According to a Reddit post all X-Sense Smoke Alarms have been pulled from Amazon at this time citing “safety or quality issues”. It can be seen on the X-Sense Amazon store that all smoke alarms currently show unavailable.
This particular smoke alarm has popped up frequently in spammy posts here on this forum, some of which have managed to slip by us mods. The circumstances surrounding this action are currently unknown, however it is a good time to mention that it is generally best to leave fire protection and life safety in your home to well known brands such as Kidde/FireX, and First Alert/BRK.
Several years ago, I did two sponsored videos for an off brand smoke alarm company, who is UL listed and still sells products today, but I have since taken those videos down and cut off any relationship with that company for similar concerns. It is always so important to set safety and reliability first, and while the reputable companies I mentioned above aren’t free from their share of recalls and faults, they are generally held to a higher standard and due to wider adoption of their products, issues are often found and addressed faster.
When more information of why X-Sense alarms were removed is available, I’ll be sure to share, and I’m sure others will share in the comments.
Stay safe!
EDIT: As of today (12/10/2025) Siterwell Alarms have also all been removed from Amazon, it seems likely for a similar reason. I still don’t see official news about WHY these were pulled, but I’m sure they have good reason for it.
Amazon finally starting to do something about the countless cheap, counterfeit, unapproved, & dangerous products littering their website are they? About time…awesome though!
Definitely: don’t settle for anything less than established & reputable brands like those for sure! (especially when it comes to safety)
Good thinking (though I personally would not have accepted such a sponsorship deal to begin with as I know companies like them are scummy).
In hindsight, I agree with you now. But at the time I was younger, less familiar, and generally excited to have had any form of “sponsored” video. I did my due diligence to make sure they were UL listed prior to engaging with them, but I wouldn’t go that route again.
I’m also really curious to see why this is. Hopefully they aren’t actually a safety issue, as I’m sure many were sold and will continue to be sold.
I know Menards (a major big-box store similar to Lowe’s or Home Depot that is based in the Midwest for anyone who doesn’t know) sells Sitterwell products under their Performax brand. I know there are currently almost 200 of their products currently in stock at my local store.
Considering they are Chinese based brands and what has been happening with other products from Chinese brands, I wouldn’t doubt if part of the reason that were pulled in the U.S. is that they could be considered a “security risk” or something even though they don’t even connect to the internet.
Little update: I do see an active ETL listing for some of Siterwell’s most popular devices, with the 9th edition UL 217 (good) Intertek ETL Listed Directory
X-Sense listings in this DB on the other hand appear to be for older revisions of UL 217, which may be why these were pulled down.
Regarding national security concerns, both X-Sense and Sirerwell have IOT connected products. It’s not impossible there is a security risk there. As a smart home person, I try to always look for products that don’t require cloud, so Matter, Z Wave, and Zigbee devices are the way to go if you really want a notification of your smoke alarm sounds.
We have a new development to this story. A user on Reddit shared an official email they got back from X-Sense on the matter. Here’s the key bit:
Why Amazon Canceled the Order Amazon recently performed a system-wide compliance update and temporarily removed several smoke and CO detectors from multiple brands — including ours — not because of a safety defect, but because our UL certification (6th Edition) for this specific batch officially expired on June 30, 2024.
Although all our detectors were manufactured fully compliant with UL 6th Edition, Amazon now requires every detector to be certified under the new UL 9th Edition standard in order to remain listed.
Because this batch was certified to the previous UL 6th Edition, Amazon automatically flagged and canceled the listing.
We want to reassure you:
The detectors in that batch were manufactured exactly according to the 2024 UL 6th Edition requirements.
There is no safety issue with the units.
Continued use of all existing X-Sense smoke and CO detectors in your home is completely safe.
We are already in the process of completing certification for the new UL 9th Edition, which all manufacturers must transition to. The approval is expected to be completed in 1–4 months. Once approved, Amazon will relist the updated product.
From this response, it is true that X-Sense has has some UL 217 certifications verified with Intertek ETL. While it’s not clear from that view on the website what edition, Siterwell by contrast DOES have devices listed with versions 8 and 9 of UL 217 distinguished clearly on Intertek’s listing, so it’s not exactly clear why Siterwell’s devices were also taken down.
Back to X-Sense, The New York Times did a story about their smoke alarms which at the time did NOT contain UL 217 certification at all. It’s an interesting read here from just about 2 months ago: We Uncovered Many Smoke Alarms on Amazon That Don’t Meet Basic Safety Standards | Reviews by Wirecutter. For an alarm manufacturer to not have compliance done over a year after the requirements went into effect is seriously insane.
Plain and simple - there remains no good reason to buy an alarm that hasn’t been put through extensive, independent testing with an organization like Intertek or UL that can verify it meets these standards.
I’m for that: surprising I’d say though that Amazon would actually bother with properly removing non-certified smoke detectors from sale as they should considering they clearly don’t care about all the other unapproved & junk-quality stuff they sell!
I just sent an email to X-Sense about the certification expiration as I have several of their units installed earlier this year. So they were sold with expired certification which should either be disclosed upfront and buyer beware or not be sold.
I agree with you. Not sure how far you’ll get with them, you’ll probably just get the same kind of response they gave to that user on Reddit, but I agree that this situation should not be handled lightly.