Smart Lock - Facial Recognition Lock (S958 Max)

A palm vein smart lock, fully automatic, with 3D face recognition as well. You walk up, it knows you, and the bolt withdraws on its own. Nothing to press and nothing to turn.

• Palm vein, and why it is on here
• Eight ways in
• The screens and the doorbell
• Fitting a palm vein smart lock, and its alarms
• The one to buy if hands are always full

Palm vein is the one that matters when your hands are full or wet. It reads the vein pattern under the skin, not the surface, so it works where a fingerprint will not.

There is a 4.5 inch screen on the inside panel and a display on the outside. Press the doorbell and the lock takes a snapshot, so you know who called while you were out. Eight ways in altogether: face, palm vein, fingerprint, code, card, key, remote unlocking and the app.

The battery is a 5000 mAh pack rather than dry cells, charged over Type-C. A C grade cylinder and a stainless steel lock body sit behind it, with an anti-black-box defence, a false attempt alarm and an anti-pry alarm.

It fits doors from 40 to 120 mm thick on a 6068 or 7068 mortise.

Palm vein, and why it is on here

Face recognition is the headline, but palm vein reading is the feature that earns its place on a palm vein smart lock. It reads the vein pattern beneath the skin rather than the surface of it, so it still works when your hands are wet, dusty or carrying shopping, which is exactly when a fingerprint sensor fails.

Between the two, it opens without you pressing anything at all. It is fully automatic: the bolt withdraws on its own when it recognises you, and locks itself again behind you.

Eight ways in

3D face, palm vein, fingerprint, code, IC card, mechanical key, remote unlocking and the app. Codes are six digits, and a 20 digit virtual password lets you bury the real one inside a longer string while somebody is watching.

It runs in Tuya or Smart Life, so it sits alongside the rest of a Tuya house rather than needing an account of its own.

The screens and the doorbell

There is a 4.5 inch display on the inside panel and a second display on the outside. Press the doorbell and the lock takes a snapshot, so you can see who called while you were out rather than guessing from a missed ring.

Fitting a palm vein smart lock, and its alarms

A C grade cylinder sits behind a stainless steel lock body, with three defences worth naming: an anti-black-box defence against the electronic attack tools sold for this purpose, a false attempt alarm, and an anti-pry alarm. Two mechanical keys are supplied.

Power is a 5,000 mAh rechargeable pack charged over Type-C rather than dry cells. The panel is 420 x 70 mm and it fits doors 40 to 120 mm thick on a 6068 or 7068 mortise, so send us your mortise size and we will confirm it.

The one to buy if hands are always full

Palm vein is the reason. Face recognition is on plenty of locks now; a reader that works through wet or dusty hands is not, and it is the difference you will notice carrying shopping in from the car every day.

It takes doors 40 to 120 mm on a 6068 or 7068 mortise, so send us what is in yours. The battery is a rechargeable pack on Type-C rather than dry cells, which is worth knowing if you were budgeting for AAs. Others in smart locks; app at tuya.com.