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Narwal Freo X Plus two-minute review

The Narwal Freo X Plus is a budget-friendly robot vacuum and mop that does many things well, but a few things fairly badly. If you're just looking at the pros and cons list, the score of this review might not make sense as there are plenty more positives than negatives – but those few negatives can make for a frustrating experience. 

If you're willing to put in the time to understand this model, it could potentially be one of the best robot vacuums for you, especially if you're on a budget. After all, most of the best vacuums that include mopping ability are not going to be this cheap, unless you get something manual like the Bissell CrossWave OmniForce. When it comes to robot vacuums specifically, the price tag for great performance, feature set, and overall functionality goes way up.

The vacuuming performance of the Narwal Freo X Plus is very solid. However, like most budget models that just pull a single stationary pad across the floor, its mopping capability is just passable. Still, you'll generally end up with clean floors. 

However, the Narwal Freo X Plus seems to have a mind of its own. Unless you just set it to clean your whole space in the most thorough way possible, you'll end up with incomplete cleaning cycles. Or it might decide to head off on a different, unassigned job.

At least it has a tiny base station, so that the Narwal Freo X Plus is easier to place than most robot vacuums. Another added benefit is that it's possible to pair and use through a voice assistant like Alexa. All in all, the Narwal Freo X Plus is a somewhat capable robot vacuum that comes with some frustrating aspects, such as its erratic cleaning behavior. But they may be worth dealing with if you're on a budget, or just want to be able to do a basic, whole-home clean.

Narwal Freo X Plus robovac review: price & availability

• List price: $399.99 / AU$899 (about £310)
• Launch date: March 2024
• Available: US and Australia

The Narwal Freo X Plus is available in the US and Australia, with a list form of $399.99 / AU$899. That puts it in TechRadar's budget price bracket, which is particularly significant when you consider it offers mopping as well as vacuuming functionality. Of course, whether it's a good value buy or not will depend on whether you're okay dealing with its navigational quirks. It will still deliver fairly clean floors, but can be a pain to deal with.

This is not necessarily unique to the Narwal Freo X Plus, as the recently reviewed Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus came with its own quirky frustrations, not to mention weaker suction power than the Narwal, and it comes with a higher $649.99 / £499 / AU$999 price tag. It is, however, available in the UK unlike the Narwal, and comes with better mopping ability.

One of the strange things about the Narwal Freo X Plus is the fact that the company's flagship, Narwal Freo X Ultra, offers much better cleaning performance along with a range of other bells and whistles. Granted, that one is far more expensive (the Ultra costs $1,399.99 / AU$2,299 – about £1,110), but it's strange to see issues with the software given that it's coming from the same company.

• Value for money score: 4 out of 5

Narwal Freo X Plus specs

Narwal Freo X Plus robovac review: design

• Compact base station
• Two side brushes and an anti-tangling brush roll
• Single, stationary mop pad

When taking a look at the Narwal Freo X Plus' design, the first thing that jumps out is in regards to its teeny, tiny base station. Since its only function is to charge the robot vacuum and give it a place to rest, it doesn't need to do a lot. Still, it's cute in its own way, not to mention makes it easier to find a good place in your space for the robot vacuum. Bigger models with self-emptying dustbins and water reservoirs, such as the flagship Narwal mentioned earlier, need a lot more space (although, of course, there are benefits of having these capabilities built-in).

As far as the robot vacuum itself, it has the typical rounded shape. There are two side brushes instead of one, giving it a leg up on the vacuuming front compared to models that only have one side brush. The main brush roll is of the anti-tangling kind so you won't find it wrapped with hair, something that's not always considered on budget robot vacuums.

The mop pad is of the single, flat variety that sits along the bottom back half of the unit. While it does apply some downward pressure, it doesn't do much in the way of scrubbing. I'll talk a little more about how this affects its performance below, but just know that this is normal for budget models and that more expensive ones seem to completely abandon this approach in favor of dual spinning mop pads.

Regarding the manual controls, there are just two buttons – a power button and a home button, each with a secondary function (start/pause/resume cleaning and child lock, respectively).

