Best Safe 2026: The Box Weighs 1.87kg

The most-reviewed product in this ranking by a factor of three: 29,924 ratings at 4.5 stars with 71 per cent five-star and 4 per cent one-star, for £57.16. It is a 35 x 25 x 25cm electronic safe with a 14-litre interior, a keypad with three indicator lights, two emergency override keys and a bolt-down kit in the box.

What it does not publish is its weight — nor does any other large safe here. The three 6.6-litre boxes in this ranking are open about theirs: 1.87kg, 2.04kg and 2.6kg. This one, more than twice their size, gives no figure at all, and the evidence comes from a buyer instead: not too heavy, bolts to wall or floor, good for my purpose. That is the honest state of this category — a safe is bought for weight and steel, and the specification tables leave you to infer both.

The design is the standard arrangement done well: the keypad takes four AA batteries, which are not included, and the two override keys cover a forgotten code or a flat battery. The reviews come from long-term owners rather than first impressions: I like the two choices of opening, and I have had it over a year now. At £57.16 it is the third-dearest product here and the only one with real internal volume.

The best seller in Amazon's cabinet safes category, and the honest starting point for this ranking: £20.91 for a steel lock box with a mechanical combination lock, 21.8 x 15.5cm and just 4.2cm tall, weighing little enough to carry in one hand. It carries 4.4 stars from 9,881 ratings with 72 per cent five-star and 5 per cent one-star.

Four centimetres is the specification that matters. A box that shallow cannot be bolted to a floor and does not pretend to be a safe: it is a locked tray for documents, cash and jewellery, with a foam-padded interior and a combination dial. The listing calls its steel anti-pry, which is a fair description of the lid; what it does not do is stop someone walking off with the whole box. The 5 per cent of one-star ratings are mostly about the dial and the latch.

The reviews say what the product is: remarkably good quality for a very reasonable price, easy to change the code, a lovely little safe for my needs. In a category where heavier boxes weigh 2kg or more, this one is doing something different — it is a locked drawer rather than a bolted box, and for documents in a house that is enough.

The second most-reviewed product in this ranking and first in its own category: £12.49 for a lock box made to look like a book, 23.9cm tall and 5.6cm deep, with a combination lock and two litres of space inside. It carries 4.3 stars from 15,914 ratings with 69 per cent five-star and 6 per cent one-star.

Its category name is the honest part: a diversion safe. This is not a box that resists a thief, it is a box a thief does not look at, and the listing says as much by recommending it be stored between two other books on a shelf. The cover and spine are fabric and there are no paper pages, and the reviews are entirely about how convincing it looks: so real looking, very realistic and practical.

As a place for a passport, a spare key or a few hundred pounds it does a job no steel box does — it hides in plain sight on a shelf where a 2kg bolt-down safe would be a target. The 6 per cent of one-star ratings are about the lock and the hinge, and at two litres it is smaller inside than it looks, which is the trade for a spine that fits a shelf.

The most-reviewed of the small safes here: 4,245 ratings at 4.3 stars, 67 per cent five-star and 8 per cent one-star, for £25.99. It measures 23 x 17 x 17cm — 6.6 litres — in alloy steel, with a digital keypad, two backup keys, expansion bolts in the box and a shelf inside.

The listing describes it in a way no other does: its special features field says Portable. That is the whole argument about small safes in one word from the seller. A 6.6-litre steel box that the listing calls portable is a box somebody can carry out of the house, and the bolts it ships with are the only thing between it and that outcome. The bolts are in the box precisely because the weight is not.

For what it is, the reviews are positive: excellent value for money, arrived with care, will do the job. It is the right box for documents, a passport and a few days' cash, and the wrong box for anything you would miss if the entire safe left with it.

The lightest box in this ranking and the best-rated: £12.10 for a 15.2 x 12.7cm steel cash tin weighing 345 grams — a sixth of a 6.6-litre safe — with a key lock, two keys and an internal cash tray with two compartments. It carries 4.6 stars from 1,232 ratings with 73 per cent five-star and 2 per cent one-star, the cleanest record here.

