TOP Best 13 Diversion Safes for Your Home
1 – A Plastic Water Bottle Stash
We’ll start with something mundane – a plastic bottle stash. The compartment area in this portable diversion safe is hidden by the label. This stash is good for hiding something like a pack of cash, a passport or other ID, and such. Just make sure it’s not something too heavy. Otherwise, the weight of the bottle might cause suspicion.
- Features: Compartment hidden by the label, portable.
- Benefits: Good for hiding small valuables like cash or IDs, inconspicuous as it blends with other bottles.
- Drawbacks: Limited by weight; heavier items might make it obvious that it’s not just water.
2 – WD40 Diversion Safe
This stash is disguised to look just like a plain WD lube canister. Simple and perfect for hiding smaller-sized valuables.
- Features: Disguised as a WD40 canister.
- Benefits: Ideal for smaller valuables, blends in well in a garage or toolshed.
- Drawbacks: Limited space and not suitable for larger items.
3 – Flower Pot Stash
- Features: A safe hidden within a flower pot.
- Benefits: Doubles as home decor, unlikely to be discarded.
- Drawbacks: Limited to non-waterproof items unless sealed properly.
4 – Underwear Stash
- Features: Designed to look like dirty underwear.
- Benefits: Highly unlikely to be touched or inspected closely.
- Drawbacks: May not be suitable for all users due to its design.
5 – Book Safe
- Features: Hardback English Dictionary appearance with a lock.
- Benefits: Authentic look, blends in on a bookshelf, added security with a lock.
- Drawbacks: If not surrounded by similar books, might stand out.
6 – Lighter Diversion Safe
- Features: Classic lighter design.
- Benefits: Extremely portable and affordable.
- Drawbacks: Very small storage space, limited to very small items.
7 – A Fake Power Surge Protector Safe
- Features: Looks like a standard surge protector.
- Benefits: Authentic appearance, unlikely to be stolen or tampered with.
- Drawbacks: Not portable and requires installation.
8 – Fake SPAM Steel Can
- Features: Vintage SPAM can design.
- Benefits: Nostalgic and blends in with pantry items.
- Drawbacks: Risk of being thrown out if not recognized as a safe.
9 – Hairbrush by Mantello
- Features: Functional hairbrush with a hidden compartment.
- Benefits: Dual-purpose, everyday use item.
- Drawbacks: Limited storage space, not suitable for larger valuables.
10 – Fake Pillow
- Features: Pillow with a hidden compartment.
- Benefits: Dual-purpose, can be used for rest and storage.
- Drawbacks: Items stored inside may be detectable to the touch.
11 – 26 oz. Salt Canister Solution
- Features: A fake salt canister.
- Benefits: Fits well in a kitchen setting, looks natural.
- Drawbacks: Potential for moisture damage if not sealed properly.
12 – Fake Rock Secret Key Compartment
- Features: Rock design with a compartment for keys.
- Benefits: More secure than traditional key hiding spots.
- Drawbacks: If not blended well with the environment, it can stand out.
13 – Air-vent Compartment Solution
- Features: Fake air-vent safe.
- Benefits: Ideal for larger items, handguns, and can be mounted on a wall.
- Drawbacks: Not portable, higher price point, and requires installation.
Why are diversion safes so great? Here’s the reason:
- With them, you can hide your stuff in plain sight, and no one will even notice that?
Read this post to find out everything you need to know about diversion safes today:
- What is a diversion safe?
- How are diversion safes better than traditional safes?
- What to look for in a high-quality diversion safe?
- What kind of things can you hide inside a diversion safe?
- Can you make a diversion safe?
- What are the best diversion safes on the market?
Comprehensive Buying Guide for Diversion Safes
When selecting the best diversion safe for your needs, it’s essential to consider several factors that go beyond mere aesthetics. Here’s a guide to help you make an informed decision:
Understanding Diversion Safes
Diversion safes, also known as hidden safes or disguised safes, are security devices designed to look like ordinary household or personal items. Their purpose is to conceal valuables in plain sight, deterring potential thieves by blending in with everyday objects.
