Best Home Security Systems That Work with Alexa in 2025

SimpliSafe Overview

When we compare SimpliSafe to Ring Alarm, it’s clear that Ring Alarm works better with Alexa. But it’s also clear that SimpliSafe is a better system overall.

It’s hard to beat SimpliSafe’s affordability, customizability, and foolproof installation. That rare combination earned it a place on our list of the best smart home security systems — and it earned it a place on this list too.

SimpliSafe Alexa Skill

Let’s get this out of the way: A lot of users have complained about the SimpliSafe Alexa Skill. That’s not unique though. Most security companies have a lot of complaints for their Alexa Skill. Compare SimpliSafe to Frontpoint, for example. Frontpoint has just as many negative comments.

With SimpliSafe, most complaints are about features SimpliSafe has never advertised in the first place. For instance, one user complained that Alexa wouldn’t work with their video doorbell, but SimpliSafe explicitly says it only allows users to arm and check the status of their security system through Alexa. That means we can’t watch our live feed or use our video doorbell with Alexa.

Despite the complaints, SimpliSafe’s Alexa Skill is simple but functional. You can arm your system, check its status, and lock your doors (if you have SimpliSafe smart locks). Here are some sample commands:

• Alexa, tell SimpliSafe to lock up.
• Alexa, tell SimpliSafe I’m leaving.
• Alexa, ask SimpliSafe what’s shakin’?

For one minor negative, when we created an Alexa routine, we needed to confirm the action each time we triggered it. We set our SimpliSafe system to arm at 8:30 every morning, and each day we need to confirm we want our system armed. We think the routine should work without that extra confirmation considering Alexa can’t disarm our system for safety reasons anyways.

SimpliSafe Smart Home

SimpliSafe is a security company, not a smart home company. And it shows. You can buy contact sensors, flood sensors, and motion detectors from SimpliSafe. You can’t buy smart lights or a smart thermostat from SimpliSafe.

The news isn’t all bad. SimpliSafe sells one of the most affordable smart locks in the business. It works with August smart locks too (Psst. That was one of our picks for the best smart lock of 2025). That lets us lock our door with commands like “Hey Alexa, tell SimpliSafe to lock up” during our tests of SimpliSafe. This command arms our SimpliSafe system at the same time.

SimpliSafe Pricing

SimpliSafe is one of my favorite security systems with no monthly fee. But there’s a catch. Some features are available only with a subscription. Unfortunately, for Alexa users, smart home integration is one of them. You need to pay at least $9.99 per month to connect SimpliSafe to Alexa.

When you compare SimpliSafe to Vivint, however, that price starts to look pretty good. SimpliSafe costs $9.99 per month for self-monitoring and $31.99 for professional monitoring with Alexa integration (their $21.99 professional monitoring plan does not support Alexa). Vivint plans start at about $30 per month.

Ring Alarm Overview

Ring and Alexa are both owned by Amazon, so it’s no surprise that they work well together. Turn your Ring Doorbell into an intercom. Stream Ring Indoor Cam footage on your Echo Show. Shut off the motion sensors in the kids’ playroom. It’s all possible with Ring and Alexa.

So, why isn’t Ring Alarm at the top of our list? One factor is its parent company. Amazon has got into trouble more than once for privacy violations — not exactly something you want from a security provider.2

What’s more, Amazon is a poster child for platform decay: when a company captures the market, only to get rid of the features that got everybody hooked in the first place.3 And yes, it is getting rid of security features. The company ended 2023 on a low note by by sunsetting Alexa Guard, Echo speakers’ built-in security system. Around that same time, Ring put their Home and Away Modes that were previously free to use behind a subscription.

The features you enjoy today could be gone tomorrow. But for now, Ring Alarm is one of the best options for Alexa users.

Ring Alarm Alexa Skill

Users of Ring’s Alexa Skill gave it mixed reviews like most security systems. Most people complained about bugs in the Skill such as the announcements when someone’s at the door no longer working. Other users experienced that issue too but were able to fix it by unpairing and repairing their devices with Alexa. We notice these same issues with most security systems we test which became apparent when we put Ring Alarm vs ADT.

The biggest edge Ring has over the competition? Security camera compatibility. You can ask Alexa to stream Ring security camera footage to your Amazon Fire  — and she’ll do it. Try asking Alexa to stream footage from your SimpliCam. Spoiler alert: It won’t work.

