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Best Rated Robot Vacuum Cleaner

Robot vacuums are great for keeping your floors tidy but they cannot replace a regular vacuum. Even the best robot vacuum for vinyl plank floors robots aren't able to get deep into carpets and rugs, and they can become tangled in cords and socks.

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

Battery Life

The majority of robot vacuums are able to handle a few cleaning sessions without needing to be charged. The Ecovacs Q30S Combo is the runner-up of our top choices. It has an energy-efficient battery that can last for up to 180 minutes (3,230 square feet) on one charge. This will suffice for the majority of small homes with a mixture of hard flooring and carpets with low pile or larger homes where the rooms are roughly the same size.

A longer battery life means the robot can spend more time cleaning and less charging on its dock. It's a good idea to choose an auto-emptying dust bin because they are more efficient in picking up debris and returning to the dock for recharging. It's important to clean or replace filters and wipe down the sensors and the camera on a regular schedule so they can be seen clearly.

Smart mapping technology can be a useful feature, since you can program your robot to ensure it only cleans certain rooms or areas it's likely to bump into furniture and other obstacles. This feature is also useful to ensure that your robot is able to reach under and around furniture like beds, sofas and other high-height items. Some cheap robovacs offer boundary strips you can place on the floor to block off areas and other models with higher-end features make use of sensors and cameras to accomplish this.

Even the best robot vacuums cannot replace a traditional vacuum for heavy-duty large-pile dirt and other debris. It is recommended to keep a power vacuum on hand to tackle these tasks, and also schedule robot vacs for light cleanings throughout the week.

Navigation

A robot must be able to navigating your home without getting caught or crashing into things like metal screws, pet hair or sand. In our tests, a tracking device is used to follow the robot around a multi-room lab. It then tracks its surroundings. We also look for the extent to which it can avoid obstacles, including power cords, furniture legs and pet waste.

The best robots can map out different floors and identify landmarks, like doors and windows. The most advanced robots, like the Roborock S8 Pro Ultra have a dual sensor navigation system, which uses an LIDAR to draw a room's layout and a structured-light camera mounted on the front to identify objects in real-time. This allows the S8 to avoid common obstacles like power cords and furniture legs and can also store up to four floor maps in its internal memory.

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

A large onboard dustbin which does not need to be emptying manually, is also a feature that's important. For models that mop the floor, this water tank will provide enough water for several weeks of cleaning sessions. Karcher's RCV 5 is an excellent example of this. It has a big enough footprint to fit under furniture, but not so big that it can't fit into the nook between your toilet and bathtub.

Apps

Robot vacuums are a lot like upright vacuums and require a lot of tech to get them up to speed. The result is a mature market that is brimming with options. Even the best models require interaction from their users particularly when it comes time to plan cleaning schedules, design the floor plan of your home and install virtual barriers.

To lessen the chance of this kind of interaction, look for a model that has its own app to determine the layout of your home and save the settings for future use. This will allow the robot vacuum to continue where it started on subsequent runs rather than having the mapping process restarted every time.

It is also recommended to consider models that offer spot or zone cleaning. They let you tell the robot vacuum to concentrate on a particular area for example, like under the dining table following a big family meal. It is possible to do this using the app or by voice commands.

Object avoidance is another feature that's available with numerous models. It allows the robot when it comes across something in its way such as a box shoes or a crate filled with dog toys, to instruct itself around. This prevents it from crashing into objects that could harm its sensors or cause jams.

Some of the more expensive models we tested have this feature. However, they usually rely on bump sensors for this and didn't always manage to avoid things in my test homes.

Pet Hair

When it comes to picking up pet hair, choose the right model designed to handle this type of debris. The most effective models come with high suction power and a brush that prevents tangling, and an emptying mechanism that can automatically dump hair into the dust bin when needed. Some are also able to detect dirt levels and adjust the intensity of cleaning in line with the level of dirt. They can also detect objects that aren't a part of your flooring, such as furniture toys, food bowls, toys cords, and so on.

Certain robot vacuums come with features that are pet-friendly, such as a small water dispenser that can be used to mop floors, and a HEPA filter that can help reduce allergens such as pet dander. They could also provide an operation that is quieter, which can reduce the amount of sound generated during cleaning.

robot vacuum cleaner vacuums with mapping capabilities are a great option for pet owners. They're designed to evaluate your home and develop an strategy based on the layout of each room and obstacles. For instance, the Shark Matrix Plus 2-in-1 Robot Vacuum is a smart vacuum that has an impressive capability to map a room and navigate around furniture and other obstructions with gyroscope and accelerometer smart sensors that work together to learn the layout of your home.

Other advanced models let you define no-go zones that are areas that the robot is expected to avoid--like fragile items or pet feeding spots. You can adjust these settings via an app. This feature can be especially beneficial for families with a lot of activity, as it allows you to schedule cleaning sessions and make adjustments without having to be in the same space as the vacuum. Another great feature is spot cleaning that lets you use the vacuum to clean a particular area that is particularly dirty or brimming with pet hair.

Dust Bin

If you don't need something small, go for a model with a big bin or even a self-emptying dustbin. This is why we suggest opting for a model that has an enormous bin or self-emptying bins. The former will enable you to keep track of cleaning the bin regularly enough to keep track of its performance and the latter will save you time and effort by automatically dumping its contents into an internal container after every few cleans.

Regardless of the size of your home, most robots can easily move around and up to furniture, and they can recognize and navigate around household obstacles such as shoes, loose cords and dog puke. Make sure you choose models with intelligent mapping capabilities. This lets them "learn the layout of your house and plan more efficient routes.

Some models offer spot cleaning. This lets you manually target an area of your house for thorough cleaning. We've found that most of the top performers in our tests can pick up fine particles like baking soda and sand along with heavier debris such as oatmeal orzo pasta screws, and pet hair.

Based on the manufacturer, most robots will last for a long time and continue to perform so long as you maintain them with regular maintenance, such as cleaning hair that has become tangled from brushes and emptying the dust bin after each use, and wiping down cameras and sensors when needed. The most efficient robots tend to be more modular, which makes them easier and less costly to replace or repair parts such as batteries and wheels as they wear out.