Genie B6172H Wall Mount Smart Garage Door Opener, DC Motor Lifts up to 14ft high 850lbs, Black

Purchased for $372 ($404 after tax). Not sure I would pay the full retail price. Watch for a sale if you are considering.

Was not super difficult to install. Just watch a bunch of videos on YouTube, and pay attention to the included instructions. You will need to run an outlet to the location, so keep that in mind, or budget for an electrician if you do not know how to do it yourself.

Functions very well. Nice and quiet. It’s been installed for a month or two, and only one time it did not close when I pressed the button. Still don’t know what that was about, but after trying a few times, it finally closed. Hopefully it’s not a sign of an issue to come.

I also purchased the wireless keypad to go outside the garage, and hard wired an additional “door bell” style switch on the inswife of the garage as a backup in case the batteries die in the keypad or included button.

The light that comes with it is not bright, but in order for the app to work, that light needs to be plugged in - I believe it is a safety safeguard the manufacturer put in place.

App works well, and the system linked up with my car’s built in garage door opener well.

Overall, very happy with this. Just hold out for a sale.

I bought this opener to control a large (12ft wide, 10ft tall) and heavy door for my workshop. We have another building that has a traditional Chamberlain opener installed so I briefly considered that brand, but after reading the reviews and the product documentation, I'm glad I didn't. This Genie product seems clearly superior.

Unlike the Chamberlain product where the installation manual requires the installation of a phone app and there is no printed manual (no thanks), the Genie installation manual is a large (22" by 34") fold-out document that is clearly illustrated and very well-written. It was a pleasure to use, but I did have two minor issues with it:

1) I had no experience with "cable keepers" and didn't understand their purpose, and the manual doesn't really explain them (they are spring-loaded levers installed at the bottom of the door that keep the cables from going slack and getting in the way when the door is being lowered). I noticed these performing their task later on when setting the upper door travel limit, which I'll explain later.

2) Step 4 of section 7 (the installation of the "Safe-T-Beams", the light sensors on either side of the door that detect any obstructions while the door is lowering) says to remove 1/4" of insulation from the wires where they connect to the opener, then twist the two "like" wires from each sensor together for insertion into the terminal block. This should really be 1/2", not 1/4". The insulation remaining on the two wires makes them too large to fit into the receiving hole, and 1/4" of wire length does not protrude into the hole far enough for the "gripper" teeth to grab them. Discovering this on a 8ft ladder while simultaneously pressing a screwdriver to release the gripper teeth and trying to insert wires upside down into a poorly illuminated receptacle that won't grip the wires is rather annoying. I had to trim more insulation off the wires before they would insert correctly.

Once installed, you switch from the installation manual to the owner's manual to program the opener. This 36-page document is also very well written and illustrated, but I did have one problem with it while setting the "down" and "up" limits for door travel. When following the first "Programming The Down Limit" procedure, the last step (after establishing the limit and "remembering" the setting) says that two LED lights will flash blue, then go out. While this is true, once the procedure is complete you immediately get two red LEDs that (to me) indicate cause for alarm. I didn't know what to do, so I went to the troubleshooting section where this LED combination says "Limits NOT set properly". I had to assume (and I was correct) that this simply means I had not yet set the "up" limit. I proceeded to that section, and after setting the "up" limit the red LEDs were no longer lit. Whew! The manual really should make this clear.

Another thing to be aware of with this type of door opener is that there are no belts, chains, or brackets directly connected to the door that effectively "pull it up" or "push it down". The opener pulls the door up by rotating the torsion bar shaft so the cables connected to the bottom of the door pull it up. That's easily understood, but when lowering the door, there's nothing "pushing" it down. The opener simply rotates the other direction, releasing tension on the cables so that the door comes down via its own weight in a sort of "controlled free-fall". Be aware that if you set the upper travel limit too high so that the vast majority of the raised door's weight is resting on the horizontal door rails that protrude into your garage, the door isn't going to start coming of its own accord down very quickly. This is exacerbated if your horizontal rails are mostly level, or worse, sloping downward away from the opening. I had the problem of the door lowering *very* slowly during the initial phase of a "close" operation, to the point where the cables went fairly slack (cue those "cable keepers" I mentioned above), then as the door started gaining momentum it SLAMMED downward forcing the cables taut, sometimes causing the opener to reverse direction. I fixed this by: 1) Raising the inward end of my door rails one inch above "level", so the door would have more of a tendency to "roll downhill" of its own accord; and 2) resetting the upper travel limit so the door was about one foot shy of its full upper position. Now the door comes down very smoothly and with virtually no initial slack in the cables.

Even with the minor documentation nits, I give this product a full five stars, and I'm very satisfied. It's VERY smooth and quiet as a mouse. It has no trouble at all raising this big heavy door, and it's SO much nicer than those old-style units with the long rails, belts or chains and woefully inadequate brackets that warp your door panels.

