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A selectable reference point at this price is genuinely rare and worth having. Against that, the instructions are widely criticised and the unit setting does not appear to survive a power cycle, which is a daily irritation rather than a one off.
| What the listing says | What owners report |
|---|---|
| Distance, area, volume, Pythagoras | Present |
| 2 bubble levels and LCD backlit | Present |
| Nothing about the reference point | Selectable front or back. A real plus |
| Nothing about unit memory | Resets to default after power off |
| Instructions included | Widely described as unintelligible |
| Imperial and metric | One buyer received a metric only unit |
| Nothing about build | Described as small and cheap feeling plastic |
The most helpful review on the listing, with six votes behind it, comes from someone who wanted a rangefinder for distance work but found them expensive and tried this instead.
Their key observation is that it allows you to set it to measure from the back of the device, for example when you put it against a wall, or from the front. That is the reference point setting, and it is the single largest source of avoidable error in laser measuring. These units are around five inches long, so measuring from the wrong end costs you five inches, roughly eighty times the tolerance any of them claim.
Plenty of budget units have a fixed datum and simply expect you to work it out. Having it selectable, and having an owner notice and explain it, puts this ahead of several more expensive tools on a point that actually matters. The general principle is worth understanding whatever you buy.
One owner, whose review five other buyers found helpful, described setting the unit to feet and inches once and taking half an hour to work out how, between long presses and short presses. Then, once it shuts off, you have to do it all over again. Their point was that it should at least remember which units you want. If you measure in imperial and pick this up occasionally, you will be relearning the sequence and reapplying the setting every session. If you use it daily, you will do it once a morning and stop noticing.
Separate from the settings problem, several owners find the documentation poor. One called the instructions very poor and the unit complicated to operate, also noting that rechargeable batteries are not included. Another simply found it difficult to use.
Against that, other owners describe it as easy to use and light, with one saying it measures easily and does everything they needed. The pattern we see across budget units generally holds here: people who read the manual once and use the tool regularly are happy, and people who pick it up twice a year are not.
Units. One owner reported receiving a unit that reads only in metres and called it totally useless. We have now documented this on several products, including a Leica listing and Hilti, and it is a market version problem rather than a settings problem when the option genuinely is not there. Given that another owner spent half an hour successfully setting feet and inches, it is worth checking which situation you are in before concluding the tool is broken.
Dead on arrival. Two owners report units that would not power on, one saying it worked once and then did not, the other that it arrived with batteries correctly fitted and simply would not switch on. Two accounts against 577 ratings is not a pattern, but it is a reason to test it the day it arrives rather than the week you need it.
The positives are modest and consistent. It works, it is light, it is easy enough once you are past the setup, and it is good value. One owner in Spanish calls it very accurate and easy to use. Another notes the reading is taken from the front of the device on theirs, which again points to the datum being configurable rather than fixed.
Nobody is claiming it is a professional instrument, and nobody seems to expect it to be.
Anyone who wants a selectable reference point at the bottom of the market and will use the tool often enough to keep the operating sequence in their head. If you are measuring regularly, the settings annoyance fades and the datum control is a real advantage.
Occasional users, who will face the manual again every time. Anyone who works in feet and inches and does not want to reset that on every power cycle. And anyone who wants the tool to feel substantial, given the plastic complaints.
If the interface is your worry. The RockSeed two pack is simpler, carries 22,354 ratings, and gives you two units for less.
If you want a bigger, clearer screen. The DTAPE has a two inch backlit display, which is the most praised feature of any budget unit we cover.
If you want the datum control without the frustration. The Klein is also settable front or back, has 1,120 ratings at 4.5, and a finish carpenter reports trusting it to a sixteenth of an inch inside thirty feet.
If you will only use it twice a year. Buy the simplest tool you can, not the one with the most modes. Our DIY guide argues that case in full, along with the fractions question that matters more than anything else for cutting work.
Whatever you buy, check it against a known length, and set the reference end before you do.
If you have not settled on a unit yet, the laser measures we recommend are gathered on our front page, eight of them, each with the reason it is there.