The Narwal Freo X Plus is a fairly sleek looking robot vacuum in its all-white aesthetic. That's partially because it covers its small water reservoir and dustbin with a glossy white top that stays in place due to some cleverly placed magnets. Both the reservoir and dustbin are easily removable and easy to fill up or empty, respectively.

• Design score: 4 out of 5

Narwal Freo X Plus robovac review: performance

• Very good vacuuming
• Mopping is just okay
• Erratic behavior in how it cleans

There are a couple different factors to consider with a robot vacuum's performance, but the core one is vacuuming. Luckily, the Narwal Freo X Plus does a very good job here. Thanks to having two side brushes, it's able to get debris on either side of it. Since it has an anti-tangle brushroll, it's able to tackle aside from charge cords (the kryptonite of all robot vacuums).

I ran this robot vacuum in a house with two French Bulldogs as well as four adult humans, two of whom have long hair, and it did a great job keeping the floor clean, picking up everything from smaller dust-like particles to debris the size of a leaf. It also picked up hair without issue and without any tangling. I even tested it with a pile of sugar and cereal and it took one pass to suck it all up. 

I used it on tile, hardwood floors, and a small but thick bath mat. In terms of just vacuuming, this robot vacuum has the goods regardless of the surface. The Narwal Freo X Plus has 7800 Pa of suction power, which isn't the highest on the market, but based on my tests is still enough to deal with most household cleaning requirements. 

Its mopping capability is a little less stellar. I would actually describe it as okay. Since it has the one pad, it's only applying downward pressure. So, somewhat dried pieces of mud in the foyer that a robot vacuum with spinning mop pads would pick up are unaffected. More frustratingly, unless I used the highest mopping humidity setting, it didn't always wet the entire area it mopped, leaving slightly streaky results. If you are going to use this robot vacuum for mopping, my recommendation is to use the highest settings and be prepared to regularly refill the water reservoir.

As far as getting to the edges, it does well with vacuuming, thanks to those two side brushes, but doesn't really get all that close when mopping.

The object avoidance, on the other hand, is pretty good. It won't necessarily give a wide berth to any randomly placed object but it will brush up against it. When I placed the bath mat down, the Narwal Freo X Plus vacuumed right up to it on all sides before deciding it could tackle it. Only then did it vacuum it.

Where the Narwal Freo X Plus falls short is in how it decides to clean. When I use the Freo Advice setting in the app, it will take the strangest path. Maybe it's only picking up certain debris on its sensor, but it will clean up maybe 20% of the area that it should. Also concerning, when I run to only clean a particular room, it will decide to move onto another room after finishing its initial job and start vacuuming there instead of returning to the base station. It's frustrating enough that I would rather have it clean the entire space instead of attempting to do any kind of spot cleaning.

• Performance score: 3.5 out of 5

Narwal Freo X Plus robovac review: app

• Easy-to-use app
• Mapping has some shortcomings
• Works well with third-party voice support

The Narwal Freo app is pretty straightforward to use, from setup to choosing the kind of cleaning you want to accomplish (vacuum only, vacuum and mop, and vacuum then mop). It's also a fairly attractive looking app. I didn't ever feel lost navigating to various settings, whether it's adjusting the specific cleaning settings such as suction power or mopping humidity or opening up the schedule to plan a cleaning.

The map is pretty easy to use, and you can even see a 3D representation of your mapped space. Of course, it suffers from the same editing shortfalls of a lot of robot vacuum apps, where you're limited on how you partition your space. If you have an open or semi-open floor plan like the space that I often test in, you'll only be able to partition once as you can't section a partitioned space in half.

On the bright side, setting it up with third-party control – I tested it with Amazon Alexa – was fairly easy to do. The only quirk is knowing the very specific phrases that it can understand. “Alexa, run the robot vacuum” doesn't work, while “Alexa, ask my robot to start cleaning” does.

• App score: 4 out of 5

Narwal Freo X Plus robovac review: battery

• Very long battery life
• Will return to base when getting low

Possibly because the Narwal Freo X Plus is a bit lighter on features than more expensive units or possibly because it doesn't have spinning mop pads, its battery life of up to 254 minutes is quite a bit longer than what I usually see with robot vacuums. For reference, most units these days have up to 210 minutes of use.

