click on “Dump Hub logs”
- Confirm the process by clicking on “Dump Hub logs” again in the pop-up.
- You’ll get a green box at the top confirming the Hub logs were requested.
Also, open support access to your account and share the device’s name so we can get the corresponding IDs for the report.
I’ve come to accept that my Zwave Schlage will simply not always be online. This does not affect security really; it simply affects reporting. Routines associated with it even sometimes run correctly when it’s reporting offline.
The one thing that does NOT happen correctly in that instance is auto-lock upon door close (driven by contact sensor). But that’s ok because you know instantly as you close the door, and if it does not auto-lock I hit the ‘Schlage’ button to lock it.
Interesting… in 8 years mine never randomly went offline. When I installed it, I had to dangle the hub within inches of it to pair though. I’m not always here and sometimes need to give someone a code to get in. I’m going to set up some spare codes to use just in case it starts misbehaving again.
How many Zigbee router/repeater (mains powered) devices - like bulbs or plugs - do you have in your network?
Just 3. One Smartthings plug in the living room turning lights on and off, and two Minoston Z-wave Outlet Dimmers. One of the Minoston Outlets is always on with nothing plugged into it… it’s near the lock and placed there to act as a repeater when I was trouble shooting the Schlage offline problem. The other is operating lights in the bedroom.
I stumbled across the dump hub logs and pressed it before I updated the APP (when I was troubleshooting the lock offline problem). I’m not sure it worked because I don’t remember getting a popup. Is there a way to check? Would it be helpful if it did?
Updating/reinstalling the SmartThings app doesn’t affect the Hub logs. But restarting the hub or reinstalling a device affects them. So, if you did any of that before submitting them, the offline event won’t be present.
It is best to have fresh logs about this. If the issue is persistent, next time it happens, you need to take note of the date and time when it happened and submit the hub logs again as soon as possible after the event.