Best Babyproofing Kit
The Babee Base Baby Proofing Set is a large babyproofing kit with various useful gadgets for keeping little ones safer. This set includes cabinet locks, strap locks, outlet covers, and corner protectors. We love the 8 magnetic cabinet locks and two keys you get with this set, and while it may not be enough to outfit a larger kitchen, it will get you started or work for the select cabinets and drawers where dangerous things are housed. It also sports 6 straps that work well for keeping the oven door and trash can lid closed with a versatile style that can be used almost anywhere. The included corner protectors are clear and unobtrusive, which is a bonus, and there are two kinds of outlet covers.
The straps are an easier snap on/off style that savvy toddlers might suss out in time, so you'll want to keep an eye out for this as they age or get stronger. Also, we aren't huge fans of the outlet covers that require a key to remove. Sure, they may be harder for your toddler to get off, but it's inconvenient to find the one key when you want to plug in your vacuum real quick. Overall, we like what this kit offers and feel it is a good jumping-off point that can help you secure some things and identify where you might need some add-on products.
The Safety 1st Safety Essentials Kit is a smaller but affordable babyproofing kit that can get you started before your baby really gets a move on. This kit includes doorknob covers, outlet covers, and pressure cabinet locks. This option has a friendly price, which makes it a quick budget solution for some families.
This kit has 46 parts, but be aware it is mostly outlet covers with only a handful of cabinet locks and two doorknob covers. The parts are somewhat dated and lack the sophistication and design of more modern gadgets like pressure cabinet locks over the easier to use magnet cabinet locks. The cabinet locks also require hardware mounting, which could be a deal-breaker for renters or those who don't want permanent holes in their cabinets. While this kit lacks some of the ease of use of the competition, if your needs are small and you are on a budget, it could easily fit the bill.
The Baby Defence Complete Home Baby Proofing Kit is a big kit with lots of variety to meet almost any babyproofing need we can think of. This kit is unique in this lineup as the only option that includes anti-tilt straps. We love these easy to install straps that keep little ones safe from falling TVs and bookshelves. While this set only comes with 2, it is better than none. It also includes 3 different types of cabinet locks, including longer straps for toilet lids or oven doors. You'll find edge and corner protection, outlet covers, and more in this kit that has a little bit of everything but the kitchen sink thrown in. A kit this all-inclusive is a great way to determine where you still have needs, including locations maybe you haven't thought of like window and door locks and anti-pinch locks for the interior doors.
While you will find lots of stuff in this kit, it's almost not enough of any one thing to get the job done. If you hope for this to do your whole house, it definitely won't. Also, it might not be the best option if your goal is outfitting your kitchen, as it doesn't include some key components you'd need in that space. Overall, we think this is a great kit for a living room where you'll need to secure heavy items and protect little ones from sharp coffee table edges and corners.
The YourBaby Baby Proofing Kit is a great choice for kitting out your kitchen. It is the only option in our lineup that includes knob covers for your stove. This kind of protection can be critical if you have low forward facing knobs little ones can reach. It also has corner guards, toilet straps, outlet covers, safety straps, and door bumpers.
Depending on the size of your kitchen, this kit may not be all you need. It also doesn't include traditional cabinet locks that reside inside the cabinet; it only has strap locks. The straps might also be operational by kids given enough time to sort out the puzzle slide feature. In general, we think this is a great option for starting your kitchen protection journey. Depending on your needs, it could be all you need for your kitchen space.
While many things in the kitchen can be harmful and damaging to little ones and should be locked away, it is natural for babies and toddlers to want to explore. We suggest keeping a few cabinets or draws accessible to little ones with safe but interesting items inside. Contents like plastic food storage containers or pots and silicone utensils can be fun and engaging for kids as they learn about life.
The Family Care Baby Proofing Kit is the smallest kit in the review, with only corner guards and straps rounding out the complete kit. We think this smaller option would be a good add-on for a home office or smaller room with few items to babyproof. While it can't deck out a kitchen or larger space, it may be all you need to secure office furniture. The straps are adjustable and versatile, making them a good addition to other childproofing products,
This is a small kit, and it is barely enough to get you started or finish your childproofing needs. So be ready to buy additional products. The straps' slide mechanism could also be sorted out by determined toddlers without supervision to redirect them away from the straps promptly. In general, this small and budget-friendly kit is a good choice for a single room with few needs.
