During testing, the Ecovacs robot vacuum was able to maneuver around the socks and faux pet messes we laid out in our obstacle course, but it did suck up a USB cord in its path. We recommend double-checking that any power cords are out of the way before using the vacuum. Additionally, we challenged each vacuum by creating a small obstacle course of furniture for it to navigate, placing socks and USB cables in its path to see if it avoided the objects or ran them over.
If you’re okay with providing the iLife V3s Pro a little supervision, this incredible value will serve your floors well. Most Roomba models will run for around 90 minutes before needing to recharge. Robot vacuums take their time cleaning your space, and Roombas are no different. The iRobot Roomba i3+ is an example of a mid-priced model that comes with this feature. The cleaning time depends on room size and, for models equipped with dirt sensors, volume of dirt. First-generation models must be told the room size, while subsequent models either estimate room size by measuring the longest straight-line run they can perform without bumping into an object or create an accurate map of the room.
So to ensure you get the most vacuum bang for your bucks, we’ve tested the leading models to really put them through their paces – and we’ve tested them in our own homes, which are much more challenging than any test lab. We’ve tested all their key features – runtime, suction power, mapping and automation capabilities and more – in real-world situations to help bissell crosswave cordless you find the best robot vacuum for you and your home. They’re smaller and more powerful, delivering better cleaning with a lot less noise. And they have clever navigation systems to ensure they don’t miss an inch or vacuum up a lost sock. Some can even detect when they’re moving from hard floors to carpets or rugs and adjust their cleaning power accordingly.
No one wants to miss their cat riding a Roomba, so you have the option of continuing the job should you return home before it’s completed. The biggest difference from our top picks is that the Roomba 600 series doesn’t have smart mapping and navigates semi-randomly rather than following an orderly, predictable path. This was the norm for robot vacuums until a few years ago, and a lot of people were happy with that approach. But as of 2022, smart robots are much more common and affordable—and much better at cleaning large spaces consistently and efficiently. Even so, the semi-random bots still have a place in the world, and we’ve concluded that the Roomba 600 series is a great option if you want a simple, sturdy bot for a fair price.
These rubber brushes don’t get tangled by long hair the way bristle brushes can. Because there’s no option to add keep-out zones in the app, you’ll need to buy iRobot’s virtual walls if there are places you don’t want the robot to go. They cost $99 for two, so if you need more than a couple of keep-out zones, it’s worth going for the j7 instead.
The Eufy RoboVac 11S and other Eufy bots whose model names begin with a number instead of a letter stand out as some of the quietest robot vacuums we’ve tested. They’re also some of the shortest, so they can fit beneath more pieces of furniture. Like the Roomba 694, the Eufy 11S is semi-random in its navigation, so it’s best for cleaning just a few rooms at a time.
Luckily, the iRobot Roomba s9+’s performance matches its hefty price tag – especially when dealing with pet hair. It picked up 98% of pet hair on average across carpet and hardwood floors, which makes it a close second to the iLife V3S Pro. Aside from cleaning your floors, Roombas also come with features such as voice control, smart mapping, and scheduled cleans. Our home testers are currently performing long-term tests on our top vacuums to put these smart features through their paces in the real world. We will update this list with their fresh and thorough insights once those tests are complete.
Even if you’re home to babysit your robot and rescue it from trouble, that kind of defeats the purpose of having an automatic vacuum. You just clip on a water reservoir (no cleaning solution allowed with most models) and a microfiber pad behind the vacuum irobot vacuum cleaner intake, and the bot wipes the floors while it vacuums. Based on our testing, the Eufy RoboVac X8 seemed to be a fine laser-nav robot vacuum, but it’s relatively expensive and doesn’t offer meaningful improvements over the company’s cheaper models.
If you live in an apartment or smaller space though, this shouldn’t be an issue. We also added sand, dirt, hair, and pieces of cereal to the floor to determine how effective the vacuums were at picking up different types of debris. Finally, we took the best robot vacuums from our lab tests home, where we continued to use the devices in our daily lives for an entire month. We evaluated the vacuums based on their performance, design, ease of use, and more before assigning a weighted score.