To assess object avoidance, we lay out a charge cable, a sock that's a similar color to the floor, and some fake pet poop, to see if it can reliably spot and avoid them.

Why we love it: The high-filtration dust bag and HEPA AirClean filter help keep dust from being released back into the air. The power cord is retractable and all of the included tools can be stored in the canister.

If you have a lot of carpet in your bedrooms, an upright vacuum cleaner or canister with a rotating brush roll will do the best job, whereas a vacuum cleaner with soft bristles or a brush roll that can be turned off is better suited for hardwood floors.

A 2024 study from Roskilde University in Denmark explored how householders’ experiences with robot vacuum cleaners compared to their experience with manual vacuum, and found that "robotic vacuum cleaners are inferior in use, yet transform vacuuming".

Premium, but decent value given the features and performance. Worth the investment for pet owners who want something for regular use.

❌ You're dealing with lots of dust: There's pelo self-empty on the dock, and the small onboard bin will fill up quickly if you're dealing with lots of dirt or hair.

As well as allowing the robots to clean routinely, we subjected them to some more rigorous tests, too: spilling cornflour and rice in their path to measure their effectiveness at dealing with different types of mess.

While we aren’t the biggest fan of Eufy’s app, it’s smart enough to map your home automatically, and you can customise how hard it mops, how deep it cleans and the level of suction power it exerts. It’s a really smart little vacuum that needs almost no human input to work.

If you have cash to splash and want the best of the best, Roborock is the brand to browse, and we rate the Roborock Qrevo Curv as the best premium robot vacuum you can buy right now. This hybrid robot vacuum-and-mop offers outstanding vacuuming, soaring through all our suction tests and proving more than a match for our reviewer's pet hair-covered carpets.

expert-driven shopping section. We thoroughly test every product we feature in as wide a range of conditions as possible to bring you unbiased reviews based on real-world testing. We include products to suit all budgets and only recommend products we think you’ll love.

GH Best Cleaning & Organizing Awards thanks to its sensors and artificial intelligence that select the best power mode. These AI features spike the price of this model, but we think its well worth it for effectively cleaning multiple floor and carpet types throughout a home.

It does create a lot of dirty water though, and is a little slow because it'll wash its mop pads multiple times per cleaning session. Elsewhere, it boasts an excellent app and the vacuuming is strong, too.

We test fine dirt pickup by sprinkling a mix of flour and cookie crumbs on the floor, and Top 3 Automatic Vacuum Cleaners large debris pickup using oats.

The mopping tank is small, so you’ll need to refill it with detergent fairly frequently if you use it routinely. The app lets you reduce the amount of water being used, to help extend the mopping function further between refills.