The Babylyzz Baby Proofing Kit is one of the smaller sized options in this lineup. It contains 10 magnet cabinet locks, 10 outlet covers (for 5 outlets), 10 corner guards, and 4 strap locks. Magnetic locks are our favorite, so we like that they are included, and straps are versatile, working on everything from toilets to trash cans and more.
Unfortunately, this kit just doesn't have enough of anything to be a whole-home solution unless you reorganize your home to get dangerous things into higher cabinets. It lacks protection for a variety of options, and the goods it has just aren't enough. While it has some nicer gadgets, there are sets with more items that cost about the same.
The Sikoimate Baby Proofing Kit has a little bit of everything, much like a combo appetizer plate on a Friday night. This pack has 43 items, but the majority are corner protectors making it a good potential option for a room with sharp corners. It also contains 8 magnet cabinet locks, 6 strap locks, and a handful of outlet covers, half of which require a key to open.
While this kit has a smattering of several types of items, it isn't enough to complete any room, much like most of the competition. If your kitchen is small, 8 cabinet locks might get you by, but the smaller number of outlet covers will leave you wanting more. Also, we aren't big fans of the keyed outlet covers as they are more difficult to remove, and keeping the key nearby, and handy will be a chore over time. Overall, this kit is nothing to sneeze at, and we like the magnet cabinet lock. However, there are kits with more for about the same price that are a better value and offer more protection.
The Inaya Child Proofing Kit comes with 40 items with a significant number of corner guards for sharp corners and outlet covers. The kit also includes 6 strap locks and 8 pressure cabinet locks. The straps are easy to use and install, and the components all use adhesive installation.
This set is on the smaller side for the price, and the components aren't as nice as some of the competition. The pressure cabinet and drawer locks are a somewhat dated design that can result in pinching and injuries as the door can open partway to expose the lock for pressing, which allows little hands to get trapped inside, unlike magnet locks. Overall, this is a basic set, but it is limited, and we prefer the style of other locks.
The Dreambaby 46 Piece Home Safety Kit sounds like a large kit for the price, and it includes outlet covers, doorknob covers, and a few different types of locks. However, most of the parts in the 46 piece set are outlet covers, and the other components' designs are fairly dated or less functional than other styles in this lineup. For instance, the cabinet locks are pressure locks instead of the easier to use magnet locks baby can't see, and the doorknob covers might thwart an adult, but in our experience, most toddlers will figure them out with ease. Even the strap locks in this set are easier to pull off and disconnect, leaving us suspicious that little ones won't be hindered much by their addition. Overall, we think there are better kits to be had that include easier to use and more effective items than this option.
Why You Should Trust Us
Bob Wofford, a Senior Review Analyst and dad to 7, researched and led the babyproofing kit review. Bob has been testing baby gear for more than 7 years leading various categories from strollers to car seats. The babyproofing kits were chosen with safety and variety in mind. We tested them for how easy they are to install, how effectively they work, and how much ground they can cover in the typical home. Senior Review Editor Wendy Schmitz completes the babyproofing team undertaking the test analysis and write up.
Analysis and Test Results
We purchased and tested 9 of the most popular babyproofing kits for testing. Each kit was assessed for ease of installation, how much the kit can cover, and how well the components work.
Childproofing is a crucial component of babyhood. However, no childproofing product is 100% effective. As with all childproofing products, we believe you should use caution and continue to monitor little ones regularly to avoid accidental proofing failures that could lead to accidental injuries. We recommend viewing childproofing gear as a stop-gap that buys you time instead of final solutions that never fail.
Ease of Use
Most of the kits include easy to use items. However, some designs are easier to install and use than others. With modern adhesive technology, we think it is easiest and yet still effective to skip the hardware mounted devices in favor of adhesive. The Safety 1st kit includes screws for the cabinet locks. The Dreambaby 46 Piece Home Safety Kit also requires the use of permanent holes and screws. This design takes installation effort to a new level and requires tools making them less user-friendly.
Another factor is the outlet covers that require a key to remove. In our experience, all outlet covers work well and are hard to remove, even for an adult. We aren't sure what benefit the key provides other than having assistance with removal, but during testing, it seemed like a hassle to keep the key nearby and within reach. No matter how hard you try, you can't keep a single key near all covers, and if you lose the key, it is hard to remove the cover. This design is a flaw in our opinion and, at best, just a pain.