While that's more than enough battery life for even fairly large spaces, the robot vacuum will return to its base when necessary for an extra charge before continuing on with its task if it's running out of juice.

• Battery score: 5 out of 5

Should you buy the Narwal Freo X Plus robot vacuum?

Buy it if...

Don't buy it if...

Narwal Freo X Plus robovac review: also consider

How I tested the Narwal Freo X Plus

To test the Narwal Freo X Plus, I used it for a couple weeks to vacuum and mop the hardwood floors and a bath mat (to simulate carpeting) in my house. I also tested all the features listed in the app, from mapping to scheduling. I took note of how well the vacuum cleaned the edges of a room as well as around obstacles, not to mention running how the handheld vacuum performed.

Read more about how we test

First reviewed September 2024

Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus two-minute review

I’ve generally been a fan of Ecovacs robot vacuums, so I was a little nonplussed testing the Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus. It’s not a bad vacuum by any means – its 4 out of 5 rating here should make that clear. It’s just that it’s much more stripped-down than a lot of other options out there, whether from Ecovacs or otherwise.

Some of the compromises made to keep the price down mean that it's hard to recommend this as one of the best robot vacuums for those working with a limited budget. Now, its cleaning prowess is pretty good as is its mopping capability. And, the fact that you have to remove the mopping pad if you only want to vacuum , then put it back on if you want to both vacuum and mop, is par for the course for something in this price range.

However, its operation is on the louder side, the robot vacuum gets stuck exiting its base station if it’s too close to any furniture, and its vacuuming prowess is not ideal if you’re trying to clean up an actual mess (I’ll elaborate on that later).

Still, it does share some characteristics of the best vacuum cleaners in this form factor, such as a long battery life and smart home features through Google Assistant or Alexa. It’s not bad for the price, and, being an Ecovacs product, you’re certain to find it with a pretty decent discount sooner or later.

Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus specs

Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus review: price & availability

• List price: $649.99 / £499 / AU$999
• Available: US, UK, and Australia

If you’re new to the world of robot vacuums with mopping capabilities, the Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus’ list price of $649.99 / £499 / AU$999 may seem expensive. However, if you look at some of the more fully featured models we’ve reviewed, it becomes clear fairly quickly that this is actually a pretty good price.

Realistically, you’re going to have to pay $500 / £500+ for anything with mopping functionality. For example, the Shark AI Ultra 2-in-1 Robot Vacuum and Mop has an almost identical form factor, including a similar clip-on mopping pad, and will set you back just a little more with an MSRP of $699 (about £559 / AU$1,054). That said, the Deebot N10 Plus has a much better battery life, although it runs a little louder.

If you want an example of a more fully-featured model to really get an idea of the Deebot N10 Plus’ value (or you’re considering splurging), take a look at the Narwal Freo X Ultra. It’s much pricier at $1,399.99 / AU$ 2,299 (about £1,110), but it has double the suction power, quieter operation, and a clean and dirty water reservoir in the base station. The base station auto-fills the robot vacuum's water tank as well as self-emptying its dustbin, and it'll also wash and dry the mopping pads. Also worth noting is the fact that the mopping pads retract so that it can just vacuum carpeting areas and then vacuum and mop hard flooring without having to swap anything out, unlike the Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus.

If you want to stay in the Ecovacs family but want to opt for a more expensive model, the Ecovacs Deebot T30S Combo is an impressive unit for $1,199.99 (about £950 / AU$1,800), but at the time of writing it's only available in the US.

• Value for money score: 4.5 out of 5

Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus review: design

• Has two side brushes and a brush roll that gets tangled in hair
• Mopping pad clips on
• Base station needs a good amount of clearance

The Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus, available only in all white, doesn’t really break any molds. The actual robot vacuum has two side brushes, which makes it much more effective at sweeping up debris at the edges of a room, an obvious improvement over the single side brush that a lot of models come with.

The brushroll underneath that actually picks everything up is easily accessible, thankfully, since it does collect hair easily and will need to be untangled regularly. That said, even when wrapped in hair, it still seems to get the job done.