At 345 grams it is a tin, and its own category says so: it is first in Amazon's cash box category, not in safes. What a tin does that a safe does not is organise: the tray separates notes from coins, and the reviews include the practical detail that it fits any note including a £50. In the hand it is a lockable box for petty cash, a float or a child's savings, and the 12.7cm width is the specification that decides what fits.

The honest complaint worth quoting is this one: the top section falls down a lot, but it does the job. Nothing in this ranking stops a determined thief, and this is the cheapest and lightest way to keep cash and coins in one place with a lock on it.

The cheapest of the 6.6-litre safes here at £18.69, and the lightest of them at 2.04kg: 17 x 23 x 17cm in SPCC steel with a flat key lock, a pry-resistant door and concealed hinges. Everything needed to fix it down is in the box — a floor mat, two emergency keys and two expansion bolts — and it carries 4.4 stars from 630 ratings with 72 per cent five-star and 4 per cent one-star.

Two kilos is the number that decides the argument. A box this light can be picked up by anyone, so the bolts are not an optional extra, they are the security: bolted into a floor or a shelf, the steel and the pry-resistant door have to be defeated; unbolted, the safe simply leaves. That this listing includes them, where the 6.6-litre box above leaves you to buy them separately, is worth more than the £5 it saves.

The reviews are short and practical: perfect size, spacious inside, good value for money — and one noting three keys where the listing mentions two. Harmless, but a reminder to check what arrives.

The heaviest of the three 6.6-litre safes here at 2.6kg, and the same size as the others: 23 x 17 x 17cm in alloy steel, with a digital keypad, two keys, a shelf and an included mat. It costs £23.99 and carries 4.5 stars from 417 ratings with 75 per cent five-star and 5 per cent one-star.

Weight is the specification buyers cannot see in a photograph and the one that matters most here. Three safes with identical internal dimensions weigh 1.87kg, 2.04kg and 2.6kg — a difference of 39 per cent between the lightest and this one — and the heavier box is the one with more steel in its walls and door. The listing calls it thickened alloy steel with double protection, which is marketing language for the same fact.

Its materials table also gives the top material as wood, which no steel safe has: a data quirk rather than a description. What the reviews support is the practical part — it opens with either batteries or a backup key, arrived as stated, and setting your own code is easy. At £23.99 it costs £5.30 more than the cheapest box of the same size and buys the extra half-kilogram.

A steel box for £23.44 that makes three claims at once: fireproof, waterproof and high security. It measures 31 x 20 x 20cm, holds 8.5 litres according to its title, and its capacity field gives the same space as 0.3 cubic feet — an American unit in a British listing, where every other box here quotes litres. It carries 4.4 stars from 330 ratings with 72 per cent five-star and 6 per cent one-star.

The claims are worth reading carefully because of the price. Fireproofing is a real specification with a real cost: a fire-rated safe has an insulating layer and is tested to a standard. At £23.44, what this listing means by the word is impossible to verify from the page, and no standard is quoted. What the reviews describe is what it actually is — brilliant for stopping prying eyes, solid construction, sensibly priced. Nobody in them has put it through a fire.

At 20cm wide and 31cm deep it is the deepest box in this ranking after the 14-litre safe, and the keypad with a backup key is the standard arrangement. Buy it as a locked box for documents and cash, and treat the fire and water claims as unmeasured until a standard is named.

A steel security box for £16.25, 12 inches (about 30cm) across, with a key lock, a bolt-down kit in the box and — in the same specification table — Portable as a special feature. It carries 4.5 stars from 2,805 ratings with 72 per cent five-star and 2 per cent one-star, the second-cleanest record here.

That pairing is the contradiction this ranking is about, printed on one product page. The listing's own bullet says it can be bolted down using the fixings included, providing maximum protection; the special features field says portable. Both are true: it is a box you can fix down and a box you can carry, and which of those it ends up being is the buyer's decision, not the listing's.

The reviews cover both lives of the product: nice and solid, it did the job protecting knives on camp — one carried it, apparently — and another notes it comes with two keys and is big enough for a lot of items. At £16.25 with a bolt-down kit included, it is the cheapest box here that can be made immovable.