Key Features to Consider
- Disguise Quality: The item should look indistinguishable from the real product it’s mimicking.
- Storage Capacity: Ensure it has enough space for your valuables while remaining discreet.
- Material and Durability: The safe should be made of sturdy materials to protect its contents.
- Lock Mechanism: Some diversion safes offer a lock for added security — consider whether this is a feature you need.
- Portability: If you need to travel with the safe, it should be compact and lightweight.
Common Questions to Address
- Where will you use it? Home, office, travel? The location can determine the most suitable type of diversion safe.
- What are you storing? Different items require different sizes and levels of security.
- Who are you hiding it from? Consider the likelihood of someone recognizing the safe for what it is.
Product-Specific Considerations
- A Plastic Water Bottle Stash: Ideal for gyms or outdoor activities. Check if the compartment is waterproof if you plan to store electronics or paper.
- WD40 Diversion Safe: Perfect for a garage setting. Ensure it’s placed among real tools and cans for better disguise.
- Flower Pot Stash: Aesthetically pleasing and functional as a pot. Consider the need for waterproofing if you plan to use it with a live plant.
- Underwear Stash: Highly unlikely to be inspected by thieves. Ensure it’s hidden among actual laundry for the best disguise.
- Book Safe: Excellent for an office or home library. Choose a title that blends in with your collection and consider a lock for extra security.
- Lighter Diversion Safe: Small and portable, suitable for a pocket or purse. Ideal for very small valuables like cash or SD cards.
- A Fake Power Surge Protector Safe: Good for an office or home office setup. Ensure it’s among actual electronics to maintain the disguise.
- Fake SPAM Steel Can: Great for a pantry or kitchen shelf. Make sure it’s not in a place where it could be accidentally opened or discarded.
- Hairbrush by Mantello: Functional as a brush, it’s a good choice for personal items. The storage space is limited, so it’s best for small valuables.
- Fake Pillow: Comfortable and practical, but ensure the items inside do not alter the shape of the pillow noticeably.
- 26 oz. Salt Canister Solution: Fits well in any kitchen. Be cautious of moisture if you’re storing items that could be damaged.
- Fake Rock Secret Key Compartment: Ideal for outdoor use. It should be placed among similar rocks to avoid detection.
- Air-vent Compartment Solution: Offers more space and is excellent for larger items. Installation is required, and it should be placed in a believable location.
Final Thoughts
Always remember that the best diversion safe is one that goes unnoticed. It should fit seamlessly into its environment and fulfill its purpose of keeping your valuables secure. Consider your personal circumstances, the nature of the items you wish to hide, and the environment the safe will be in when making your choice.
What is a Diversion Safe?
To get an idea of what a diversion safe is, think of spy movies, suspense thrillers, prison escape dramas, and such. Most likely, you’ve seen more than one or two examples of secret hiding places that movie characters used.
Some characters used their secret home safes to hide family heirlooms from thieves. Others built a diversion stash for documents, jewelry, cash, or other valuables. But whatever a character hid in their secret storage compartment, it always had to be something… well, secret. Something that looked nowhere near like a regular safe.
It could be a book safe with a gun in it. Or it could be a secret compartment on the bottom of an old chest or a traveling case. Some could hide their money or whatever in between drawers.
So the concept of a diversion safe is to build a hiding spot for valuables (or other items that you would like to keep undiscovered) that will not draw the attention of curious eyes. With a diversion safe, you can hide your stuff without worrying that someone could find it.
For instance, you can build such a thing on a wall and hide it behind, let’s say, a poster.
Remember that famous Shawshank Redemption scene? Andy Dufresne, the protagonist, spent several years digging a tunnel in a wall and used celebrity posters to hide it. While not safe per se, this is the perfect example of how you can keep something in plain sight and no one would suspect a thing.