Though this is a robot vacuum with mopping functionality, the Deebot N10 Plus requires a bit of manual labor that you won’t find on more expensive units. Not to make it sound like hard work because it’s not, but you have to clip on the mop pad when you want to utilize that feature, then you have to unclip it whenever you want to use it on carpeting. It will however avoid any kind of carpeting when the mop pad is in use. You also have to fill up the water reservoir in the vacuum itself regularly.

In fact, I learned that lesson the hard way when I originally set up the base station in a room with carpeting and the Deebot N10 Plus would get stuck on the carpet every time it tried to run. While it’s not that much work, this is not the set-it-and-forget-it type of robot vacuum. Of course, that’s to be expected at this price point when you add in mopping.

Speaking of the base station, it’s kind of cute in its petite, somewhat slim design. It has just enough room for a dust bag, since it does have a self-emptying capability. The only other thing worth mentioning is that the bottom plate that the robot vacuum sits on when at rest is at an angle.

And when you have the base station too close to a piece of furniture (a chair in my case), the robot vacuum will try to exit off to the side of that bottom plate instead of going straight back, which results in it getting stuck. It’s frustrating, but easily fixable if you give the base station a good amount of clearance on either side.

• Design score: 4 out of 5

Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus review: performance

• Good for maintenance cleaning
• Vacuuming gets to the edges, mopping does not
• Runs a bit on the loud side

Most robot vacuums are great for keeping the daily buildup of dirt at bay, while not providing true deep cleaning. That’s certainly the case with the Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus. You’re still going to need to deep clean from time to time, and you'll still need to grab a more traditional vacuum when dealing with unforeseen messes.

When vacuuming, for instance, the Deebot N10 Plus does a great job of keeping the floor clean, picking up dander and hair. As mentioned above, hair does get tangled in the brush roll, so you’ll have to clean that out from time to time. However, I didn’t find that that affected its ability to suction up debris.

I did also test this robot vacuum with a bunch of cereal and, while it managed to suck up a good amount of it, it didn’t get it all, seemingly not detecting that there was still debris on the floor. It did, at least, get edges.

Mopping is pretty good with its single mop pad that vibrates on the floor as it moves along, but again, you’re not going to get a deep clean – models I’ve tested with spinning mop pads seem to get a little deeper (they’re also twice the price usually). But it’s good enough. However, the mop pad, being in a static position, isn’t able to get to the edges of rooms the way the side brushes are.

Be aware that you’re going to have to wash the mop pad every now and then as there’s no automatic cleaning on hand. Also of note is the fact that it runs a little bit on the loud side, registering around 65dB at full power.

• Performance score: 4 out of 5

Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus review: app

• Straightforward in setup and use
• Accurately maps and can save maps for multiple floors
• Limited partitioning can be an issue for open floor plans

Whether it’s going through the setup or just running the Deebot N10 Plus remotely, the Ecovacs app is fairly straightforward to use. There are a small amount of additional settings you can work with, such as adjusting when it self-empties into the base station, or creating a schedule.

It’s worth noting that, unlike most apps I’ve used for robot vacuums, adjusting cleaning modes is hidden behind a “cleaning preference” button instead of being right on the front page. However, once you’ve pulled that page up, it follows the same format.

Since I tend to get stuck on mapping features with these apps, I want to dig into that a little bit. Not only does the robot do a good job of mapping out the space, but the app will automatically break up what’s been mapped into rooms. On top of that, you can save different maps so that you can use the Deebot N10 Plus on different floors without having to remap when you move it.

Merging and dividing rooms in the app is easy, though it suffers from using a line tool for dividing, meaning that you’re limited in how much you can partition what it considers to be a single space. That can be an issue with those with open floor plans.

• App score: 4.5 out of 5

Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus review: battery life

• Can last up to 300 minutes
• Still plenty of battery life on highest settings

The battery life on hand here is pretty impressive as it lasts between 200 to 300 minutes (or three and a half to five hours) depending on the intensity of the cleaning mode and whether it’s also mopping. Since the Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus uses a static mop pad for the mopping functionality, it doesn’t even seem to impact the battery life all that much.

