The Best Medical Alert Systems With No Monthly Fee, Tested by Caregivers

Price: $189 one-time charge

The WellBe Medical Alert Device and Smart Speaker is a smart speaker that helps you stay on top of your health. Connected to Wi-Fi, it lets you use music, news, weather, and health apps. It will make your life more convenient, reminding you to take medications and refill prescriptions.

If you’re looking for a way to stay on top of your health, then the WellBe Smart Speaker is an ideal option — no wearables required. Operated primarily through voice commands, the smart speaker provides answers to health-related questions — and it can also play music and audiobooks.

You may be familiar with smart speakers like the Google Nest and Amazon Echo, but the WellBe is a smart speaker that specifically helps you maintain your health. When we wanted to record a glucose reading, for example, we said, “OK, WellBe. Record my blood pressure as X over Y.” Later we could ask what our blood pressure reading was. Keep in mind that the health data will come from other devices, not the smart speaker itself.

We programmed our medication schedule into the app so the speaker told us when to take which prescription. We also asked the speaker health questions, and it told us helpful information without requiring the app. When we wanted to know our treatment options after a recent hernia, for example, WellBe gave us the rundown. It also helped us locate the nearest pharmacy and told us a generic for an expensive medication we were taking.

The app has many uses in addition to health-related functions, from providing a weather report to updating us on the latest political news. The app includes iHeartRadio, which allows you to listen to tons of radio stations, but we used our own Spotify account to listen to music and podcasts.

Although the WellBe is useful for monitoring health, it doesn’t have fall detection or an urgent-response feature. For that, you’d need to invest in other WellBe products, like the WellBe Medical Alert Pendant or the WellBe Medical Alert Watch.

The WellBe Medical Alert Device and Smart Speaker costs $189, which is a bit higher than other devices on this list. There are no monthly costs to use the smart speaker on its own. Although $189 may seem like a high startup cost, there are no monthly fees, so the device pays for itself in less than a year compared to $40-a-month medical alert systems.

Not paying monthly fees was great, but the device was not helpful when we staged a fall that would have required a call to 911. For those events, you want a system with urgent-response buttons or voice commands that connect you to 911 to get the help you need. Every other device on this list has that feature.

The WellBe Medical Alert Device and Smart Speaker would be a good addition to your health monitoring devices.

Price: $99.99 one-time charge

By pairing with your smartphone, the Silent Beacon offers quick access to 911 calls, and it will even send automated messages to loved ones. Best of all, it can be worn on your wrist.

The Silent Beacon looks like a watch without a face. It’s a circular, black speakerphone that can be worn around your wrist. On the side of the circular part of the bracelet is a large button with a raised center. When we pressed the button for two seconds, it made an emergency phone call to 911, as well as a custom message to the other emergency contact we’d selected (we had it say, “Come home now”). Our contact got the message via email, a push notification from the Silent Beacon app, and a text message. Using our GPS from our mobile app, the message included our location as well.

The other button on the Beacon, located on its right side, has four functions: turning on the device, sending a message to your emergency contact to let them know you’re OK, letting them know you want to be monitored, and getting the status of the device (either connected to the app, not connected, or power off).

Does that sound too good to be true? You can program the Silent Beacon to call any number, but because there are no monthly fees, you can’t connect to a 24/7 monitoring center — unlike with a traditional medical alert system. That means you won’t have someone stay on the phone with you until help arrives. When we pushed the button, for example, we had to wait until one of our emergency contacts or 911 called us back. Although 911 will respond quickly, it could mean a bit of a waiting game if your friends and family are busy.

The Silent Beacon costs a one-time fee of $99.99. There are no mandatory monthly fees, but we still got to add one emergency contact to whom we could send email, push, and text alerts. We also protected our mobile app data with a unique password so only the people we selected could access our location and device information. In the app’s Community tab, we could see other users in our area and tell each other about potential safety threats, like a package thief or a hurricane. It was kind of like Nextdoor, the neighborhood watch app we’ve used in the past.

Silent Beacon offers some paid plans that provide additional features with the Safety App, such as up to eight emergency contacts, low-battery alerts, and 24/7 professional monitoring. Plans cost $2.99 to $9.99 a month, if you are OK with paying a bit for more protection. If not, no monthly fees it is!

The main drawback of the Silent Beacon is that it requires a nearby smartphone in order to function since it doesn’t have a built-in cellular connection or GPS. Monthly fees are technically required, then, since you’ll need a cell phone plan for it to work.

