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Robot vacuums are impressive devices that will clean your floors well without complaining (much). As prices have dropped, these busy little bots have become less of a luxury and more of a necessity. They can reach places most standup vacs never see (under beds and sofas) and, thanks to better batteries and robot brains, they rarely get tired of cleaning.
I’ve been testing robot vacuums for six years and have run over 60 robot vacuums all over my house. These are my top picks if you’re looking for the best: a robot vacuum that can do it all without getting stuck and with limited intervention from you.
I’ve also got options to fit specific needs, such as mopping, tackling small spaces, or besting pet hair. Check out my budget robot vacuum guide if you want to spend under $500 on a robot vacuum. Here, we’re going to look at the premium options.
Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra – Best Overall
With top-notch vacuuming performance, an easy-to-use app, and built-in voice control, the S8 MaxV Ultra is a superb vacuum and good mop. It features Roborock’s best obstacle avoidance, innovative features like dirt detection, and a hands-free dock that makes it an expensive but excellent choice.
Dustbin capacity: 270ml / Self-empty dock option: Yes / Auto-refill mop option: Yes / Mop-lift: Yes, 20mm / Mop washing: Hot water and heated air drying / Mapping: Yes, lidar / AI-powered obstacle avoidance: Yes / Suction power: 10,000Pa / Remote check-in: Yes / Keep-out zones: Yes, virtual / Brush style: Dual rubber / Works with: Matter, Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Siri Shortcuts
Roborock’s S8 MaxV Ultra ($1,799.99) is an exceptional vacuum cleaner and a very good mop thanks to several innovations and quality-of-life features that make it a superb floor cleaner. Its dual rubber roller brushes and 10,000Pa suction make it the best robot vacuum for carpets; its mopping chops make it great for hard floors, too, and its improved AI-powered obstacle avoidance means it will mostly get the job done.
The S8 MaxV Ultra is also the best model in the relatively new category of “hands-free” robot vacs, bots that do virtually everything for you: empty their bins, refill their mop tanks, and clean and dry their mop pads. Roborock invented this category with the S7 MaxV Ultra and has been steadily improving it.
With the S8 MaxV Ultra, the company has produced the best top-of-the-line robot vacuum. If you are willing to spend the cash, this machine will keep your floors clean with relatively little intervention from you.
The S8 MaxV Ultra is the best robot vacuum for carpets
The S8 MaxV Ultra comes with the brand’s best AI-powered obstacle avoidance, finally bringing back the camera it last had on the excellent S7 MaxV Ultra. It’s not quite as good as Roomba’s obstacle avoidance — it sometimes confused a pile of Cheerios for a charging cable and avoided them — but it’s much better than the Roborocks that rely on non-camera obstacle avoidance. It deftly navigates around most household clutter, allowing you to get the job done without having to tidy up.
Roborock has caught up to Roomba regarding cleaning prowess, and the S8 MaxV Ultra’s dual rubber brushes and 10,000Pa of suction power tackled the pet hair on my fluffy carpet and demolished my oatmeal test. It also did a better job at mopping than Roomba’s mopping bots. Its sonic mopping system — which vibrates its mop pad 4,000 times a minute — ably simulated scrubbing and wiped out my OJ and ketchup tests, though I did have to set it to deep scrub. Plus, the addition of a side mop and flexi-arm brush that extends from the bot helped with cleaning edges and corners.
Roomba Combo j9 Plus – Best Roomba robot vacuum
Dustbin capacity: 300 ml / Self-empty dock option: Yes / Auto-refill mop option: Yes / Mop-lift: Yes, up and over / Mop washing: No / Mapping: Yes, vSLAM / AI-powered obstacle avoidance: Yes / Suction power: N/A / Remote check-in: No / Keep-out zones: Yes, virtual / Brush style: Dual rubber / Works with: Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Siri Shortcuts
I’m a big fan of Roombas for three main reasons: their dual rubber roller brushes rotate in opposite directions to effectively dig up dirt from carpets, their AI obstacle avoidance is by far the best, and they have a history of being easy to repair. Their auto-empty docks are some of the best-looking, too, and I like Roomba’s vSLAM mapping, which takes longer than lidar mapping but is more reliable. The Roomba app has never lost my maps, which happens frequently with lidar bots.
