TCL D2 Pro Smart Lock: The Palm-Scanning Door Lock That’s a Half Wizard, Half Flop

Hello everyone. Let’s talk about the TCL D2 Pro Smart Lock, because clearly what we all needed in 2025 was another attempt to convince us that our doors should be a science experiment. Forget keys – that ancient technology that somehow, shockingly, still works 100% of the time – now we’re waving our palms like we’re summoning dark magic at Hogwarts just to get inside our own homes. Fantastic. Truly what the world was waiting for.

The Gimmick: Palm Vein Scanning

The headline pitch here is palm vein scanning. Yes, you heard that right. Not fingerprints, not facial recognition, but the oh-so-secure, oh-so-futuristic act of blasting near-infrared light through your hand to map your vein network-because apparently, we’re all James Bond villains now. TCL touts it as safer and smarter than fingerprints because your veins are under the skin. Great in theory… until you realize the moment you wear gloves, smear dirt on your hand, or heaven forbid, lose circulation like you’re in a boss fight with frostbite, you’re locked out. Brilliant.

Pros & Cons: The Waiting Room Chart

• Pros: Fast palm scanning, affordable price, comes with a rechargeable battery, supports six unlocking methods, and installs easily enough that you won’t curse like you’re upgrading your GPU.
• Cons: Buggy firmware, lack of Matter support, no Apple Home, key card missing (for now), and the app is about as useful as a broken EKG monitor.

On paper, yes, it’s a decent value. In practice, the firmware issues mean you’ll be staring at your door like you’re trying to log back into EA servers on launch day. Or worse, like you’re shouting at your doctor when the Wi-Fi health app won’t track your resting heart rate. Tech should relieve stress, not send you running for blood pressure meds.

Installation: Surgical Precision Required (Or Not)

Physically, the install is painless. Fifteen minutes, some screws, and boom – door surgery complete. The lock has IP55 protection, so rain and dust are fine, which is more than can be said for your average third-party joy-con stick. The real pain starts later, though, in the TCL Home app, where firmware updates fail like a bad Windows installer and palm registration gaslights you into thinking you failed until it reveals, oh wait, it actually did work. It’s like some Kafkaesque medical chart where the diagnosis updates three pages after your appointment. Efficient? Not remotely.

Unlocking Methods: Pick Your Poison

Here’s what you get: palm vein scan, keypad code, physical key, mobile app, Google Assistant, Alexa, and supposedly a key card fob… except TCL forgot to include one. That’s right – they sold you a feature and mailed you half a product. You must email them to ask for the accessory, like begging your doctor’s office for a prescription refill they already promised you. Smooth.

Yes, the palm scan is fast (0.3 seconds). Yes, it works even if your hand is wet (tried the plastic sandwich bag trick). No, it doesn’t work with gloves – so in winter, good luck. And no, you cannot tweak button behaviors like that awkward 3-second long press to lock. Who thought that was a good idea? Probably the same engineer who still thinks forcing firmware updates at random is a feature.

Smarts? Not Really

This is where TCL faceplants. The app can notify you about door usage, track events, and scream “failed attempt detected” like it just caught your toddler raiding the cookie jar. But automation? Scheduling? Geofencing? Forget it. It doesn’t exist. The auto-lock is just a gimmick timer-meaning it’ll lock even if your door is wide open. Nothing says “genius” like bolting your door frame while you’re mid-way through the groceries. Local control? Nope. Lose internet, and you lose app functionality. In 2025, when everything claims to be “smart,” TCL delivers something as smart as a broken Tamagotchi.

The Good News: Battery and Price

Credit where it’s due: the removable 10,000mAh USB-C rechargeable battery is fantastic. I’m frankly done sacrificing endless packs of AAs to smart locks. This feels like progress. It’s rated for up to 10 months on a charge, and TCL plans to sell extra spares on Amazon. That’s smart design – like swapping out med kits between boss fights rather than having to restart the entire campaign.

At $189, it undercuts other futuristic smart locks substantially. If your only goal is “wave hand, door opens,” it’s hard to argue with the value. But if you want compatibility beyond Google or Alexa, forget it. Without Matter support, this thing is practically begging to become irrelevant in a year or two. Like every “smart” product rushed out before standards matured, it’s destined to gather dust faster than Kinect peripherals.

Conclusion: Half-Wizard, Half-Flop

The TCL D2 Pro is both impressive and exasperating. The palm scanning works shockingly well, the price is fair, and the battery solution is excellent. But the software? It’s lazy, buggy, and about as forward-looking as thinking Game for Windows Live was going to last forever. The lack of Matter support is suicidal in the current smart home landscape. So, do I like it? Not really. Do I hate it? Also not really. It’s one of those products that shows the potential but makes you feel like a beta tester paying for the privilege.

Verdict? It’s an interesting gimmick that might work for the tech-curious. For everyone else – just buy a deadbolt and spare yourself the existential dread of watching your internet connection decide whether or not you can get inside your own house.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is entirely my opinion.

Source: TCL D2 Pro Review: This Fast Palm-Scanning Smart Lock Is No Jedi Mind Trick