For cabinet locks, we prefer the magnet locks to the pressure design or external strap locks in many of the kits. The magnet locks are out of sight out of mind for little ones, and while they require a key to unlock, it is easier to keep the key in the kitchen for all locks than it is to keep an outlet key in every room you have an outlet when the kits only provide one. We also like that the magnets don't allow the cabinet or drawer to open at all. The pressure locks allow the doors to open enough to fit a finger inside to press the lock down to disengage and open the door. This design means little ones can often fit their hand inside the cabinet or drawer, and it can pinch or shut on them as it won't open further. The Babee Base Baby Proofing Set includes 8 magnet locks and 2 keys that might cover an entire kitchen depending on size and cabinet contents. The Inaya Child Proofing Kit, Safety 1st, and Dreambaby include pressure locks.
While strap locks are useful, versatile, and work well in situations where other locks don't, we don't like them for drawer or cabinet locks as children are drawn to playing with them. Many are fairly easy to open given time and patience. If you need a toilet or trash can lock, these are the way to go, but they wouldn't be our top pick for locations that work with a magnet lock that, in our opinion, is both easier and more effective.
Coverage
While some of these kits boast rather large numbers of gadgets, we caution you to really look at what they have to offer and assess your home situation before buying. More isn't always better if it includes a bunch of stuff you'll never use. The Inaya Child Proofing Kit boasts many items, but close investigation reveals they are mostly outlet covers and corner protectors. For a living room, this might be a good choice where coffee tables and outlets for electronics will be in higher supply, but it may not have enough cabinet locks or straps to get the job done for a kitchen.
Overall, we think it is unlikely that any single kit will solve all your childproofing needs. It is best to assess each room in your home, looking for what specific needs you should address. How many cabinets and drawers do you need to lock? How many can stay open for exploration? How many outlets are low to the ground versus at countertop height? Is there a need for a more versatile strap for lids and doors that need locks but cabinet locks won't suffice? Once you've assessed your room needs, you can review which kit will best help you reach your proofing goals. You may need several kits or more than one of the same kit, so be open to several purchases to get the job done with adequate coverage. The smallest kit in the group is the Family Care that only includes straps and corner guards. This kit is unlikely to work for kitchens or bathrooms and is best viewed as an add-on kit instead of a standalone choice. Alternatively, the Babee Base Baby Proofing Set and Baby Defence Complete Home Baby Proofing Kit offer the most in number and versatility of items so that depending on your home's size and your needs, one or the other could potentially be all you need.
Efficacy
While any childproofing gear can appear to be effective on first blush, trust us, until a toddler gets their hands on it, you'll never really know. In our experience, some little ones will accept the smallest inconvenience as a giant bump in the road, and they will go no further and accept that they shall not pass this point. However, other toddlers will see every obstacle as a challenge, and you can almost hear them saying, "Hold my bottle, I got this…" This second kind of toddler will sort out every babyproofing obstacle you put in place, and you'll soon find yourself with a master Houdini on your hands that can't be stopped no matter what you try.
As parents, we've wrestled with childproof doorknob covers to the point of high frustration only to have an 18-month-old casually open the same door as if the cover didn't exist. The point? No matter how well protected you think you've made your home, depending on your child, it can all fail if given enough time and motivation.
Therefore, we recommend you check your gear frequently to ensure the adhesive is still in place, the corners are securely snug, the cabinet locks can't be pulled open or pinched shut, and all straps are a struggle to take off. While we did not experience any product failures during testing, we can see how some products could fail over time, given an obstinate and savvy toddler looking for adventure.
Babies often find small or novel items fascinating. This means they might be drawn to new or novel items like corner guards or outlet covers. If your little one shows too much interest in any childproofing gear, including picking parts off or solving the removal puzzle, we strongly recommend replacing any damaged or dysfunctional gear to avoid potential hazards or failures in design. We believe that adult supervision is crucial for little ones, even if you have childproof components installed.
Also, keep in mind that you don't want gear that is so hard to use that even you can't manage it when you need to. A toilet lock strap you can't open quick enough could lead to trouble for everyone!
Conclusion
After much research and testing, we aren't convinced there is a one and done kit for every home. Depending on your home's size or needs, you may need to purchase multiple kits or products to get the job done, or you may find that one simple kit is all you need with extras leftover. We suspect that while one or more of the kits in this review might work in your home, you'll probably still need to add on some other products, so keep this in mind. This review should provide the details you need to find the right starter pack for you and your baby.
— Wendy Schmitz and the BabyGearLab Review Team