The best robot vacuum cleaners 2024

The X10 Pro Omni has one of the best feature sets around – and it costs significantly less than similarly performing robots from rival brands. It vacuums and mops to a high standard: it has a powerful 8000Pa of suction and its rotating mop pads provide enough pressure to properly clean a floor.

It’s also self-emptying and it’ll wash and dry its mop pads when it returns to its station. It has carpet detection as well, so it can raise its mop pads over lower-pile carpet or avoid carpet altogether.

The app is easy to use, allows for multiple maps and lets you precisely schedule cleaning with tailored programmes for specific rooms.

We were most impressed with its AI.See navigation, object detection and avoidance: if it spots a cable on the floor, it’ll not only avoid it but add a cable icon to the map in the right spot.

If your home aesthetics are important, you probably don’t want a huge, featureless chunk of plastic standing against your wall. And, as robot vacuum docks have become larger to accommodate dustbin-emptying and mopping accessories, that’s become increasingly difficult to avoid. Enter the iRobot Roomba Combo J9+. Its admittedly chunky charging base has a bevelled design and a wood-effect panel on top designed to support a plant or ornament. Altogether, it’s more like a piece of furniture than rival models.

The robot has plenty of other good features as well. It’s iRobot’s most powerful vacuum yet and its mop can scrub away stains effectively, rather than wetly dabbing them. The robot mops using an arm that retracts to protect carpet. It also has effective object detection and can avoid a number of common household objects, including pet poop.

Still, it’s pricey and we feel that the app could be streamlined and made simpler to use.

Shark’s new flagship robot vacuum is well-priced for its feature set, although as yet, it’s not quite as good value as the Eufy X10 Pro Omni. Still, we expect it to come down in price over the coming months.

The reason to buy it is that it’ll provide a completely hands-off cleaning experience. Not only does it vacuum and mop, empty its onboard bin, empty and refill its water tank, but it also cleans and dries its mop pads. Plus, the dock features an anti-odour catridge, which will ensure that no damp smells linger around.

In our testing, we found that its NeverStuck technology lived up to its name and the robot didn’t require rescuing. That’s an important feature if you want set and forget cleaning: it’s no good scheduling your robot to do its rounds while you’re out if it immediately wedges itself into a corner and can’t do its job.

Overall, we found the vacuuming and mopping to be very effective, except for a few caveats. The robot sometimes scattered debris on hard flooring, and in spite of its EdgeDetect cleaning promises, it sill left crumbs in corners.

Ecovacs’ flagship Deebot X2 Omni has a compact, square design that’ll allow it to get right up to walls and into tighter spots for more comprehensive cleaning.

But it’s not just its shape that’s had an overall. We think it’s a definite improvement on its predecessor in terms of features and performance. In our test, it cleaned carpets thoroughly and reliably thanks to its high, 8,000Pa suction. Its mopping is also very good, although not flawless. And its carpet detection means that carpets will get a thorough clean while being protected from damp mop pads.

It’s pricey, but if you want the most comprehensive and advanced robot vacuum available right now, this is probably the one to buy.

At around half the size of a standard robot vacuum, the K10+ can reach spots other robots can’t – and it’ll take up less space than bulkier rivals. That’s despite the fact that it comes with an auto-empty dock, which will give you up to 70 days of hands-free cleaning. The K10+ also mops but it can’t mop and vacuum at the same time. But there’s no water tank onboard, so mopping means attaching a wet wipe to the robot, which will only give your floors a gentle clean.

We found the navigation and mapping to be good, plus it has a comfortable 2500Pa of suction and a quiet 48dB operational noise. Altogether, it’s a solid robot whose diminutive size makes it stand out from the crowd. It’s good value for its price as well.

Mova is a new name for the UK. But if its design look familiar, it’s because it’s basically a Dreame machine, which becomes clear on closer inspection as the similarities are striking, right down to the component level. This is plus, as Dreame robots are technically excellent, and the E30 Ultra is competitively priced for its feature set. Buy it and you’re getting a high quality machine for what it costs.

It comes with a base station that, as well as a dust bag, contains a 4-litre tank for dirty water and a 4.5-litre tank for clean water. It also automatically cleans the mops both during and after cleaning sessions. What it lacks, however, is a detergent container – only water is used for mopping.