Since it does have such a long battery life, it does take a while to charge back up: about six and a half hours. That can be a pain if you find yourself in a similar situation as I have, where the robot vacuum gets stuck on an area rug with tassels and runs down the battery trying to escape / waiting for rescue. That said, when I was faced with that situation, it still had some juice left unlike other robot vacuums that I’ve found in similar situations (and they all get stuck on tassels, too).

• Battery score: 5 out of 5

Should you buy the Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus?

Buy it if…

Don’t buy it if…

Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus review: also consider

How I tested the Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus

To test the Ecovacs Deebot N10 Plus, I used it for a couple of weeks to vacuum and mop the hardwood floors and carpeting in my house. I focused on how well the vacuum cleaned the edges of a room as well as around obstacles, not to mention pick up different sized debris. I also tested the features listed in the app, most notably the mapping.

Read more about how we test

First reviewed August 2024

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra: two-minute review

Launched July 2024, the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra is a high-spec, feature-packed robot vacuum and mop with a self-empty base. For this model, Roborock has tweaked both its basic features to offer more efficient and effective cleaning, as well as adding fancier new bonus features. I put it to the test to see how it compares to the rest of today's best robot vacuums, and if it justifies its premium price tag.

Overall, I was impressed. In terms of cleaning, it did a very good job, delivering reliable suction and performing well in my tests with different sized debris. I found the mopping equally effective, with the extra side mop doing a good job of getting right up to the edges of rooms. 

There are a lot of different options to offer precision cleaning, and useful features like the ability to sense carpet and boost suction accordingly, and the fact the mop pad can raise up to 2cm off the ground so you don't end up with damp rugs if you go for for the mop-first option. The rubbery rollers are great at gripping hair and propelling it straight into the dust cup before it has a chance to tangle, although the same cannot be said for the roller axles. 

The base station offers automatic dust emptying and detergent dispensing, and will clean and dry the mop pads after every use, all of which mean less hands-on requirements from you. Mapping is accurate and fast, and the app is intuitive to use, making getting set up pretty speedy and straightforward.

The S8 MaxV Ultra is the first to feature Roborock's smart voice assistant, and while the chance to boss a robovac about is appealing, in practice I found it struggled to understand the most basic of commands. The extending side-brush designed to reach under furniture and into corners was equally unreliable. Like a shy turtle, it refused to emerge, even in scenarios when it was clearly needed.

Roborock says that this robovac is able to intelligently identify 73 different common household objects to avoid, and if you ask it to, it'll even send you photos of these objects for you to approve. On test, results were mixed – it correctly identified some objects, although not every time it came across them, and it seemed to have a specific problem with socks. 

Another use for that on-board camera is to enable this robovac to embark on a 'pet patrol' while you're out. It'll find and photograph your pet, and you can even talk directly to it via the two-way mic.

Also in this range is the Roborock S8 Max Ultra (no 'V'). It's a little less powerful in terms of suction (8,000Pa vs 10,000Pa for the MaxV) and loses the intelligent voice assistant (although it does still have third-party voice control) and camera, which might appeal to those concerned about the privacy side of those features. It's also slightly cheaper. 

I'd recommend the S8 MaxV Ultra robovac to someone looking for a high-spec machine that can deliver precise cleaning, and will work equally well on hard floors and carpet. However, if you don't want all those extra features – and especially given some could still do with a little refining – there are cheaper, less fancy options that will work perfectly well for general use. That's the short version; read on for my full Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review.

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review: price & availability

• List price: $1,799.99 / £1,725 / AU$2,999 
• Launched: July 2024

At list price, the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra will set you back $1,799.99 in the US or AU$2,999 in Australia. In the UK, it's only available on Amazon at time of writing, at £1,725.63. This was the price provided by our Roborock contact, but it feels much more like a price that will fluctuate rather than an RRP.

While that price tag might make some wince, it's increasingly common for brands' range-topping robovac models to reach into the quadruple figures, and bear in mind too that anything that offers mopping and self-emptying on top of just vacuuming will be at the pricier end of the market, to start with. By way of comparison, the Roomba Combo 10 Max – another high-spec, self-empty robot vacuum and mop, launched in August 2024 – is $1,399 / £1,499. 

