At a recent trip to Walmart I happened to stop by the automotive department and noticed that they are now carrying transponder keys. They didn’t appear to have a huge selection but I definitely saw Ford and Nissan keys which seemed to be priced at about $50 dollars. The keys they are using are clonable which means they will use a scanner to read the chip value of the original key, swap the keys and then write that value to the new key. A very simple procedure and much easier than using a scan tool.

This is a step in the right direction for retailers, especially since transponder keys have been on the market for over 10 years and it’s still such a pain to have them duplicated. Hopefully more companys will follow suit and it will continue to get easier to have transponder keys made. Not that I don’t recommend showing some love to your local Locksmith (I do) but not all Locksmith’s have this capability. If you are in need of a new key you might want to check this out since it’s much cheaper than going to the dealer, as I’m sure many of you already know!

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