Or you can remember the way Andy hid a tiny hammer that he used to grind his way through a rock wall in the Bible. Book safe is actually one of the most popular options for a diversion safe. Just because you can have plenty of books in your house, and who knows which of them really is a hiding spot.
The main feature of diversion safes is that they come in shapes of everyday things:
- A hair-brush;
- Food cans;
- a Coca Cola or a soda can;
- Anything from household items;
- A water pouch or bottle;
- Etc.
You can even use natural objects to hind things. Say, you can put important business documents, money, or something under a rock in your garden. It is unlikely that thieves would waste precious time turning all the rocks around your house, or checking on every single soda can in your kitchen, checking on books in your library, or tearing open your kids’ toys looking for whatever they came for.
It’s because when thieves break into a house, they tend to look for a traditional safe that could look like a cabinet or a closet and have a combination lock or any other sort of locking mechanism.
But that’s not the thing with diversion safes that can be just anything, and you won’t even know it.
Two Reasons Why Diversion Safes are Better Than Regular Safes
If you don’t have a safe yet, you might be wondering what type of safes you need – a secret one or a regular one. And while there are strong points on why you might want to get a regular steel safe, in this article, we will show you the opposite and tell you why sometimes buying (or making) a diversion safe is better.
Reason One – Diversion Stashes Don’t Draw Attention
Picture this. There’s a house with a metal safe in the living room. Where do you think an intruder would look first? Of course, that very thing would be the primary goal because traditional safes draw attention. There is just no way that those safes are empty or just collecting garbage.
In most cases, traditional design home safes are used to stock firearms, jewelry, money, and other valuables. So it is a no-brainer that a thief would try their best to get inside the safe or – if it’s too difficult – would try to take it with them.
In that matter, diversion safes are an altogether different case. They are just there, and no one will have a clue they are looking right at the stash. Those safes may be soda cans, a water bottle, kids’ toys, a rock in a garden, etc. In other words, diversion safes are “invisible.”
Reason Two – Diversion Safes May Be Portable
That’s right. In most cases, you may take valuables with you if there’s a need and have them hid in portable diversion safes. You can travel with a book, a food container, a secret compartment or a double-bottom bag, a hair-brush of some sort, etc.
You can hide your valuables all over your dorm room or a hotel room, being able to change locations at a minute’s notice. Often, a diversion safe is of small size, so it is so easy to travel with them.
But if you need to hide something of a bigger size, you will have to think of a bigger secret stash. But even in that case, a diversion case is way better than a traditional one. Because your valuables may be anywhere in your home, and only you will know where they exactly are.
What Must a Reliable Diversion Safe Be Like?
When choosing or making a DIY diversion safe, for best results, make sure that your model qualifies according to these four simple requirements:
1 – It should be properly disguised.
This means that a diversion safe should fit as naturally into your home interior environment as it is possible. When picking such a safe, consider the proper color and shape. The bottom line is that your secret stash should not give the impression of being out-of-place, something foreign and ingenuine.
If it’s a book safe, make sure it does not stand out from other books on the shelf. If it’s a soda can or some sort of another home item, make sure it’s made of the same material or at least give the impression of such. In other words, a perfect diversion safe should look natural and boring in a good way. By the way, this is our next point.
2 – Boring is Perfect.
The more down-to-earth your masked safe is, the better. Let it be something straightforward. Something that can be as uninteresting as it is even possible. Remember, the thing about a secret safe is to hide things in plain sight. So to pass as such a stash, your diversion safe must look like a perfectly boring everyday item. If you succeed in buying or make one, consider your valuables protected.
3 – Make sure that your secret safe won’t get thrown away by anyone in your family!
As we have said above, a perfect secret compartment should look like a boring everyday item. But the trick here is not to make it too boring or something that your wife, your girlfriend, or your kids would consider a piece of garbage and throw it away.