I purchased the sidemount garage door opener in December, from Amazon, came the next day, packaging was perfect.

Installed it the next day, easy to install, it looks nice and the unit itself isn't too heavy and easy to carry up the ladder.

Hit the button and was amazed at how quiet it is. Programmed the keypad, the cars and the extra remote and set up the app. The app doesn't work and had to call genie, on hold for an hour, super nice guy answered and we walked through the app and it connected. Opener seems to do everything is supposed to do and I'm happy.

A few days go by and my wife calls, she can't get in the garage, the unit has two bonking red lights. It won't move, doesn't respond to any input from any remote or the wall mounted controller. Call genie again, hour plus wait. They instruct me to unplug the unit and plug it back in. Get it the ladder unplug the unit, wait 10 or more seconds and plug it back in. It works, thank the guy on the phone and in happy again.

3 days later, another call from my wife, for won't open. Two blinking lights, call into genie, in told that is a mechanical failure, not in the unit but my door is mechanically having issues and tripping the safety sensor.

I call the garage door company, the door has been working fine since 2006 but safety and a working door is important. New springs, bearings, rollers and anything else that moves is replaced. $2300 later my door is like new! Opener is reset by an authorized genie technician and my door is given a clean bill of health and I am told annual maintenance and you for will last a lifetime.

Wife calls again, can't get in. 2 blinking red lights. I've become smarter, instead of getting the ladder down to unplug the unit, I just turn the breaker off, wait 10 or more seconds and turn it back on and the door most of the time works again.

I'm on vacation, amazon can't get the door to open, call my dad to retrieve the package of the porch, he gets the door to open but not all the way, it starts to close and stops, two blinking red lights. I walk him through how to turn off the breaker, wait 10 or more seconds turn it back on and to try the door. Door closes

We return from vacation, can't get in the house...

This goes on, genie says it's a fault with the door.

I take down the genie, replace it with a Chamberlin, just as quiet, I can use the myq camera keypad and it's faster. My wife complained that the genie seemed to be slower. Luckily I have 2 garage doors so I timed the door with a ceiling mount belt drive and it takes 12 seconds to open it close. The genie takes 18 seconds. The Chamberlin side mount takes a little over 12 seconds and mayhem the speed of the belt drive in our other garage.

I have the genie listed on offer up for parts. No takers yet.

I know some have had great luck with these. We did not. I am unable to recommend the genie side mount garage opener.

I don't have time to wait on hold with genie an hour at a time every 10-20 openings of the garage door because it thinks my door has an issue. It does not, verified with a very expensive bill and a certified technician.

I'm quite pleased with this opener and my main issues came from the fact that the door wasn't installed properly in the 90's... the rails aren't set wide enough at the bottom and so I couldn't install the cable tensioners. Long story. Got that figured out.

The device itself: pretty easy to mount but I wish the instructions were clearer as to how many turns you need on the bolts that grab the fitting that grabs the shaft. Typically you put 3/4 turn on all other hardware, like the drums, the spring etc... unless instructions say otherwise. Instructions didn't say anything, and so I put 3/4 turn on the 3 bolts, only to find out that it won't slide over the shaft anymore... Ugh. I loosened them up a bit, used the Dremel to remove the little bumps and it did mount, and it grabs the shaft just fine, but this could've been avoided if they specified how far to turn these bolts.

It took me several attempts to sync this thing to my WiFi. It worked, but not without waiting forever. My router is just above the garage ceiling, about 12' away from the opener and my phone has full strength WiFi signal there.

Otherwise it was easy and straightforward. I wish the opener wouldn't time out so quickly during adjustments. If I needed to consult the manual briefly, or get off the ladder to verify the gap at the bottom of the door, it would time out on me. I also wish there was a way to use one of the buttons on the remote, to turn the light on/off. There are three buttons and I only have one door. If the wireless wall console can operate the light, why can't the little fob? Or the app? Seems like something they could fix.

The battery is not Lithium manganese oxide. It's just a normal lead acid 12V battery. Not that it matters all that much, but I don't understand why they false-advertise the battery type.

I don't love the gentle start thing as the door rolls down. Since I can't possibly install the cable tensioners, originally (before I fixed it a different way), when the door started doing its little shaky start, the cables would get loose on the drum and jam the damn thing. Not sure why it starts that way after being open for a while. When I open and immediately close, it doesn't do it. I wish there was a way to turn that off. Maybe there is? couldn't find it though.

It's kind of weird that they only want you to rely on one bracket to hold it in place (well, it's also hanging on the fitting attached to the shaft). When I watched videos on how to install, you could see the operator wobble a bit as it rotates the shaft. I went ahead and added two more brackets, so that all 3 accessible corners are mounted to the studs. Works great and no wobble.

The opener is so quiet. I love it. Relatively fast, too. A little slower on the battery, but that's also totally fine. The operator is nicely tucked away, which is the main reason I got it. The light is pretty bright and I like that I can sync a couple more.