When it comes to cleaning and results, the Mova E30 Ultra delivers really well. With suction power of 7,000Pa, its cleaning is solid. However, it does have a bit of a problem with accessibility, so if your home has high thresholds or other obstacles, it’s worth bearing in mind.

If you want a multi-functional robot vacuum – high-quality mapping, decent mopping, self-emptying – it can be a pricey proposition but this is one of the best you can buy for a mid-range price point. And that’s with the auto-empty station included.

It’s low profile, at 9.5cm high, giving it a good chance of getting under beds and sofas. It has a 270ml water tank and a 335ml dustbin – the latter is on the small side but this won’t matter if you have the vacuum station, which contains a 2.5 litre bag that you’ll only need to change every month or two.

In our test, its mapping was quick and accurate and, once your home is mapped, you can schedule cleaning with specifications for each room, or set it off to clean a room where’s there’s been a spill. It’s good on carpets as well as hard flooring and it’s especially good on pet hair, although we did find that some still tangled in the brush. It’s also compatible with Google and Alexa home assistants, so you can start it with a voice command.

Its navigation is dependable – but it does have a blind spot where low objects and cables are concerned. Its mopping is pretty decent as well, although not as powerful as pricier models that use spinning mops. Altogether, it’s a very good buy

Unless you can spend big, mopping tends to be an afterthought where robot vacuums are concerned. And if your home has mostly hard flooring, you need mopping to be the priority. Enter the Hobot Legee D8. If the brand name is new to you, that’s because it’s only recently entered the UK market, although it’s popular in Australia and South America.

The D8 and its Lulu service station make mopping effective and simple. The service station refills the robot with water, and washes and dries the mop pad for a hygienic clean every time – and it really works. Meanwhile, the robot mops with one large pad that uses reciprocating, or an up and down, motion for a much more effective clean than many similarly price rivals.

Altogether, there are eight cleaning modes, including an anti-tangle and a stain mode.

The onboard dustbin is capacious at 500ml and it has a compression function, so you won’t need to empty it as often. This is good news as one thing the Lulu base station doesn’t do is empty the onboard bin, which is a feature some won’t want to do without.

If you want an auto-empty robot vacuum but want to stick to a budget, the D10 Plus is a serious contender, especially now that it’s come down in price. The 2.5 litre bag inside the charging station will only need to be changed every month or two. When coupled with its high quality mapping, this is a robot vacuum that you can schedule to clean and forget about.

The D10 Plus has good 4,000PA suction in its turbo mode, but in our test, we found that its quiet, standard mode was more than good enough for hard flooring. If your flooring is mixed, you can switch on the carpet detect function and it’ll automatically increase the power on carpets and rugs. It also has a decent mopping function, although, like many competitors, it’s water-only and won’t clean away stubborn stains.

It can create multiple maps for different floors and is Alexa and Google Assistant-compatible if you’d like to control it with voice commands.

The Miele Scout RX3 has some impressive features. Its hardware is beautifully designed and it’s intended to last for five years – a long time in robot vacuum terms. It’s also a highly effective cleaner.

However, we didn’t love the fact that it communicates via error message codes you need to decipher, when many rivals at a similar price point have a voice assistant that just lets you know what the problem is. It also lacks the in-depth mapping that rivals iRobot and Ecovacs have, which allows you to target cleaning to specific pieces of furniture in a room.

It has a simple app and is Alexa-compatible as well. We tested the flagship Home Vision HD model, which you can pilot remotely to check in on your home and your pets using its onboard camera.

Initially, we felt that its feature set was too limited to justify its high price point – but it’s come down in price. And there’s a case to be made for the fact that, if you’re happy with a relatively simple robot vacuum, you can invest in this one and it will last you for years to come.

There’s a lot to like about the Roomba i7+. Buy it with the vacuum dock and it’ll empty itself after each clean. And you’ll only need to change the bag in the dock every 1-2 months. And the dock itself is smaller than rival auto-empty robot vacuums.

Another clever feature is its mapping, which allows you to target not only rooms but specific pieces of furniture within them.

This means that you can set up a cleaning schedule to target the cat litter (which you can opt to mark up) first thing every morning, or get the i7+ to vacuum under the sofa in the living room once everyone has gone to bed.

However, it’s not without its flaws. It’s noisy in operation and in spite of its promises of sophisticated navigation, it repeatedly bumps into furniture. Still, now that the price has come down, we think these compromises are worth it.