Expert's Rating
Pros
- Excellent camera with lots of features
- Attractive (if enormous) hardware
- Huge rechargeable battery
Cons
- Sometimes misses events, both motion-based and physical
- Fingerprint reader is difficult to work with
- Doorbell button isn’t obvious to visitors
Our Verdict
This massive smart lock probably won’t make you a convert of the doorbell-camera-lock combo idea, but it has plenty of positive qualities that could make it worthwhile for some users.
Best Prices Today: Eufy Video Smart Lock S330
Six long years ago I called the industry’s first combination of smart lock and video camera “a no-brainer, awesome idea,” and the concept has only become more pervasive since. Newer spins on this category shove even more smart home essentials into a single device—including a doorbell on devices like the Lockly Vision Elite—in the hopes that outfitting the home of the future will require little more than replacing the deadbolt on your front door.
The latest attempt at this do-it-all device comes from the smart home veterans at Anker’s Eufy division. The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 combines a door lock, camera, and doorbell into its version of a do-everything device.
Like Lockly’s device, Eufy’s smart lock is huge, measuring nearly 8 inches tall on its interior escutcheon and weighing more than 3.5 pounds. It comes with an external device that serves as an interior chime for the doorbell, a Wi-Fi bridge, and network-attached storage device. This component is a mandatory part of the installation.
Eufy’s cameras have always shined, and the one built into the Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 is no exception.
Design and feature set
There’s so much going on with this hardware that even breaking down everything it can do is a daunting proposition. First, it’s a complete smart lock that fully replaces your existing deadbolt. The matte black unit offers various means of ingress, including numeric keypad, fingerprint reader, physical key cylinder (secreted beneath the doorbell button), and—of course—via an app. It’s also a video doorbell, with a camera located above its numeric keypad, and a ringer button beneath it. This button illuminates in blue when someone approaches. Finally, it can do double (triple?) duty as a standard security camera, complete with a motion sensor, night vision, person detection, and two-way audio.
This review is part of TechHive’s in-depth coverage of the best smart locks.
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 has a fingerprint reader on top and a high-res video doorbell on its face.
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 has a fingerprint reader on top and a high-res video doorbell on its face.
Christopher Null/Foundry
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 has a fingerprint reader on top and a high-res video doorbell on its face.
Christopher Null/Foundry
Christopher Null/Foundry
Despite its significant complexity, installing the Eufy S330 is similar to other complete smart locks, in that you connect its exterior escutcheon with a mounting plate on the inside of the door using two hefty bolts. A third screw is available if you need extra support, but this screws the mounting plate directly into the door rather than passing through to the exterior escutcheon.
Two electrical cables connect the two escutcheons together—these are easy to get into place—and the interior escutcheon is connected to the mounting plate with three tiny bolts. The process didn’t take more than a few minutes for me, although I found a little extra elbow grease to tighten all the bolts was a good idea to help keep things aligned and in place. Eufy’s manual does a reasonable job at walking you through all of this, and those familiar with smart lock installation probably won’t need to refer to it much, if at all.
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 has a massive interior escutcheon.
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 has a massive interior escutcheon.
Eufy
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 has a massive interior escutcheon.
Eufy
Eufy
Instead of the more common AA batteries, the Eufy S330 uses a large 10,000mAh rechargeable battery that charges via a USB-C cable. Eufy says the lock should operate for about 4 months on a full charge. The battery can take several hours to fully charge, so plan accordingly. You’ll need to provide your own power adapter and cable. A USB-C port on the exterior underside of the lock will power up the lock in an emergency if its battery dies while you’re out.
Electronically, configuring the lock is a two-step process. First, the chime must be configured, which you’ll find listed separately under the “Smart Lock” section of the Eufy Security app’s “add device” function. You’ll need to scan a QR code on the underside of the bridge before plugging it in, then step through various Wi-Fi settings (only 2.4GHz networks are supported), firmware updates, and formatting a microSD card that’s used to store video clips from the lock (cards with capacities up to 128GB are supported, but none is included). Note that the lock is also compatible with the Eufy HomeBase 3 NAS box, although I did not test the lock with one.
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 captures excellent video.
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 captures excellent video.
Christopher Null/Foundry
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 captures excellent video.
Christopher Null/Foundry
Christopher Null/Foundry
Once the chime is configured, it’s on to setting up the lock itself, listed in the same “Smart Lock” section under the header of “Video Smart Lock.” Again, you’ll need to scan a QR on the lock, then use the lock’s camera to scan another QR code displayed on the screen of your phone. This was followed in my install by another 18-minute-long firmware update before, at last, I was up and running.