You are paying a premium for features like the new smart voice assistant, though. If you don't need such a high-spec model, there are plenty of cheaper options about that will serve most people's needs perfectly well. 

Robot vacuums often attract discounts around major sales events like the Black Friday deals, so it's worth keeping an eye out around then if it suits when you need to buy.

• Value for money score: 3.5 out of 5

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra specs

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review: design & features

• Sleek design with matte and shiny plastic
• On-board voice assistant, mics and camera
• Chunky but smart-looking dock with water reservoirs and auto-empty

The Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra's body is a combination of matte and shiny plastic. That combination of textures is more noticeable on the black version, rather than the white I tested, but the overall look is still smart and stylish. On top are three multifunctional buttons: a power button, a mop button and a home button. However, more likely you won't use these buttons at all, but instead will use the companion app or your voice to set the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra about its tasks. At the back are your charging contacts, plus ports for water to go in, and dirty water and dust to come out.

At the front of the robovac you'll find an RGB camera, 3D light sensors and an LED headlight for illuminating the way in dark rooms. In the centre, there's a raised puck, protected with a bump sensor, and housing the LiDAR and microphones for the voice assistant. This is Roborock's first voice assistant. You wake it by saying 'Hello Rocky', and it's designed to respond to a wide variety of commands: Start cleaning, Skip here, Empty the dustbin, Pause, Vacuum harder, Mop softer, Clean the living room, and so on. 

If you ask it to, the onboard camera will take photos of the objects that it has identified and elected to avoid. You can send it out to find and photograph your pet, and you can also conduct remote conversations with said pet via the microphones. (Sadly, I am lacking a pet to spy on / remotely harass, so wasn't able to test these features for my review.)

The addition of the camera and mics will be welcome to some, but perhaps not the most privacy-conscious of you. Note that while the mics are active by default, they can be switched off. The camera is not switched on as standard, and it's very difficult to activate accidentally as it requires manual pressing of the three buttons on the robot itself (rather than just an in-app toggle), and you also need to set up a password pattern.

If you don't want a robot that has an onboard RGB camera and microphones, the cheaper S8 Max Ultra version lacks the voice assistant and swaps the RGB camera for reactive 3D.

The shiny panel on the top can be lifted off (it's magnetic, which feels like an elegant solution) to reveal a Wi-Fi indicator light and reset button, plus a 270ml dustbin and washable paper filter, and a 100ml water tank. You won't need to access this bit too often, because it's all self-emptying, but on occasion you may want to get in there to clean the filter.  

A note for those with bigger homes: the onboard dustbin is on the small side. You can increase empty frequency, but minimum duration is after 30 minutes of cleaning, so if you have high dirt buildup, this might not suffice. The same goes for the onboard water tank. 

Flip your Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra over and you'll find the dual rollers. These are similar to those on previous Roborocks, made from a rubbery ridged material designed to grip hair and debris efficiently, without getting clogged or tangled. 

Corners and room edges are notoriously tricky for robovacs to tackle, but Roborock's approach is to add a spinning FlexiArm that reaches out, ET-style, when the model senses it's approaching a corner or some low furniture. It's designed to assist the vacuuming process by flicking debris in the corners and edges of rooms into the path of the vacuum. This is listed as being unique to Roborock, but it's actually an approach utilized by Dreame in its X40 Ultra (review in progress).

The main mop is a little smaller than found on previous Roborocks (another potential down-side for those with bigger homes) and sits on top of two vibrating plates that create the scrubbing motion – these vibrate at 4,000 times per minute, which is quite a difficult metric to visualize, but certainly faster than I could do it manually. The mop pad can lift a generous 2cm off the floor when going over carpeted areas, and if you activate the automatic re-mopping feature in the Roborock app, it'll go over very dirty areas again.

Note: if your priority is mopping, you'd perhaps be better off with the Roborock Qrevo Master, which has dual spinning mops instead.

The mop pad is attached at one side, so while you can pull the Velcro-ed on bit to see the plates beneath, you can't remove it entirely. This seems like an odd decision, because it prevents you from, for example, putting it in the washing machine, if you wanted a more thorough clean. 

