Designed to safeguard liquor cabinets, jewelry boxes, medicine cabinets, or any other place where valuable or potentially dangerous items are stored, the Kini SafeAlert is a Wi-Fi-enabled sensor that sends email and SMS alerts when it detects motion. At $75, it offers an affordable way to keep tabs on your belongings, and it works as advertised, though I'd love to see native support for home automation platforms like Alexa, Google, and HomeKit. For additional protection, I recommend a security camera or a home security system, but the Kini SafeAlert is a worthwhile tool for peace of mind.

Design and Features: Multidirectional Motion Sensing

Available in Candy Apple Red or Gun Metal Gray, the SafeAlert is a small rectangular motion sensor that measures 2.5 by 1.5 by 0.75 inches (HWD). The top has a built-in lanyard hole for attaching a tether cable (included), and the bottom edge holds a USB-C charging port and a tiny recessed on/off button that requires a pin (also included) for activation. There’s a small LED indicator on the top of the device that pulses white when the sensor is ready for setup, briefly glows red when motion is detected, and briefly flashes green and blue during a reset.

(Credit: John R. Delaney)

The Kini uses accelerometers to detect x-, y-, and z-axis movement, and it has built-in 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi and Bluetooth radios, as well as a temperature sensor. It is powered by an internal rechargeable Lithium Polymer battery rated to last up to one year before requiring a recharge. The Kini can be controlled and installed via a web portal or a mobile app (iOS and Android), and it will send push, email, and SMS messages to let you know that a motion event has occurred. You can also configure it to send an alert when no motion has been detected for a specified period.

The Kini does not offer native support for third-party smart home devices or the Alexa, Google, and HomeKit automation and voice control platforms. However, you can create applets using the IFTTT Webhooks channel to have it trigger any compatible device or service. In a nutshell, Webhooks are event-driven communications that trigger an automation on a secondary device when a specific event occurs on the primary device. For example, you can create an IFTTT applet using Webhooks to have a TP-Link light bulb blink or change color when the sensor detects motion. The IFTTT applet generates an action URL that is inserted into the Kini Webhook Integration setting in the mobile app. When the Kini is triggered, the URL action is executed.

The Kini mobile app (available for Android and iOS) opens to a screen titled Your Kinis that contains panels for each installed sensor. The panel displays the sensor's name and associated email address, and it has Wi-Fi signal and battery life status icons. Tap the panel to open a screen with several sub-panels. The top one shows the Wi-Fi SSID, the current temperature and firmware version, the time and date of the last alert, and the last time the sensor connected to the Kini servers (for a check-in).

(Credit: Kinisium)

In the next panel, you can edit the sensor's name and the email addresses that will receive alerts (you can enter two different addresses). Here, you can also enable Critical App Notifications that will bypass Do Not Disturb and Silent Mode settings on your phone, and customize the text that will appear in the email and SMS alerts.

Other settings allow you to enable One Tap Silencing, which lets you silence the alert without opening the app by tapping the SMS message. You can also enable or disable the LED's flashing when the sensor detects motion, and adjust the motion sensitivity. Advanced settings let you turn off monitoring for x-, y-, and z-axis movement, enable a Stasis mode that has the sensor send an alert if motion has not been detected for a specific period of time (between 30 minutes and 30 days), set minimum and maximum movement acceleration changes, and enter a Webhook URL for IFTTT integrations. There’s also an experimental Temperature Monitoring setting that lets you set low and high temperature thresholds, but it was still in development and not working at the time of this review.

Back at the Your Kinis screen, there are three buttons at the bottom. The Your Kinis button takes you back to the opening page, the Events button opens a log of all motion events, and the You button opens a screen where you can edit account information.

Installation and Performance: Painless Setup, Prompt Alerts

You can activate the Kini sensor using a web portal or with a mobile app. Either way, setup is quick and easy. I used my phone to scan the QR code on the quick setup guide and followed the instructions to charge the sensor using the included USB-A-to-C cable. I downloaded the mobile app, created an account that required an email address and a phone number to receive SMS and email alerts, and verified the account. I tapped the +Kini button on the Your Kinis screen, enabled Bluetooth, and used my phone’s camera to scan the QR code on the Setup Kini bag. I tapped Yes to activate the sensor, used the pin to turn on the device, and verified that the LED was blinking. I entered my Wi-Fi credentials when prompted, checked my network connectivity, and tapped Next. To complete the installation process, I entered the six-digit code found on the Setup Kini bag and gave the sensor a name. At this point, you can use the included hook-and-loop strips to attach the sensor to any surface, or use the wire to hang it from a doorknob or handle.

(Credit: John R. Delaney)

The Kini sensor worked well in testing. I used the included cable to hang it on a cabinet door and was immediately alerted via SMS and email whenever the door was opened. I also set it to Stasis mode and received alerts when no motion was detected for one hour. The SMS alerts were accompanied by a loud alarm that could be heard in the next room, and the One Tap Silencing setting worked as intended.