I plugged the operator in through a power monitor. When idling (doing nothing), the opener draws ~12.5W, ~0.1A on a 120V circuit. When it's pulling the door up (8x7 door) it takes just under 100W (less than 1A) and around 60W on the way down. Not sure about the light.

Can't speak to its longevity. Only installed it a month ago.

UPDATE: So after about a half dozen calls with Genie and Amazon, here's the scoop: Amazon sent me the entire wrong bundle, not what was listed on the Genie store on Amazon. No wifi, no battery backup, zilch. So now I've had to purchase all these separately, and I gotta hand it to the Amazon support staff--they've taken good care of me and we are financially even on it all. Since I had already paid my contractor to install the whole setup it was not an option to pay him to take it all down and put up a whole new setup (a total of 3 times), so I will just add to what's there. Genie support is very good, but for general support you have to wait HOURS for a call-back, but it is worth the wait. I did get right through to the Aladdin group and they were very helpful too.

So I'm waiting for parts to arrive now, all the genie stuff is honestly a breeze to work with, I expect it to be a cinch to add on to. Just looking forward to having everything in place. Upping my star rating to 5 cause the product and support for this (despite being an extra hassle) has been top notch all the way, and I would recommend anyone to buy this same bundle.

Oh yah, and RE the bluetooth LED light....just needed to follow directions. Literally can't get any easier.

Original post:

We are doing a large reno on our shop to convert most of it to a mom-in-law apartment (ADU) leaving about a third of it for a shop--and that included me losing the battle to have a man-door from the apartment to the shop. So while I'm waiting for next spring to get a different exterior door cut in I am relying on the garage door opener solely for access to the shop.

First blush--man I wish I would have done this sooner. Got the heavy duty one for large doors on this shop--quietest opener I've ever seen, pretty straightforward install, good instructions. I won't ever go back to belts, chains, worms, any of it. Shaft drive from now on. My contractor first got the sensor wires a little crossed, but once we got that sorted it works great. Very pleased with the core package.

LED wall light....no go. Can't get it to connect, it's via bluetooth apparently. Going to keep working on that with Genie. [read on]

Bought this package from Amazon, says it includes the battery backup.....no battery in the box I received. So, called Amazon and told me that I have to call Genie because that's their arrangement for this product. Call Genie support..."we can give you a call back in maybe 3 hours" (which will now be closing, so likely no call). Genie chat support...."want to have a senior tech contact you? that can take up to 3 days", so no help today. Only hoping that this will work out soon so I can have the door open, the light come on, and know that the battery is there to help it out when the power goes out (already has a couple times in the past month). I'll try and give an update on just what kind of service we get.

I normally don't write reviews but I had to for this garage door opener. The install was simple. The hardest part was running an outlet to the opener location but since I have an attic over the garage it was pretty straight forward. I installed two of these side by side for two garage doors so they used the same outlet and the installation looks clean. I did endless research and the reason I bought the Genie is because of the size compared to the Liftmaster and Chamberlain openers, Aladdin vs MyQ, the cost, battery back-up and the ease of install. I took so much pleasure in removing the old traditional openers which freed up all that ceiling space! You can barely hear this opener and I can probably reduce the sound even more by replacing the steel rollers with nylon rollers. The install was simple and the app is incredible. I had MyQ before but Aladdin is far superior and works flawlessly with Alexa. The automatic lock and scheduling feature gives you piece of mind that your garage door is closed and locked. I bought two on prime day and the total price was less than one Liftmaster.

For about a year my dad would manually raise and lower his shop door with a chain gear every single time he got in and out. Needless to say, multiple times a day over a year got old. The door was a 12x12 roll back so a regular opener wouldn’t cut it. I ended up getting him this one and he can’t stop telling me tank you for it. The install is straightforward, just make sure that you diligently follow the instructions and don’t skip steps like I did. Most importantly, make sure that you install the light that comes with this unit.

This opener is not like a standard chain or belt opener. It’s designed to be mounted on the side of the door onto the rod. You may be required to get a key for the shaft so keep that in mind before getting started. I also needed to trim the rod slightly to get this mounted. You will also need to mount the beam safety’s at the bottom of the door, and will have to drill into your track to add the automatic locking mechanism. The install is straightforward.

As for the operation of the unit, it is incredibly quiet. I’m amazed at how effortlessly it lifts the door and how it controls the decent. I haven’t had to use the battery backup yet, but I have no doubt it will take care of the job. The vehicle remote is a little frustrating to use as it doesn’t have a definite click like most garage door openers and the door has a slight delay when opening. You can also pair the door over WiFi and use an app to open remotely. This is a great opener and I wish I had gotten it for my dad much sooner.

This system is amazing, easy set up, fairly cheap for what it’s worth, so many different ways to control it that are very easy to set up. I love the light that comes with it and also it is the most quiet garage door opener I’ve owned!!! It also makes so much room in the garage!!!