All electric locks and locking devices fall into one of the two categories i.e. fail-safe and fail-secure. You have probably heard these terms before if you have ever looked into purchasing an electric lock or electric strikes for your door. Below are the explanations regarding these categories of electric locks as well as which one would be more suitable for your specific security needs.

Fail-Safe

Fail-safe electric locks and strikes need constant supply of power to lock. The door will be unlocked if there’s a power outage or when the power is interrupted by an access control. These kind of locks are mostly used for life safety applications, for example high rise building stairwell doors where a signal is used to automatically release the locks from fire life safety command center of the building in case of a power outage or any other emergency. And if you are using fail-safe locks or strikes on interior doors and have no connection to the life safety command center, then you will have to install a battery back-up power in order to provide constant power to electric strikes and locks during a power outage.

There are cases where using fail-safe locks or strikes is prohibited or not recommended, for example fire rated doors because they are required to stay latched regardless of whether they are unlocked or not in order to maintain fire door integrity. If you install a failsafe strike on a fire rated door, then it would be impossible to keep that door latched when unlocked which will result in allowing flame, gases, or smoke to travel through the opening in case of an emergency.

Fail-Secure

Fail-secure electric locks and strikes need power in order to unlock. The door unlocks when energized by use of an access control. So, if there is a building power outage, a fail-secure lock will lock or stay locked. Of course a constant supply of power by a battery will be required to ensure continued operation during building power outage. Normally used for high security applications, fail-secure electric locks and electric strikes are not recommended on fire rated doors because they stay locked during a power loss or an emergency.

You can use fail-secure electric strikes on fire rated doors that are equipped with mechanical locksets. These doors ensure free egress at all times because they are not locked on the interior. However, any fire rated door that is considered a 2-way exit in case of an emergency should not contain fail-secure electric strikes.

Conclusion

The terms “safe” and “secure” refer to the door’s status on its secure side (a.k.a. key side or the outside). A thing to note here is that most electric door locks, regardless of whether they are fail-safe or fail-secure, still allow you to exit the building in case of a power failure. So when it comes to the selection between these two categories of electric locks and strikes, it’s just a matter of which one will best serve your particular needs.