Heading on a trip soon? This $18 portable door lock 'adds so much security'

When you're traveling, especially on a vacation, you should be focused on having fun — not worrying about potential break-ins or unexpected visits from your hotel's housekeeping staff. Knowing that someone can get into your room that quickly and easily can be a bit unsettling. Investing in a portable door lock like the Addalock, though, can give you some peace of mind. This device has gone viral in the past few years for giving travelers one less thing to worry about when staying away from home. It's easy to install but makes it much harder for anyone to enter your room once it's in place.

When the hotel door looks like it's made of cardboard or the dorm room lock is just for show, the Addalock can help boost your security, privacy and peace of mind. How's it work? Simple: It fits into the strike plate of the door and catches the door if someone attempts to open it.

It takes seconds to install, and it fits in most doors. There's a caveat: If there isn't enough width between the door and its frame, it might not fit — but that points toward poor door installation more than anything else. It should fit most standard doors.

Best of all, this thing is tiny. It can fit into a purse or even some larger wallets. At just 5.8 inches long, 3.5 inches high, and less than an inch across (including the plastic section), the Addalock is ideal for travel.

More than 13,000 Amazon customers have given it a five-star rating. And it's not just reserved for travel — some reviewers say they use it to keep their apartments and homes more secure.

"I recently moved to a new apartment where there is no entry code to get to your front door. So basically my front door is the outside door. But our doors can be opened by code, so Ring doorbells/cameras are not allowed. Which made me quite anxious as there's only a door between me and the outside world," shared one shopper. "After I bought this, I could sleep so well at night. My boyfriend and I tested the potential for break-ins with this and it didn't move. .. When I left the door unlocked, this thing held its own."

Another customer was surprised by how well it worked: "I wanted my wife to feel more secure in the home while I'm at work for the day, so I purchased this thinking, if it doesn’t work, I’ll just find another product. This thing actually works, and works far better than my expectations. I'm a large person (6'4", 400 pounds) and I tried to push the door in from the outside while my wife placed this inside. Not only could I not open the door, it didn't even budge. ... I genuinely can't believe someone designed something so effective and inexpensive that adds so much security."

"I'm admittedly paranoid, but I don't trust hotels with keycard entry systems," one more shopper explained. "It's too easy for the wrong person to have a key. This device allows me to double the protection on my door, making me feel more secure."

One shopper ran into a slight issue: "I recently used this for a hotel stay and the latch was a larger size, so only part of it was able to fit." The reviewer noted that "it still worked, nonetheless, if someone tried to open it."

Another reviewer pointed out one final critique: "Every single time I travel with it, TSA flags it in my carry-on and then I have to wait while they go through my bags. They always take it out and inspect it and ask me what it is. So, I travel with it with the instructions, the bag, and [the] box it came in. I do this so I can show them how it works so they believe me that it's not a weapon."

The reviews quoted above reflect the most recent versions at the time of publication.

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