Top 5 Best Child safety gates of 2022

The Safety 1st Auto-Close is an easy-to-use child safety gate with some well-thought-out functions. Installation is simple. The gate has four separate brackets that are either screwed to the wall or attached directly with a self-adhesive surface. The gate is mounted in a door opening up to 80 cm wide, but there are also extensions that allow the Safety 1st Auto-Close to be up to an extra 28 cm in width. The appearance of the gate is classic, in painted metal. The gate has a transverse bar at the bottom, which means it’s not suitable for placing at the top of a staircase. There’s a risk of tripping over the lower edge of the gate when going through it. But in all other types of door openings, the Safety 1st Auto-Close is an incredibly practical gate.

As the name suggests, Auto-Close is a self-closing gate. Only one hand is required to open it, but unlocking takes place in two steps for that little extra safety. A latch and a button must be pressed in at the same time, then the gate can be opened. Once you let go of the gate, it automatically swings shut again and locks. This function is particularly convenient if you often carry a child when going through the gate, or even if you're just worried about bigger siblings going through but forgetting to close the gate behind them. The Safety 1st Auto-Close can be set so that it can be opened in both directions or just in one direction. After frequent use, the Auto-Close was still trouble free, and the gate never feels stiff – but nor is it too easy to open either. As long as it’s not used on a staircase, the Safety 1st Auto-Close is one of the most convenient child safety gates on the market, and is thus our choice for best in test.

The Lascal KiddyGuard Avant is a premium-class child gate, and that quality is evident throughout. The gate is very flexible in terms of mounting, and is one of the few that works even in the most complicated door openings or stairs. When the gate is open, it’s barely visible and not at all intrusive against your other furnishings. To use the gate, you must turn a knob with one hand, pull out the fabric with the other hand and hook the gate into the brackets. Bigger siblings of school age will understand how the gate works and be able to open it, but their arms will be too short to close it. After a few months of use, the fabric in the gate is a bit slacker after the children have hung on it, but not very much and it doesn’t really affect how well the gate works.

The only function that’s really lacking is the ability to open the gate conveniently with one hand, as it’s best done with two hands. One-handed opening is possible in theory, but it does require you to quickly first turn the latch and then, equally quickly, unhook the gate from the wall bracket. All of which is a bit difficult to do with a child on your arm, and it’d be much better if it could be done more conveniently. The advantage, of course, is that two-step opening means an additional degree of safety and makes it that bit harder for small children to accidentally open the gate. In summary, the Lascal KiddyGuard Avant feels like a very safe purchase. Flexible enough to be attached almost anywhere, more or less invisible when not in use and really safe and durable when closed and in place. The price tag is high but the functions are so good that the Lascal Kiddyguard Avant is still our choice as the best premium gate.

Baby Dan’s FLEX Large child gate has more uses than just being attached in a doorway. The FLEX includes a gate and two side pieces, which are mounted together and can be angled as needed. If you buy additional panels, you can arrange the FLEX to become a kind of mini fence. In this way you can surround a stove or screen off one half of a room. The FLEX also works very well as a gate in a double door, as most other gates are too narrow to fit in such wide openings. Despite the fact that the gate consists of so many parts, it feels stable and sturdy. The gate itself can be opened one-handed, but it isn’t easy to grasp how to do that. With practice, it’s easy, but for occasional guests the gate is perceived as cumbersome and they prefer to step over it.

The FLEX Large has a crossbar at the bottom, which means it’s not suitable to be mounted at the top of a staircase as the risk of tripping is too great. On the other hand, you can always construct the gate in an arch in front of the first step. The gate itself can be opened in both directions. It has no automatic closing, so you must ensure that the gate is locked after you have passed through it. Closing the gate is a bit more difficult than opening it, as you have to fit the locking mechanism perfectly. The Baby Dan FLEX Large would have been even better with automatic closure or if it had locked itself after you shoved it shut behind you. If you need to block off something larger than a standard doorway, however, the Baby Dan FLEX Grind Large is the best option on the market.

Baby Dan's Two-Way Auto-Close is a metal gate that can be mounted in a doorway without the need for screws. The gate is clamped in position and the four washers for the brackets are held in the correct position with double-sided adhesive tape. After a long period of use, the gate still looks very nice and the joints haven’t yet started to squeak. The best feature of the Two-Way Auto-Close gate is the automatic closing, which means you never have to be afraid of forgetting to close the gate behind you. This is also very useful if you have forgetful older siblings in your home. The gate is opened with a simple one-handed grip. Opening is simple enough for older children to be able to perform, but too difficult for a small child. So the gate feels very safe and secure.

Assembly of the gate isn’t completely straightforward, as you need tools to tighten the nuts so the brackets are completely stable. Once the gate is mounted, it’s not easy to move either, so it’s really best suited for long-term use. This gate isn’t suitable for mounting at the top of a staircase, as it has a crossbar at the bottom that you might trip on. Otherwise the gate worked very well. The Baby Dan Two-Way Auto-Close can, as the name suggests, open in both directions. If placed in a doorway where it doesn’t always need to be in use, we’d have liked a function that made it possible to fold the gate away. When the kids aren’t at home, the gate does sometimes feel in the way. After testing the Baby Dan Two-Way Auto-Close, we believe it offers a good quality gate at a fair price.

The Baby Dan Guard Me is a plastic panel gate that folds away like a fan or accordion when it’s opened. This makes it very unobtrusive, keeps it out of the way when not in use and allows it to fit well in doorways or stairs whilst open. The Guard Me fits in doorways up to 79 cm wide, but you can also buy extensions separately. The gate can be attached both inside and outside the door frame so the gate sits in front of the door opening. As it has no crossbar at the bottom – which you can easily stumble on – the Baby Dan Guard Me can also be used at the top of a staircase. Mounting is simple, but it does require screwing the brackets to the wall. After that the panels are put in place.

You can open and close the Guard Me with one hand. But when the gate is new, our testers found the buttons to be stiff, and it took some time before they really worked properly. This makes the gate difficult at first to both open and close. But the more the gate is used, the easier it becomes. On the other hand, because it is a bit stiff, the Baby Dan Guard Me is very child-safe. There’s no chance that a small child will be able to open it. One big plus is that the gate folds up automatically against the wall when you open it, and then takes up very little space. The Baby Dan Guard Me is stylish, the gate is unobtrusive and the functions are intelligent – so overall this is a well-designed child safety gate.