The Best robot vacuums for 2024
The Best robot vacuums for 2024
If you’re going to drop some money on a robo-vac, make sure it’s the right one.
We could all use a little help with household chores, and robot vacuums can be the answer for those that just don’t have time to vacuum themselves (or particularly loathe the task). Robot vacuums have gotten much smarter in the past few years, with improved suction, self-emptying bases and even mopping capabilities, too.
And even though these are some of the most expensive smart home devices you can get, the good thing is that now you have tons to choose from at all different price points.
This space is saturated with machines made by iRobot, Shark, Anker and others, so if you need help figuring out where to start looking for the right robot vacuum for you, Engadget has you covered. These are our top favorite robot vacuums you can get today, plus advice on how to pick the best model for your home.
What to look for in a robot vacuum
Wi-Fi connectivity
As we explained in our budget guide, Wi-Fi connectivity is a key feature for most robot vacuums. Some of the affordable devices aren’t Wi-Fi connected, though, so it’s best to double check before you buy cheap. Wi-Fi lets a robot vacuum cleaner do things like communicate with a mobile app, which then allows you to control the device from your phone.
Vacuum suction
Suction power is another important factor to consider. Unfortunately, there isn’t a standard power scale that all robo-vacs adhere to, so it’s difficult to compare among a bunch of devices. Some companies provide Pascal (Pa) levels and generally the higher the Pa, the stronger the vacuum cleaner will be. But other companies don’t rely on Pa and simply say their robots have X-times more suction than other robots.
Floor type
Ultimately, we recommend thinking first about the floors in your home: Do you have carpet throughout, or tile and hardwood floors, or a mix? Robots with stronger suction power will do a better job cleaning carpets as they can get into the nooks and crannies more easily. Some machines have “max” modes as well, which ups the suction power but also typically eats at battery life faster than the “normal” cleaning mode.
Mapping features and object detection
Past a certain price threshold, you’ll find advanced perks like home mapping features, improved object detection and automatic dustbin disposal. Home mapping is exactly what it sounds like: The vacuum uses sensors to map your home’s layout as it cleans, allowing you to send it to particular rooms or areas. Most robo-vacs have object detection, but some will be better than others at actually avoiding things like chair legs and children’s toys. Higher-end models like iRobot’s j7 series even go so far as to promise obstacle avoidance to steer clear of things like pet poop that can potentially ruin your machine.
Robot vacuums with mopping capabilities
We’re also now starting to see more robot vacuums with mopping capabilities. Machines with this feature have a water reservoir either built into the robot’s chassis or as a separate piece that you swap in for the dustbin when you want to mop your floors. It makes the robo-vac more useful if you have hard floors in your home that you like to keep squeaky clean, but it does require more work on your part. Filling and emptying the reservoir remains a human’s job.
Auto-empty station
Finally, for peak convenience, consider a robot vacuum that comes with a self-cleaning base. These are basically garbage bins attached to the machine’s docking station. At the end of each job, the robo-vac automatically empties its small dustbin into the large clean base – that means you won’t have to empty the dustbin yourself and you’ll only have to tend to the base once every few weeks.
Just keep in mind that most self-emptying bases require proprietary garbage bags – another long-term expense you’ll have to factor in. Also, any vac-and-mop robot with a water tank will not dump its dirty water into the clean base, so you’ll still have to clean up that yourself.
The best robot vacuums for 2024
Shark AI Ultra Robot Vacuum
Best bag-free, self-emptying robot vacuum
Wi-Fi connectivity: Yes | Floor type: All floor types | Features: Obstacle avoidance, home mapping, LiDAR navigation, Alexa/Google Assistant voice control | Mopping capabilities: No | Self-empty: Yes
Shark’s RV2502AE AI robot vacuum with self-emptying base ticks all of the boxes that a mid-range machine should. It offers reliable cleaning performance, its mobile app is easy to use and it produces accurate home maps. On top of that, its base is bagless, which means you won’t have to spend money on extra bags every few months.
Setting up the Shark is as simple as taking it and its base out of the box, plugging the base in and downloading the companion mobile app to finish things up.
The machine connects to Wi-Fi, allowing you to control it via the app when you’re not at home, or using Google Assistant and Alexa voice control. The first journey the Shark makes is an “Explore Run,” during which it produces a map of your home that you can then edit from the mobile app.
The Shark produced a pretty accurate floorplan of my two-bedroom apartment, and I was happy to see a “re-explore” option that I could use if the map wasn’t up to my standards. With a completed map, you’re then asked to label rooms in your home. That way, you can send the Shark to only the bedroom for more direct cleaning jobs, select “no-go” zones and more.
The first few times I ran the Shark robot, I had it clean my whole apartment. I was impressed by how quiet it was – or rather, how much quieter it was compared to other robo-vacs I’ve tried. You’ll have to turn up the volume on your TV if it’s cleaning in the same room, but it’ll be hard to hear when it’s sucking up debris down the hallway.
It also did a decent job maneuvering its way around the cat toys I left out on the floor. The device’s object detection feature claims it can avoid things as small as four inches, but I found that it was much better at sensing and moving around the three-foot-long cat tunnel on my floor than the many tiny mouse toys.
