5 Things a New Garage Door Opener Can Do (Besides Open Your Door)

One of the most important responsibilities of being a homeowner is understanding as much about your home as possible. A great area to start at is the garage area, particularly your garage door opener. This is because it is not often that homeowners get to use these additional features. In a way, that’s a good thing as many of the additional features include those that are useful in times of an emergency. Nevertheless, it is still important to get to know them. The following includes five things a garage door opener can do besides open your garage door.

1. Garage Door Opener Safety Reversing Features

Unfortunately, a home’s garage door can cause injuries and even worse. These injuries led to sweeping legislation that made the inclusion of an automatic reversing feature a requirement in 1992. No matter how good your garage door is, there will be times when it malfunctions, even briefly. If there is no automatic reversing feature added to the garage door opener, it can lead to a potentially dangerous situation.

Fortunately, a modern garage door opener can reverse a door that has detected an object within its path. This is possible because of sensors found at the base of the garage door. Other doors may have these sensors on the sides of the garage door rather than on it. They still provide the same benefit.

It must be said that if you have an older door (specifically from the ’80s), this feature may not be included or simply outdated. You should also ask a garage door repair company to come in for a maintenance check. That action may even save you some money in future garage door repairs.

2. Ability to Change Codes

Over just the past few years, thieves have gone from attempting to break their way into your garage to simply figuring out your code and walking right in. Unfortunately, these hackers are often successful because they use everyday items such as electronic toys and smart devices within your home to then connect to your garage opener. This was a very serious problem and one that garage door opener manufacturers quickly began to find a solution to.

The answer to these hackings was to include rolling code technology within each opener. This technology allows your door to come up with a new code each time you open it. This makes it extremely difficult for anyone to hack into your opener. However, if you have a door older than 1993, this feature may not be added to it. Thus, it is highly recommended to bring in a garage door installation company to help you add a modern door opener to your garage.

3. Modern Openers Contain Battery Backups

One of the best features of a garage door is the manual release that allows homeowners to lift the door by hand in the event of an emergency. However, as the saying goes, you can never be too safe. This is why garage door opener manufacturers have included a backup battery to many of their devices. The battery allows you to open the garage door (a limited number of times) after complete power has been lost. Although it is recommended to use the battery only during real emergencies, homeowners can rest assured that the battery will begin to charge itself once power has been restored.

4. Smart Features in Modern Garage Door Openers

We live in an age where technology is within every building we visit and even in the cars we drive. This is no different from today’s modern garage door openers, as they themselves can also be accessed by smart devices such as your phone. Why is this an important feature to have? Have you ever been driving to work and began second-thinking if you actually closed your garage door? This can stay on your mind the whole day, and unless you have a neighbor who is willing to check on it for you, you’re not likely to know for sure. Fortunately, because smart garage door openers have become almost standard across the country, you can now use your smartphone to quickly check into your garage and look at it via a camera. On many devices, you can even close it right from your phone.

5. Built-in Lighting

A garage with light is nothing new, but let’s face it, they were never the most reliable nor provided enough light. Although this isn’t too much of an issue for adults, it can be for the elderly and younger children. This is why manufacturers have begun to include lighting systems within their openers. These lighting systems provide homeowners with two benefits. The first one includes providing them with enough light to maneuver around their garage and the second as a means of additional security as many of these lighting systems come with motion detectors.