>>Read more: The Best Senior Phone Plans

If you want quick, wearable access to help, the Silent Beacon is an affordable and easy option.

Price: $149 one-time charge

FastHelp makes getting help in an emergency simple: as simple as pushing a button, with no monthly fees whatsoever.

The FastHelp is a medical alert button we carried around in our pockets. To call 911, all we would have had to do was push the big, red button. It would have said, “Calling 911, calling 911,” and we could have explained our emergency to the operator through the button itself. Because the device uses cellular networks, it could tell our location using triangulation as long as we were within range of a cell tower. (Locations from mobile phones aren’t as exact as locations from landlines, however, and some carriers have more accurate results than others.) Accidents happen, of course, so when we pushed the button by accident, all we had to do was hold the small, silver button for five seconds to cancel the call.

FastHelp is similar to the Silent Beacon in that it lets you call 911 with the click of a button. It’s not a wearable device like the Silent Beacon or Apple Watch SE, but it has a belt clip and lanyard slot (FastHelp sells neither). We kept the device in our pocket, which may be a burden for some people — especially those without pockets. Like the Silent Beacon, FastHelp lacks fall detection or 24/7 professional monitoring like more traditional medical alert systems, hence the lack of monthly fees.

FastHelp costs $149, making it cheaper than the $189 WellBe but about $50 more than the Silent Beacon. Given its similarity to the Silent Beacon, we don’t see where the $50 is going, especially because FastHelp isn’t wearable and lacks an app for caregivers. Neither device requires monthly fees.

You can use FastHelp only to call 911, not friends and family like with the Silent Beacon. FastHelp is a button, not a wearable bracelet or smart watch, which makes it easier to lose or forget to bring with you.

The Expert Take

From Cody McGonagill

Firefighter/EMT

I have observed that smartphones are becoming increasingly prevalent among older generations; however, I have also seen individuals who do not use the devices their family has purchased for them due to the complexity and advanced features. It is important to understand where the user is at in their understanding of the device.

FastHelp is a good option for people who don’t want to wear their medical alert system, but still want a way to contact 911 in their pocket.

Price: $249 one-time charge

It’s more widely known for its entertainment features, but the Apple Watch SE has some features of a medical alert device, such as fall detection and an urgent-response button.

The Apple Watch SE combines the best of a medical alert system with many of the capabilities of an iPhone, all on your wrist. It has not only fall detection, but also crash detection. We conducted a test fall, and a message popped up immediately on the watch’s screen asking if we had a fall. In order to prevent the device from calling 911, we deactivated the call. We did, however, send emergency messages to our contact through the watch. The text messages even included our location.

The Apple Watch SE is the only option on this list with fall detection, but that only scratches the surface of what you can do with the device. Essentially, it’s a wearable iPhone that lets you see text messages, monitor your heart rate and sleeping cycles, listen to music, and a ton of other capabilities. It’s all part of WatchOS, the Apple Watch operating system. Its price tag is steep compared to the other devices on this list, but the Apple Watch SE’s capabilities blow the others out of the water. For seniors not familiar with technology or people who have difficulty controlling apps on a tiny screen, however, the many capabilities could actually be a bad thing.

>>Read more: The Best Smartwatches for Seniors

The Apple Watch SE starts at $249, making it the most expensive device on this list. And when we say “starts,” we mean it. Buying it in a bigger size, with a certain finish, or with GPS and cellular could make the price even higher. If you want to save money, go with the GPS-only option. If you go the GPS-and-cellular route, you’ll have to add the watch to your plan with either T-Mobile, Verizon, or AT&T, which means you’ll have some monthly fees. Even GPS-only, however, requires an iPhone. That could cost hundreds of dollars, so this is only a good option if you already have an iPhone.

Unless you purchase a separate cellular plan for your watch, the Apple Watch SE will work only if you have your cell phone nearby. When we left it in another room, we couldn’t use the watch to call people or send texts. We wouldn’t need our phone nearby if we upgraded to a GPS-and-cellular plan, but then we’d have monthly fees added to our phone bill every month. That’s not why you’re reading this page.

Combining fall detection and an urgent-response button with iMessage, Apple Pay, and a ton of other WatchOS apps, the Apple Watch SE is the Cadillac of medical alert systems. To learn more about how this device can protect your loved ones, read our guide: Apple Watches vs. Medical Alert Systems.