Seven Ways to Make Your Home's Entryway More Secure

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While you might assume that thieves would prefer to find less visible, less public ways of breaking into your house, your front door and entryway are actually prime targets for anyone who wants inside without your permission—more than a third of burglars use the front door when gaining entry to a home.

If you want to sleep a little better at night, securing your home's entryway is a good first step. Even if you have a security system in place, stopping a home invasion from taking place at all is a much better outcome. Doing just a few of these things will make it a lot harder for anyone to break into your home and compromise your property and your safety.

Select a front door made of a secure material

Your first step towards securing your entryway is the door itself. A solid-core wood door provides decent security, but an upgrade to a steel door will make it even more difficult for a would-be home invader to cut, kick, or break the door itself. Aluminum or fiberglass are also solid choices to increase the security of your door, though they’re also generally more expensive.

Whatever material your front door is made of, you can enhance its security by installing a metal security door, which is like a storm door that adds an extra lockable barrier over your front door, making it even less likely that someone can gain access without your permission.

Reinforce the door's frame

If you can’t install a security door, you can still add some security to your existing door by reinforcing the frame. The locks on your door (and the door itself) will only be as good as the frame the door is attached to—the best lock in the world will be useless if one well-placed kick will crack the frame.

You can purchase simple kits like this one that will reinforce your door frame and make it a lot more difficult to kick or pry the weak points on your door—the hinges and jamb. Typically made from steel, these plates stiffen the existing frame material and deflect tools away from weak spots.

Reconsider those decorative glass windows

Entryways with a lot of glass are popular because they let in natural light, but if your front door has a lot of glass inserts or sidelights (the narrow areas on either side), that’s a huge security risk because glass is so easily broken (see any film or TV show depicting a burglary, ever). Reducing or eliminating glass in your entryway is an easy way to increase security simply because it removes the weak point.

If you can’t remove the glass (or simply don’t want to sacrifice the light), you can replace it with security glass. If that’s too expensive, you can also install a security window film. Security films won’t necessarily stop a determined thief from smashing their way into your home, but they can slow them down and make the job more challenging, increasing the chances they’ll give up before gaining entry.

Upgrade your locks

Just as your door locks will only be optimally effective if your door frame is hardened, your door will only be secure if you use a high-quality lock with an appropriate security grade. The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) applies a grade of 1 to 3 to all locks that describes their security level—Grade 1 is the best. Installing Grade 1 locks (make sure they actually have the official ANSI seal on them) will give you the best security for your front door.

Adding a deadbolt to the door is an easy way to make it more difficult for someone to break in. A single-cylinder deadbolt (with keyed entry on the outside and a thumbturn on the inside) are best for residential doors, because needing to use a key on the interior will make it a lot harder to get out in an emergency.

Upgrade hardware

Another way to make your entryway more secure is to do some small upgrades to the door’s other hardware—the hinges and strike plate:

• Deeper screws. Most screws supplied with door hinges will be about 1 to 2.25 inches long. That’s certainly sufficient, but a deeper screw will be more difficult to tear out, increasing the overall strength of the door. Replacing your hinge screws with 3-inch (or deeper) is a cheap, simple way to make the entryway more secure. Just be sure to check that there’s enough depth to handle the longer screws, and that the screws won’t interfere with nearby windows or wiring in the walls.

• Hinge bolts. Hinge bolts install between the door hinges (see them in action here) and make it difficult for someone to lift the door off the frame even if they manage to push the pins out of the hinges. These are mainly useful if your door swings outward (most residential doors swing inward) but certainly can’t hurt, especially as they’re cheap and easy to install.

• Strike box. The strike plate is the strip of metal where the bolt and latch from the door connects with the frame. It’s typically just a flat piece that doesn’t provide much by way of reinforcement, so installing a strike box instead is a good idea. A strike box inserts into the hole drilled for the latch or bolt and helps absorb and spread any impact from an attempt to break the door frame.

Rework your landscaping for maximum visibility

A simple way to enhance the security of your entryway is to clear away landscaping that hides your front door from the street. While privacy is always nice, if you have a lot of lush landscaping around your front door it could be an opportunity for someone to work on your door unobserved. This combined with plenty of light at night will make even the most determined thief think twice about assaulting your door.

Get rid of that spare key in the front yard

Even if you make your front door a marvel of strength and security, it means nothing if you leave a spare key under the doormat—or hidden in one of those obvious fake rocks. Everyone needs some spare keys seeded around their lives to prevent being locked out of their own home, but be thoughtful about where those keys are. A trusted neighbor or nearby friend (or relative) or tucked in a desk at your job are good ideas. Don’t hide the key anywhere near the door, however, as it’s too easy for a cursory check to turn it up.

Of course, going keyless with a smart lock is another option that removes the possibility of losing your key—though it still might be a good idea for someone you trust who lives nearby to have the code in case you ever need someone to get into your house.

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