But even if Mr. Mouse caught the edge of the Shark’s wheels now and then, the robo-vac took it all in stride. One thing I look for when testing robot vacuums is how much attention they need from me during cleanings. The best ones are hands-free and require no extra attention at all – once they start a job, they’re smart enough to putter around your home, move around objects and return to their base when they’re finished.
With Shark’s robo-vac, I never had to tend to it when it was cleaning. Now, I did my due diligence and picked up pieces of clothing and charging cables off the ground before running the Shark (ditto for every other robot vacuum I tested), so those things were never in the way. Most companion apps will actually remind you to do this before starting a cleaning job.
This Shark machine comes with an auto-empty station, so it will empty its dustbin after every cleaning run – and also during a job if its bin gets full before it’s done. In the latter situation, the Shark will go back to cleaning automatically after it’s freed up its bin.
That’s a great feature, but I found the best thing about the base to be its bagless design. Shark’s device is unlike most other robot vacuum clean bases because you don’t have to keep buying proprietary garbage bags to outfit the interior of the base.
When you want to empty the base, part of it snaps off and opens to eject debris, and it easily locks back in place when you return it. Not only is this quite convenient, but it also brings the lifetime cost of ownership down since you won’t be buying special bags every few months.
Its worth noting that Shark has a couple of models that are similar to the RV2502AE that just have a different color scheme, a 30- versus 60-day self-cleaning base capacity and other minor differences.
The biggest feature that would impact how you use the machine is the clean base capacity: we recommend springing for the 60-day models if you want to interact as little as possible with your robo-vac.
PROS
- Strong suction
- Included bagless self-emptying base
- Easy to use mobile app
CONS
- Loud while cleaning
The best robot vacuums for 2024
iRobot Roomba j7
Another good option
Wi-Fi connectivity: Yes | Floor type: All floor types | Features: Advanced obstacle avoidance, home mapping, Alexa/Google Assistant voice control | Mopping capabilities: No | Self-empty: No
Not much has changed since Amazon bought iRobot a little while back – the Roomba j7 remains a great option if you want the latest obstacle avoidance technology from the company in an attractive package. The $600 j7 doesn’t come with a clean base, but you can get the same vacuum with one for $200 extra.
The biggest selling point of the Roomba j7 series is its upgraded AI-driven computer vision which helps it detect and move around objects. This includes pet poop – a robot vacuum’s arch nemesis – and iRobot even promises pet owners that it will replace their j7 machine if it runs into pet poop within the first year of ownership.
That’s one feature I was happy I never got to test while reviewing this Roomba, as my cat kept all of her activity to her litter box. Otherwise, the Roomba j7 did a good job sucking up dirt and debris around my apartment and it didn’t make too much noise while doing so. All of the robo-vacs I tested at this mid-range level had roughly the same level of suction, so there wasn’t a big difference between them when it came to cleaning power.
Like other robot vacuums, you can set cleaning schedules in the iRobot mobile app so you never have to start a cleaning job on the fly. The app also has a “favorites” section, which lets you create profiles that you’ll use all the time like “clean the living room and the entryway.” And if you prefer to use voice commands, the robot supports Amazon’s Alexa and the Google Assistant.
The Roomba j7 has Imprint Smart Mapping, but unlike the Shark, it took more than one runthrough of my home for it to create a complete map. iRobot’s app distinguishes between a regular cleaning job and a “mapping run,” so make sure you’re choosing the latter the first few times you run the machine.
I tested the j7+, which means I was treated to the roaring sounds of the machine emptying its dustbin into its base. The emptying process isn’t as simple as an automatically opening flat that shakes dirt from one garbage can to another – the base actually sucks the dirt from vacuum.
This was the case for all of the machines I tried that came with self-emptying bases; they’re all quite loud, but the Roomba j7+ was the loudest of them all. The whooshing sounds last for only five to 10 seconds, but it was shocking the first time it happened. Just keep that in mind if you ever decide to run your self emptying robot vacuum at night when others are sleeping.
PROS
- Strong suction
- Advanced obstacle avoidance
- Easy to use mobile app
CONS
- Expensive
- Cannot clean while creating initial home map
The best robot vacuums for 2024
Anker Eufy RoboVac X8 Hybrid
Honorable mention
Wi-Fi connectivity: Yes | Floor type: All floor types | Features: Obstacle avoidance, home mapping, laser navigation | Mopping capabilities: Yes | Self-empty: No
You may be unfamiliar with Anker’s robot vacuums, but they’re often more affordable alternatives to the iRobots and Sharks of the world. The Eufy RoboVac X8 Hybrid isn’t a budget machine by any means, but it’s a solid robot vacuum that offers a few key features that many competitors don’t have. Plus, you can often find it on sale for $549 or even $449.
Unlike our other midrange picks, the X8 Hybrid doesn’t come with a self-emptying base, nor is there one you can purchase separately. It’s just a standalone robo-vac, but the “hybrid” indicates that it’s also a robot mop. It has both a dustbin for collecting debris and a 250-milliliter water tank that you can fill whenever you want to run a mopping cycle.
