You never think about garage door openers until they don’t work any more. After 17 years, we finally had to replace our garage door opener. We opted for the Chamberlain Garage  Door Opener (belt drive) which has Wi-Fi and a smartphone control.

My family is into home automation and wanted to be able to monitor the garage door from our smartphones using the Chamberlain Garage Door Opener app called MyQ.

FEATURES OF THE CHAMBERLAIN GARAGE DOOR OPENER

It’s awesome how garage door openers have come a long way. Before my husband would have to install a battery backup power supply for the garage door and installed a switch that allowed us to turn off the power of the garage door (for security purposes).

• But now the Chamberlain garage door openers have it’s own battery backup for when power goes out.
• It is Wi-Fi enabled so you can monitor if the garage door is open or closed with the smartphone control app called MyQ.
  
• You can open and close the garage door with your smartphone app (from anywhere).
• Enables you to close the garage door automatically after several minutes of being open. We decided to have the garage door close automatically after 10 minutes. If you plan to leave your garage door open longer than that, make sure to have your phone or garage clicker with you to open the door. When 10 minutes have elapsed, the garage starts beeping to let you know that the garage door will be closing and starts closing. This feature can also be disabled.
• Belt drive garage door openers are much quieter than the chain. I barely hear the garage door open nowadays. I typically know when the garage is open when I receive an email, phone, and watch notification that the garage door is open. You can control what notifications/alerts you want to receive.
  
• You can program extra remote controls from the main garage door opener display. This saved me from getting the ladder to press the program button on the garage door opener itself.
• The older garage door opener only had a push button to open and close the garage door. So I was surprised how the newer displays have improved. Aside from the main button to open and close the garage door. It also displays the time and temperature of the garage. It also has a menu to program other things with the garage as well as lock the garage which doesn’t allow remote controls to open the garage door (a security feature). It also has a motion sensor on the unit so when you pass by the display the light automatically turns on. You can also choose to turn on or off the light with the light button as well.

It took my husband a couple of hours to remove and install the Chamberlain Garage Door Opener. He bought the unit at the Home Depot since we needed a new unit as soon as possible. If you aren’t in a rush to purchase one, it’s cheaper to buy it on Amazon.

The best part about this garage door opener is that we never have to worry about leaving the garage door open. Yay! If you are in the market for a new garage door opener. I’d recommend this Chamberlain Garage Door Opener (1-1/4 HPS Smartphone-Controlled Wi-Fi Belt Drive Garage Door Opener with Battery Backup and Ultra-Quiet Operation which costs $268 at the Home Depot).