Another handy little feature? Multi-way audio. When we were working in our home office and someone rang our Ring Video Doorbell, we could use Alexa to ask what the visitor needed. It connected to our doorbell camera’s two-way audio so we could talk to them and they could talk to us all through our Echo Dot smart speaker.

Ring Alexa Skill Example Commands

• Alexa, answer the front door.
• Alexa, set Alert Snooze duration to one hour on the backyard.
• Alexa, show me the last activity from the back door.
• Alexa, disable Ring motion alerts.

We could set which devices we included in our groups. That let us choose which devices we controlled when we made a command for our backyard. For instance, we could include the motion detector for our smart lights and our backyard camera. Setting those device alerts to snooze would stop them from sending us alerts when they see motion. That came in handy when we had a backyard party one night that otherwise would have had our phone buzzing constantly.

Ring Alarm Smart Home

Ring sells approximately a bajillion smart devices on its website. Okay, not really, but there are a lot more options than we see from other security companies. You can get basically anything you can think of and some things you can’t, like a smart pump that shuts off your water supply as soon as the pipes freeze. (Shout out to Flo by Moen: It costs $549.98, but it seems like it could be worth it!5)

That gives Alexa a lot more to work with. Of course, we could ask her to arm our alarm. But, we could also ask Alexa to check the status of our pipes, change the thermostat in our kitchen, and turn off our backyard motion sensor while the kids played tag.

A caveat: When we tested Ring Alarm, we ran into trouble with connectivity. We were able to get everything up and running, but it took a few tries. The selection of smart devices is great, but the reliability leaves something to be desired.

Ring Alarm Pricing

Ring Alarm on its own is a good value. Ring Alarm with Alexa is a great value. While you can connect the security system to the AI assistant without a subscription, you won’t be able to do much with it. Nearly all of its capabilities are locked behind the $9.99 per month Ring Home plan. Without it, we couldn’t even arm or disarm our system with Alexa. That’s still a good deal considering a Vivint subscription is about three times more expensive.

ADT Overview

Can you teach an old dog new tricks? We don’t know, but someone certainly taught this old security company new technology. ADT systems work with Alexa — and that’s just the beginning.

ADT Alexa Skill

There’s a lot to like about ADT’s Alexa skill. Given ADT’s partnership with Google, we were surprised how well it worked with Alexa. We could use it to arm and disarm our system, dim our lights, lock our doors, and adjust the temperature in our house.

ADT Alexa Skill Example Commands

• Alexa, disarm ADT.
• Alexa, dim the bathroom light to 25%.
• Alexa, lock the back door.
• Alexa, unlock the front door.
• Alexa, set the bedroom temperature to 70 degrees.

While our ADT system worked well with Alexa, multiple users have reported a bug that sends their authentication code into the void — preventing them from using Alexa. That was the main complaint we came across when reading reviews of ADT’s Alexa Skill. It was always with users who own an ADT Pulse system which was two iterations ago. We haven’t seen the ADT Plus system experience this issue and our system didn’t have this issue either.

ADT Smart Home

You might not think of ADT as a cutting-edge company. But when it comes to smart home automations, it’s one of the best around. We bought smart lights, switches, locks, thermostats, and more with our ADT system. Most of the smart products were Google-branded devices but they still integrated with Alexa despite them being competitors.

That means you can ask Alexa to dim the lights as well as arm the security system. She’s a multitasker that way.

ADT Pricing

Just like ADT caught up with the times when it comes to their smart home technology, they also caught up with the way they sell security systems. They used to be like Vivint and required us to buy a system through a sales representative. But the most recent ADT system we tested, we bought entirely online.

>> Read More: ADT vs. Vivint Comparison

We like the new way of doing things a lot better. It made it easy for us to figure out how much our ADT package cost us which was just under $1,000. And we still had the option to finance our security system over the course of three years like we did when we bought our old system through a sales representative. Sure, we missed out on the opportunity to negotiate free professional installation, but the new system let us DIY the install for free anyways.

Vivint Overview

Vivint is more than a security company. Vivint is a smart home automation company. It sells oodles of connected devices that pair well with Alexa.

The long, expensive contracts will be a deal-breaker for some. But if you order a smart home package, the professional installation could be worth the price. They’ll install and connect all of the smart home products then show you how to use them.

>> Read More: DIY vs. Professionally Installed Home Security Systems

Vivint Alexa Skill

Vivint may not offer Ring Alarm’s dazzling array of Alexa commands, but it comes pretty close.

