If a robot runs across anything smearable, get ready to do some nasty cleanup. The iRobot Roomba S9+ is part of the Vacuum Cleaners test program at Consumer Reports. In our lab tests, Robotic Vacuums models like the Roomba S9+ are rated on multiple criteria, such as those listed below.
The RoboVac G30 offers a lot of power for its size, and it automatically increases the suction when it moves over carpets and heavily soiled areas. While pricey, iRobot’s Roomba j7+ robot vacuum has smarts to spare, with a guarantee to avoid pet waste and a self-emptying base that means you rarely have to lift a finger. This is an app-controlled vacuum with a low profile that didn’t perform well enough in our testing to compete with others in the same price range. It can be controlled via a remote, app or voice assistant but has no mapping or room-specific scheduling capability, and the random navigation, in our testing, never quite completed a run of the house. If you live in a home without high-pile carpets and find yourself constantly vacuuming up pet hair or dirt, and don’t need the ability to map your home and create virtual walls or no-go zones, the Eufy 11S is a top choice.
In theory, these systems should help the robots simply drive around any floor clutter they find, and even avoid hazards like dog turds. The 11S is quiet enough that you could easily forget that it’s running if you’re home while it’s working. We measured the volume on the bot’s maximum suction setting and found that it was just 57 dBc, a full 5 dBc quieter than the Roomba 694—that’s a major difference. On its normal suction setting, it’s just 53 dBc, which sounds more like a fan than a vacuum cleaner (“traditional” vacuums are often 70 dBc or louder because of their much stronger suction). And since the 11S stops short of most obstacles, it also avoids creating many of the bonking impact noises that the rougher Roomba 694 does.
If the iRobot Roomba i3+ EVO robot vacuum was of interest to you but you’d like to include the ability to mop with your robot vacuum, this bundle may be the right one for you. While it includes the iRobot Roomba i3 robot vacuum, with it comes the iRobot Braava jet m6 robot mop. The combo stacks up well against the best robot vacuum mop combos, as it packages all of the powerful cleaning capabilities of the Roomba i3 with the ability to mop alongside it. For a true hands-off cleaning experience, this bot can connect to select Roomba models to automatically trigger mopping after a vacuum cycle. The robot will automatically adjust its cleaning cycles to whichever type pad is attached. Like the i7, the Roomba i3 has 10 times the power of the 600 series and coordinates with the iRobot app.
Users have reported a few issues with the intelligent mapping not actually being followed. On top of that, several people have stated that their i7 can become easily stuck or lost. At 25000Pa, the machine has sufficient power to clean every square inch of a home’s floors.
Parts of some models are interchangeable, allowing owners to mix and match features, or switch to other units for longer battery operation. Additionally, some units can be adapted to perform more creative tasks using an embedded computer in conjunction with the Roomba Open Interface. Many homes have hot spots—a weird door jamb, a lumpy rug—where you will need to rescue your vac. Do a quick run-through beforehand for robot booby traps, like ribbons and pieces of string.
It only takes about a minute to review the obstacle images, and doing so can prove extremely useful. This method allows you to quickly and easily create Keep-Out Zones around areas that typically halt cheaper robot vacuums. With so many different features to choose from, which robot vacuum is right for you?
The Neato Botvac D7 Connected makes our list of the best robot vacuums because it’s the fastest, and one of the smartest, robot vacuums we’ve tested. It finished our tests in an average of 10 minutes, 22 seconds, blitzing through pet hair, Cheerios, and kitty litter — and picking up a great deal of them, too. However, it wasn’t as effective as our top two picks, the Shark Ion R85 and the iLife V3s Pro, at collecting debris. Not only is the modestly priced Eufy Robovac G30 Edge robot vacuum a very good cleaner, but it’s a very quiet one, too. We barely heard it as it made its rounds as is made its way through our rooms in a very methodical pattern.
It’s comes with a hefty price tag, but offers some of the more premium features, such as a self-emptying base. It can also connect with the Braava jet m6, to mop your floors once it’s finished vacuuming. The iRobot Roomba S9+ is self-emptying when it reaches a certain level in its bin.
But we still think bump-and-run bots have a place, so we’ve shuffled our favorites to budget pick status. In March 2022, iRobot released a software update that allows you to create a smart map for your bot to tell it to clean specific rooms and adjust cleaning preferences for them using the app. But it should grant you the greater level of control you irobot vacuum cleaner get with other smart-mapping models, like the Roborock S4 Max . This is the Roomba i3 EVO packaged with a charging dock that automatically sucks all the debris out of the robot after a cleaning session. Reflects the average time it took the robotic vacuum on its max-clean setting to clean our greater than 600 square foot test room over 3 test runs.