How Metal Detectors Can Perform Like Evolv At 90% Lower Price

Evolv has scared the public into thinking that its competitors, who cost 90% less than them, will invariably have false alarms on phones and keys.

But that's just not true. Watch the 2-minute video below to understand:

IPVM bought and tested 2 units from widely used conventional metal detectors - Italy's CEIA and USA's Garrett.

With simple tuning from IPVM, these units were able to reliably not false alert on keys and phones (even large ones or multiple phones) while being able to correctly alert on larger weapons. [See Research Report: Tuning and Optimizing of CEIA and Garrett Metal Detectors Tested.]

These units, with this tuning, still do false alarm on laptops, water bottles, and umbrellas, just like Evolv. These units also often miss smaller weapons, just like Evolv.

The main difference is that Evolv has fought to hide their problems missing smaller weapons and false alarming on many objects from the public.

Evolv purposefully hid these problems to make it seem like it was far better than it was. And its competitors, coming from service in airports and prisons, designed their products to be very sensitive to even tiny amounts of metal. This is why the simple tuning we did enabled them to perform much like Evolv.

We are happy to test these systems fairly side-by-side to determine exact differences but Evolv has repeatedly blocked us from accessing their's.

However, Evolv does have 2 clear structural advantages - it has built-in video verification and cloud monitoring.

But Evolv costs $2,500 per month, every month. Over the minimum 4-year contract, that's $120,000. But the conventional metal detectors from CEIA and Garrett cost less than $10,000.

The public, the taxpayers, have the right to know the truth about the performance of products used to protect them. We encourage them to make rational decisions based on this full information.

Addendum

We have received good critical feedback so are adding in the following to clarify:

• Evolv claims to decrease the labor cost of screening significantly while increasing throughput. Tuning conventional metal detectors to minimize or eliminate false positives on phones and keys will decrease the labor cost of screening significantly while increasing throughput.
• As we acknowledge in the report, Evolv has video verification / localization of alarms, which is an advantage and can help decrease labor costs and increase throughput. Buyers should see how much value this provides separately from the tuning that can similarly reduce false positives.
• A concern has been raised that tuning metal detectors like this will miss small weapons. This is certainly a real risk, as it is a risk with Evolv. We recommend facilities be very highly careful about this but if they are going to accept the risks with Evolv of missing small weapons, they should consider a similar approach with a far lower-cost product option.