In other words, your diversion safe must be immune to being tossed away. For instance, if soda can contain cash or jewelry, make sure it looks like an unopened can. If it’s a book, let it stay among other books in your library and not just lay around your home randomly. Well, you get the idea.
4 – Is it even locked?
The funny thing about diversion safes is that sometimes people might underestimate the importance of locking systems in them while this is crucial.
For the most part, a diversion safe will stay untouched. But what if your kids would accidentally find it? They should not be able to open it and play with your valuables and toss them all over the living room. Or should it be discovered by an intruder, it is best if the safe would stay at least unlocked. So choosing a reliable locking mechanism is a good idea.
What Sort of Items Diversion Safes Are Good For?
Documents & Cash
These are the first things that come to mind when speaking of secret stashes. We know that from books and movies – most often, people choose secret compartments to hide legal or business papers and cash. That’s because paper is a great material to store in confined spaces. You may roll paper, fold it many times or even crumple it. Just make sure you’re not trying too hard to destroy your valuables in the process.
Keys
While others choose to hide spare keys just above their doors or under doormats, you don’t have to go that way. Use a more elaborate option – use a diversion safe! Come up with a few ideas of everyday things you can use as a stash for home or car extra keys.
Messages
You can use diversion safes not only for hiding things but also for secret communication. Just like they do in spy movies or in films about prisons where a group of people must keep their plans top secret. There are countless items you may store messages in:
- A book;
- A handle of a hair-brush;
- A secret compartment in a wardrobe;
- Etc.
Weapons
Knives, shockers, pepper spray, handguns, rifles – you name it. Of course, in most cases, you’re going to look for a spacious compartment. Just make sure the chosen compartment qualifies as a diversion safe and will not be discovered.
Drugs
IMPORTANT:
- We DO NOT support the keeping or distribution of illegal substances. This part of our guide is purely speculative.
It is a no-brainer that various kinds of secret stashes are used by criminals to hide illegal items such as drugs from police forces, fellow criminals, their children, etc.
Making a DIY Diversion Safe
There are countless ways to turn an old unused product into a secret stash item. For instance, watch the video below about the three easy ways of making your a diversion safe of your own:
If you choose to go DIY, here is the list of products that are be found in every home that makes for the best results in turning them into secret safes:
- Food containers;
- Lamps and flashlights;
- Candles;
- Bottles;
- Paperweights.
But if you’re unsure about your imagination and skills, our recommendation is to look for a professionally made diversion safe that you will be able to use for stashing jewelry, guns, or whatever valuables you have.
There are a lot of products of a wide price range to choose from. Below, you will find the list of thirteen best options to add to your online shopping cart. Check them out!
Flip through our extensive survival prepping guide! Learn about the first-class survival tools, the most crucial survival skills and everything concerning ideas for real preppers, homesteaders, and survivalists out there!
Frequently Asked Questions – FAQ
What is a Diversion Safe?
A diversion safe is a secret compartment where people store their valuables, jewelry, important papers, cash, weapons, and such. The main feature of diversion safes is that they must be masked to look like everyday items – a piece of kitchenware, a household item, a book, a table lamp, etc.
Do Diversion Safes Work?
For best results, diversion safes must meet the four basic requirements:
- They must look like regular everyday objects;
- They must fit it naturally into their surroundings;
- They must be disguised as something having minimal value;
- They must have locks on them.
How Do You Make a Diversion Safe?
With a little bit of imagination and skills, you can make a diversion safe out of practically any item that you have at home: an old case, a wardrobe, a bed, a hairbrush, a lamp, or a flashlight. You may also make a diversion safe inside a wall or inside a floor.
How Can I Hide My Safe in My Closet?
If you have a traditional safe, you may have it built into a wall of your closet or have it installed into the floor. But it is best to have a diversion safe you can keep inside a closet or a wardrobe. It may be something very usual for such an area: a shoebox, an iron, etc.
