"A Guide To Best Rated Robot Vacuum In 2024

Best Rated Robot Vacuum Cleaner

While robot vacuums are excellent in keeping your floors clean, they can't replace a full-size vacuum. Even the best vacuums (continue reading this) struggle to get deep into carpets or rugs, and can often get caught in cords and socks.

Maintaining a regular schedule of maintenance (replacing filters, cutting tangled hair from brushes, and emptying the dust bin) will help your robot last longer.

Battery Life

Most robot vacuums are capable of handling a few cleaning sessions before needing a charge. The runner-up of our overall picks, the Ecovacs Deebot Q30S Combo comes with a battery capable of lasting up to 180 minutes (3,230 square feet) of cleaning time on one charge. That amount of runtime is more than enough to clean most smaller homes with the combination of hard floors and low-pile carpets or a larger house in which the rooms are about the same size.

A longer battery life means the robot will spend less time charging and spend more time cleaning. It is recommended to choose one with an automatic emptying bin. These models are more efficient in picking up debris and returning back to the dock to recharge. It is important to clean or replace filters and wipe down sensors and cameras regularly so they can see clearly.

Smart mapping technology is an important feature to look out for, as it allows you to program your robot vacuum reviews to clean certain rooms or avoid areas where it's likely to bump into furniture or other obstacles. It's also beneficial for ensuring your robot is able to go under and around beds, sofas and other furniture with a high height. Some cheap robovacs come with boundary strips that you can use to block off certain areas. Other high-end models depend on sensors and cameras.

Even the top robot vacuums aren't able to substitute a traditional vac when it comes to heavy-duty dirt and debris. It is recommended to keep a power vacuum on hand for these chores and plan robot vacuums for light cleaning throughout the week.

Navigation

A robot must be able to navigate your home without getting stuck or crashing into objects like screws made of metal, loose pet hair, or sand. In our tests, a tracking device is used to follow the robot vacuum hoover around the multi-room lab. It then maps its surroundings. We also look for how well it avoids obstacles like power cords, furniture legs, and pet waste.

The best robots are able to identify different floors and identify landmarks, like windows and doors. The most expensive robot vacuum advanced robots like the Roborock S8 Pro Ultra have a dual sensor navigation system, that uses an LIDAR to draw a room's layout and a structured-light camera at the front to detect objects in real-time. The S8 can evade obstacles such as cables for power and furniture legs. It also has the ability to store up to four floor maps.

More affordable models don't have this kind of object detection and rely on bump sensors, which aren't as accurate. In my tests they were able see through dog poop and cords, as well as a pair of shoes placed in the middle. The best inexpensive robot vacuum value pick, the Dreametech D10+, is one exception to this. It is a great carpet and hard floor pickup, excellent hair and Best Vacuums tangle pickup, and a near perfect auto empty score.

Another feature that is important is a large dust bin which doesn't have to be manually empty, and for models that mop, a water tank that can hold weeks worth of cleaning sessions. Karcher's RCV 5 is a great example of this. It has a large enough footprint to be able to be placed under furniture, but not too big that it is unable to fit into the nook between your toilet and tub.

Apps

Robot vacuums are similar to their upright counterparts and require lots of technology to keep them up to date. There are plenty of alternatives available in a marketplace that is a mature. But even the best models require some interaction with their users - particularly when cleaning schedules are being planned, establishing a home floor plan and setting up virtual barriers.

To lessen the chance of this interaction, consider looking for a model that has its own app to recognize the location of your home, and save those settings for the future. This will allow the robot vacuum to continue where it left off on subsequent runs rather than having the mapping process restarted each time.

It's important to look out for a model that has zones or spot cleaning modes. They allow you to instruct the robot vacuum to focus on a specific area for example, like under the dining table after an enormous family meal. You can usually choose to do this using the app or voice commands.

Many models also provide objects-avoidance. It allows the robot to detect objects in its path, such as a box of shoes or a crate of dog toys, and then guide itself around it. This will prevent it from crashing into objects that could harm its sensors or cause jams.

Some of the more expensive models we've tested come with this feature. However, they usually rely on bump sensors to accomplish this, and they weren't always able to stay clear of things in my test homes.

Pet Hair

Find the best vacuum cleaner specifically designed to remove pet hair. The most effective models will have a high suction, a brush which stops tangling, and an automatic emptying mechanism. Some models can detect dirt levels to alter the level of cleaning. They also can detect items that aren't a part of your flooring at home, such as furniture, toys and food bowls.

Some robot vacuums have extra features that are pet-friendly, such as small water dispensers that can be used to mop floors and an HEPA filter that can help reduce allergens like pet dust. They may also have a quieter mode of operation to reduce the amount noise that is generated during cleaning.

Robot vacuums that include the ability to map are a great option for pet owners, as they're engineered to assess your home and devise an action plan in accordance with the layout and the obstacles in every room. For example the Shark Matrix Plus 2-in-1 Vacuum is a smart vacuum that has the impressive ability to map the room and navigate around furniture and other obstructions using gyroscope and accelerometer smart sensors which work in tandem to understand the layout of your room.

Other models that are more advanced allow you to create no-go zones, which are areas that the robot is expected to avoid--like fragile items or pet feeding spots. You can adjust these settings through an app. This feature can be especially beneficial for families with a lot of activity, as it allows you to plan your cleaning schedule and make adjustments without having to be in the same room as the vacuum. Another great feature is spot cleaning, which lets you direct the vacuum to clean an area that may be particularly dirty or full of pet hair.

Dust Bin

If you're not searching for something small it is recommended to select a robot vacuum cleaner best that can carry at least a full bag of garbage from one cleaning session. We recommend going for a model with a large bin, or perhaps a self-emptying dustbin. The former will allow you to keep up with emptying your bin frequently enough to keep it functioning. The second will save you time and effort by automatically emptying the contents into an inside container each time you clean it.

No matter the size of your house the majority of robots are able to move around and up to furniture, and almost all can detect and navigate around household obstacles like loose cords, shoes, and dog urine. Find models with intelligent mapping capabilities, which permit them to "learn" the layout of your home and design more efficient routes, and ones that can sense and avoid objects that could hinder their routes (like shoelaces or tangled charging cables).

Certain models also offer spot cleaning, which allows users to select a particular area of your home for thorough cleaning. We've observed that the majority of the top performers in our tests can pick up fine particles like baking soda and sand, together with larger debris like oatmeal orzo pasta, metal screws and best vacuums pet hair.

Depending on the brand, most robots can last for a long time and continue to perform so long as you keep up with maintenance, such as cleaning tangled hair from brushes and emptying the dust bin after every use and wiping down cameras and sensors when needed. The most efficient robots tend to be more modular which makes them simpler and cheaper to repair or replace parts such as batteries and wheels when they wear out.