When we tested Vivint, we were able to use Alexa to:

• Control Hue lighting
• Adjust the Nest thermostat
• Manage the Kwikset smart lock
• Arm the Vivint security system
• Livestream the Vivint security footage

Based on Vivint’s Alexa Skill reviews, however, some users have difficulties using all of Vivint’s Alexa capabilities. Multiple users report having trouble accessing their security footage and others have had a hard time connecting Alexa to their system. Most users, however, found Vivint worked well with Alexa.

Vivint Alexa Skill Example Commands

• Alexa, tell Vivint to turn on my lights.
• Alexa, tell Vivint to arm my home “away.”
• Alexa, tell Vivint I am cold.
• Alexa, tell Vivint to lock the front door.

Our favorite feature from Vivint’s Alexa integration was the way home states worked. It just made sense to us. We could preset modes so that our system and home reacted to our announcements. For instance, we could say “Alexa, tell Vivint I am leaving” and our home would automatically turn off the lights, lock all of our doors, arm our security system, and lower the temperature in our house.

Vivint Smart Home

Vivint sells more than just security sensors. Like, a lot more. You can get lights, locks, thermostats, and practically every other smart device from Vivint. (No smart water monitor, though. That’s where Ring Alarm has Vivint beat.) We bought smart locks, a smart lock, and a thermostat on top of our security system gear. Best of all, our Vivint technician installed and connected every component for us.

>> Check Out: Ring Alarm vs. Vivint

Vivint Pricing

Vivint is a great security system. It’s also a pricey security system. The most basic Vivint package starts at about $600 if you pay upfront. We spent well over $1,000 for our package.

Here’s one reason it might be worth it. Let’s say you’re a smart home nerd (no judgment — we are too). Alexa is just the tip of the iceberg. You want a smart thermostat, garage door opener, and lighting system too.

That’s a lot of equipment to install. Would you like some help? Vivint will actually give you some. The company sent a technician to install our system and they’ll send one for you too. SimpliSafe recently started connecting customers to a third-party installation company, but that’s just not the same as an in-house installation team.

Frontpoint Overview

If you’re looking for a tried-and-true security system that will play nicely with Alexa, Frontpoint should be on your list.

And if you run into problems with installation? You can call up its famously excellent customer service. (Seriously. We managed to get real, live, helpful humans on the phone when we tested Frontpoint.)

Frontpoint Alexa Skill

Frontpoint’s Alexa Skill got mixed reviews from users. But we know the crowd reviewing security system Alexa Skills is a tough one. Most complaints revolved around features they wish Frontpoint offered like being able to view a video livefeed from an Alexa device. That’s not a feature Frontpoint advertises, so we can’t knock them much for not having it.

While we can’t watch our live feed on Alexa devices, the Skill enabled a range of smart home commands. We could check our room’s temperature, dim our lights, and disarm our security system.

Frontpoint Alexa Skill Example Commands

• Alexa, ask Frontpoint to disarm my security system.
• Alexa, ask Frontpoint what the temperature is.
• Alexa, ask Frontpoint to set the kitchen light to 100 percent.
• Alexa, ask Frontpoint to pan the living room camera to the couch.

Not enough for you? Frontpoint didn’t stop there. In the Frontpoint app, we could make a scene. No, not the screaming “fire” in a crowded room kind of scene. A home automation scene: a list of smart device commands we bundled under one name.

For example, we created a “go to sleep” scene that turned off all our lights, locked all the doors with smart locks, and armed our Frontpoint security system. To make all these things happen, all we had to say was “Alexa, ask Frontpoint to go to sleep.”

Frontpoint Smart Home

Frontpoint offers smart locks, and cameras — all of which are Alexa-compatible. It’s not as wide a selection as Ring or Vivint, but it’s everything you need to start your smart home journey. Plus, Frontpoint works with third-party devices since it’s Z-Wave compatible. That means we were able to pair our Frontpoint system with tons of other smart products from smart lights to moisture meters for our houseplants.

>> Learn More: Frontpoint FAQ

Frontpoint Pricing

Frontpoint offers one main professional monitoring plan called the Ultimate Plan at $49.99 per month. They advertise plans as low as $14.99 per month if you call to request them, but we found out that those plans do not support Alexa. We needed to pay $49.99 per month to use our system with Alexa.

Even though Frontpoint’s professional monitoring is on the high end, Frontpoint’s pricing for equipment is on the low end. That means we avoided the upfront expense normally associated with security systems. We started with the $69 package and then added a few components. Our total was still under $200. That made the $49.99 per month monitoring sting less.