However, Roombas are falling behind the competition in features and cleaning prowess, especially regarding mopping. And while they’re no longer the most expensive robot vacs you can buy, they are costly. As much as I appreciate the simplicity of the iRobot app, some may prefer the deep customization options other brands offer.
The current top-of-the-line Roomba, the j9 Combo Plus, is my top pick for a Roomba, as it features a well-designed dock and can refill its own mop tank. Like the j7 Combo, the j9 has a retractable mopping pad it can lift up and over the robot to avoid getting your carpets damp and has higher suction power than previous Roombas. There’s also a nifty dirt-detect feature, which “remembers” which rooms are dirtiest and seeks them out first. The j9 is the quietest Roomba I’ve tested and offers three suction levels for an even quieter clean, something most other Roombas don’t have.
Dreame X40 Ultra – Best robot vacuum / mop hybrid
With a unique ability to remove and reattach its mop pads, the Dreame X40 solves the problem of vacuuming carpets while also mopping hard floors. Its mops can also swing out and under low furniture, getting where most bots can’t reach. An extendable side brush helps get dirt out of corners. A whopping 12,000Pa of suction mean it’s a great vac, if not quite as good as the S8 MaxV Ultra.
Dustbin capacity: 300ml / Self-empty dock option: Yes / Auto-refill mop option: Yes / Mop-lift: Yes, 20mm / Mop washing: Hot water, hot air drying / Mapping: Yes, lidar / AI-powered obstacle avoidance: Yes / Suction power: 12,000Pa / Remote check-in: Yes / Keep-out zones: Yes, virtual / Brush style: Single, rubber / Works with: Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Siri Shortcuts
The Dreame X40 is the best robot vacuum / mop hybrid because it can drop its mop pads automatically, extend them, and swing them to get under your cabinets and consoles. I watched the X40 spread its mops wide apart and swing behind my TV console, allowing it to access the dust wedged a good inch under it. That’s impressive.
The X40 also features an extending side brush arm to reach corners — like the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra — and its dual oscillating mop pads are more effective than Roborock’s thin microfiber pad. If you have a mix of carpeted rooms and hardwood floors with high-pile rugs, the Dreame is the best robot vacuum for you.
Its signature feature is its ability to automatically remove and reattach its mop pads depending on whether it’s vacuuming or mopping. This solves the problem of how to vacuum and mop without getting your rugs wet. The robot will do this procedure multiple times during cleaning to ensure carpets are vacuumed and floors are mopped. Genius.
Roborock Q5 Pro – Best robot vacuum for pet hair and great budget option
The Q5 Pro has a huge bin and big wheels to get up on higher-pile carpets easily. It has a small removable mopping reservoir for when there are dirty paws on the floors, but its main job is to suck up dirt and pet hair, and it does very well at both.
Dustbin capacity: 770ml / Self-empty dock option: Yes / Auto-refill mop option: No / Mapping: Yes / AI-powered obstacle avoidance: No / Suction power: 5,500Pa / Remote check-in: No / Keep-out zones: Yes, virtual / Brush style: Dual, rubber / Works with: Amazon Alexa, Google Home, Siri Shortcuts
My recommendation for families with pets who don’t want to spend a small fortune on an auto-empty robot vacuum is to buy a good bot with a big bin. These are getting harder to find now that every bot wants to be a multitasker and also mop (the water reservoir takes up valuable dustbin room). So, I was very pleased with Roborock’s recent entry-level robot, the Q5 Pro; it’s my new favorite for pet hair.
This relatively inexpensive vacuum has a huge 770ml bin on board and dual rubber brushes that are better at getting pet hair out of rugs than single brushes. The rubber is also less prone than bristles to getting tangled with hair, and combined with 5,500Pa suction power, this vacuum does a really good job on very dirty floors. It does have a removable mopping pad with a small water tank built into it, which is useful for getting up the fine dust left behind by the vacuum, but it isn’t going to scrub your floors. It will, however, keep the pet hair at bay.
Don’t confuse this with the cheaper Roborock Q5, however. That bot has a smaller bin, lower suction, shorter runtime, and only one roller brush. It’s worth spending the extra for the Pro.