Plenty of other robot vacuums have this feature, and it could be even more useful than a self-cleaning bin if you have lots of tile or hardwood floors throughout your home.
Besides that, I was impressed with how easy it was to set up the X8 Hybrid, how accurate its mapping capabilities were and how many extra features it supports. It has four cleaning modes – auto, room, zone and spot – and four suction levels starting with Pure at the low end and topping out at Max.
These features give you a lot of control over where the machine cleans and how powerfully it will do so. The X8 Hybrid was in Pure mode the first time I ran it, and I was surprised by not only how quiet it was but also how thoroughly it cleaned considering it was on the lowest suction setting.
There’s also a “tap and go” feature that lets you pinpoint any spot on your home map in the EufyHome app, sending the robot there to clean. Manual controls are also available, which isn’t something you see on a ton of robo-vacs. This option lets you control the machine almost like a slow and slightly clumsy RC car, giving you more control over where it cleans.
It may not have the name recognition that iRobot or Shark do, but the Eufy RoboVac X8 Hybrid is a solid choice nonetheless, especially if you don’t care to add a clean base into the mix. It’s an even more tempting choice if you can snag it at a lower price when it’s discounted.
PROS
- Vacuum and mopping capabilities
- In-app manual direction controls
CONS
- No self-emptying base
iRobot
iRobot® Roomba Combo j7+
Best robot vacuum and mop
Wi-Fi connectivity: Yes | Floor type: All floor types | Features: Advanced obstacle avoidance, home mapping, Alexa/Google Assistant voice control | Mopping capabilities: Yes | Self-empty: Yes
Vac-and-mop devices aren’t new, but they are new to iRobot’s lineup and the company made a great one in the Roomba j7+ Combo. This machine offers an elegant solution to what usually is a more manual process of instructing the robot vacuum where to mop and where to actually vacuum.
The 2-in-1 version of the Roomba j7+ has a mop pad built in that only flips down when the machine senses that it’s rolling over hard flooring, dispensing water and cleaning solution before lighting scrubbing your floors. When it’s on carpet, it’ll act like a standard robot vacuum.
Arguably the most compelling reason to get a robot vacuum at all is convenience, and iRobot managed to figure out how to incorporate mopping into an already stellar robot vacuum without removing any convenience. Sure, you have to add water and cleaning solution when you want to mop, and dispose of the remnants when it’s finished, but that’s about it.
The Roomba has enough smarts to take care of the rest, without accidentally dampening your carpet along the way. The included self-emptying base still comes in handy as it will suck up the vacuumed debris that the robot catches, but just know that it will not take care of excess water for you.
Aside from the adding mopping abilities, the Combo is basically just a Roomba j7+ and that’s not a bad thing. It’s been one of our favorite robot vacuums since it came out thanks to its improved obstacle avoidance, strong suction power, accurate home mapping technology and a decent runtime.
The iRobot mobile app, from which you can start and schedule jobs, edit your home map and more, is easy to use, and you can even control the machine using Alexa or Google Assistant commands. The hardest thing to swallow about it (besides how it sounds like a jet engine when emptying debris into the clean base) is its sky-high, $1,100 price tag.
iRobot understood that caveat fairly quickly and recently introduced the Roomba j5 series to remedy it. The Roomba Combo j5 and Combo j5+ machines come in at $600 and $800, respectively, and the biggest difference between them and their j7 siblings is that users will have to swap out their bins when it’s time to mop instead of vacuum.
The more advanced of the two, the Roomba Combo j5+, can identify no-go zones that you set in the app as areas to avoid while mopping, plus it has advanced obstacle avoidance. We haven’t fully tested these yet, but we expect them to perform similarly to the j7 Combo series. So as long as you’re ok with a bit more manual work when you want to mop, the j5 Combo series could be a good option if you want to save a bit of cash.
PROS
- Vacuum and mopping capabilities
- Senses floor type to automatically mop certain surfaces
- Included self-emptying base
CONS
- Expensive
- Base requires proprietary garbage bags
Are robot vacuums worth it?
We tackled this question when we reviewed budget robot vacuums and the answer is yes, especially if vacuuming is one of your least favorite chores. Robots take the hard work out of cleaning your floors – just turn the thing on and watch it go.
Any robot vacuum cleaner worth buying is semi-autonomous in that it will suck up dirt around your home until its battery is low and then make its way back to its charging dock. Unlike a regular vacuum, you should only have to interact with it to turn it on, empty its dustbin and untangle it if it were to get stuck somewhere.
That’s not to say robot vacuums are perfect. They’re almost always less powerful and less flexible than traditional vacuums. Since most robo-vacs are much smaller than traditional models, they often don’t have the same level of suction you’ll get in an upright machine. Plus, their dustbins are smaller, so they will need to be emptied more frequently.
While Wi-Fi-connected robot vacuums give you the flexibility to start a cleaning job from anywhere using an app, targeting a small area of your home can be more complicated. Some robo-vacs have spot-cleaning features that focus the machine’s attention on a specific area, which almost – but not quite – mimics the spot-cleaning you’d be able to do yourself with a regular or cordless vacuum.
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