Software setup
With various options to control the lock, doorbell, and camera, configuring the S330 can be an exhaustive process. As a lock, it’s at its most straightforward. Users can be configured with individual PINs of 4 to 8 digits. Users can be set to have access “always” or on a schedule that either expires at a certain date or is allowed only at certain times and days of the week. Up to 100 users and PINs and up to 50 fingerprints are supported.
The lock operates smoothly with the app, but using the external controls to open it can be tricky. Tapping in a PIN usually went smoothly, but not always, sometimes requiring several taps to “wake up” the darkened touchscreen. I had considerably more trouble with the fingerprint reader. I usually had to place a thumb on the reader 3 or 4 times before it would engage, and sometimes found my fingerprint didn’t read correctly. It’s also tough to tell whether the reader is activated; it would be helpful if both the touchscreen and the fingerprint reader lit up when you approach the lock.
You’ll need to plug Eufy’s chime into a nearby outlet. It also functions as the smart lock’s bridge to your Wi-Fi network.
You’ll need to plug Eufy’s chime into a nearby outlet. It also functions as the smart lock’s bridge to your Wi-Fi network.
Christopher Null/Foundry
You’ll need to plug Eufy’s chime into a nearby outlet. It also functions as the smart lock’s bridge to your Wi-Fi network.
Christopher Null/Foundry
Christopher Null/Foundry
The doorbell button is also supposed to illuminate in blue when motion is detected—the distance is configurable—but I found this response to be erratic and unpredictable. Lastly, even settings for “one-touch locking” didn’t work right. If activated, you’re supposed to be able to re-lock the door by long-pressing the check button on the lock—which in itself is an unintuitive way to lock the door—but this simply didn’t work every time during my testing. Fortunately, an auto-lock option is available as a failsafe.
The doorbell button functions as expected: Press the button and the lock hardware rings along with the chime inside the house. (Eufy specifies that lock, chime, and Wi-Fi router should be no more than 40 feet away from one another at most.) Whether visitors will understand what they’re supposed to press is a bigger concern. The button—low on the lock—is supposed to light up blue when someone approaches, but this was erratic and inconsistent in my testing. Even when it is lit up, it’s still not completely obvious that it’s a doorbell. Humans simply haven’t reached a point where they’re looking at the doorknob to find the doorbell. Some manufacturers of similar equipment include a placard that you can place on the wall near where your doorbell is supposed to be that alerts people where the new doorbell is located, but Eufy does not.
Considering how many smart devices are incorporated into this lock, it’s no surprise there’s nothing subtle about its industrial design.
Considering how many smart devices are incorporated into this lock, it’s no surprise there’s nothing subtle about its industrial design.
Eufy
Considering how many smart devices are incorporated into this lock, it’s no surprise there’s nothing subtle about its industrial design.
Eufy
Eufy
Eufy’s cameras have always shined, and the one built into the S330 is no exception. With a top resolution of 2560 x 1920 pixels and a huge 160-degree viewing angle, video is more than adequate for the short-range needs of a doorbell camera, and standard features like a capable infrared night vision mode and a variety of motion sensing options are included. Motion detection is tunable to include all motion or only people, and at a distance ranging from 3 feet to 20 feet. The lock can detect loitering if a visitor lingers for too long (time and distance are also configurable), and it can detect when people leave the house. This could be handy if you have small children who tend to wander off. While these features generally worked as advertised, they weren’t perfect in my testing, missing a few motion events and, especially, failing to respond to loitering on some occasions.
Alexa and Google Home devices are supported if you want to stream video to a third-party device or control the lock with your voice. There is no support for IFTTT or Apple HomeKit.
Should you buy the Eufy Video Smart Lock S330?
As is always the case with Eufy products, you don’t need a cloud-storage subscription to use the device, and with a decent microSD card—or a Eufy HomeBase 3—you aren’t likely to really need one (read our microSD shopping guide to find the right one for your camera). If for some reason you need even more storage (or a backup to physical storage, which can be more easily stolen), Eufy offers 30 days of cloud storage for $3/month or $30/year for a single camera, or $10/month or $100/year for up to 10 devices. The Smart Lock is also compatible with Eufy’s Basic Protection Plan, which lets you call for professional help for $5/month on demand. The Smart Lock, however, doesn’t support Eufy’s more advanced 24/7 professional monitoring Plus plan.
The Eufy Video Smart Lock S330 isn’t a bad deal when you find it on sale for $300, as buying all these components separately will cost you considerably more. If the lock was a bit more robust it’d be a no-brainer recommendation, but that’s true only if you can affirmatively answer this primary question about the device: Do you really want all these things in a single device?
Best Prices Today: Eufy Video Smart Lock S330
Author: Christopher Null, Freelance Contributor
Christopher Null is a veteran technology and business journalist. He contributes regularly to TechHive, PCWorld, and Wired, and operates the websites Drinkhacker and Film Racket.