There's also a spinning side mop – a new addition with the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra, designed to enable you to mop closer to your baseboards. Within 1.68mm of the edge of your room, to be precise. The mop has its own dedicated water outlet, but it is fixed in place rather than extending when it senses the edges of rooms, like the FlexiArm does. 

Finally, underneath the robovac is a set of cliff sensors to prevent your robovac from throwing itself down the stairs, plus a carpet detection sensor so it knows not to try and mop there.

Moving on to the dock. Note that this needs to sit on a hard, flat floor (the instructions suggest wood, tile or concrete) and obviously it also needs to be near a power outlet, too. Although it's still quite chunky – unavoidable with self-emptying, mop-and-vac models – the design has been streamlined compared to previous Roborock robovacs, with the various reservoirs hidden behind covers. 

The dock houses a 4L clean water reservoir, with a silver ion block designed to discourage the growth of bacteria. New to this model is a separate detergent compartment, which distributes your floor cleaner evenly and removes the need for guesswork when premixing your cleaning solution. There's a 3.5L dirty water tank and a 2.5L dust bag. 

Within the dock you'll find a spinning brush roller for cleaning the mop. It uses hot water (Roborock says up to 60C) to sterilize and remove grease from the mop pads, and heated air to dry. While the mop is being washed, there's a sensor to detect how dirty the pad is, and extend cleaning time if required. There are also different cleaning intensity options you can choose manually. 

You will need to refill the water tank manually. If you want to avoid that, there is a version that comes with a refill and drainage system. Be aware that this will require you to plumb in the base station, meaning you won't be able to move it. 

• Design score: 4.5 out of 5

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review: performance

• Overall, strong mopping and vacuuming performance
• Decent obstacle avoidance, but did still get tangled in cables
• Voice commands unreliable

Let's start with vacuuming performance. The MaxV Ultra promises extreme suction. Figuring out how to tell how much suction a vacuum cleaner has is easier said than done, but here it's measured in Pascal, and the MaxV Ultra has 10,000Pa of it – which Roborock says is 'industry leading', but the Deebot T30S Combo actually offers 11,000Pa on max mode. It's still very sucky though. 

Generally, I found this robovac delivered a decent clean. There are sensors to detect when the robovac is on carpet and increase suction accordingly, and I found this feature worked reliably during my review period – I could hear the suction amping up when the robot trundled onto soft flooring in my home. 

There are quite a few vacuuming options to cater for different cleaning needs and preferences. You can opt for a deep clean, where the carpets are vacuumed twice to form a checkered pattern, or Carpet First Mode if you want the robovac to tackle carpets first, before it does any mopping, so the mop pad will be dry for this part of the clean (the mop pads do lift when the vac is on carpet; it's just as a backup). You can also set it to boost suction power when navigating around pet supplies.

To test fine debris pickup, I sprinkled cornflour on my medium-pile carpet. It picked up the surface dust but nothing more ingrained. I had similar results from my large-debris test – the robovac got most of the oats sprinkled on my carpet, but left a few. So not perfect, but still very acceptable. This was after just one pass – it is possible to instruct the robovac to do a more thorough clean. 

The extending side brushes, however, could be improved. I have radiators that sit slightly too low for the robovac to get under them, but the spinning side brush did not extend to clean these areas – particularly unfortunate, as dust often collects here. I saw another review from someone who had the same issue with low-sitting cabinets. I also found that pickup on the corners of rooms wasn't great – the robovac doesn't really linger long enough for the extending brush to do its work, often leaving debris.

Roborock promises a 99.5% hair pickup rate in carpet mode. I have long hair, and rollers did a great job of tackling this on the carpet; filtering it straight into the dustbin rather than letting it tangle around the rollers. However, I did find hair got tangled on both the axles of the rollers and the extending side brush, the former of which was particularly tricky to remove. 

Looking for the best robot vacuum for pet hair? I think this would be a good shout, with the combination of powerful suction and those grippy rollers. However, the small onboard bin might prove problematic if you have a pet that sheds a lot. 

Moving on to mopping. Again, I was impressed. I found the mopping effective, with the robovac tackling both wet spills (coffee) and sticky spills (dried on honey) effectively. The hot mop cleaning also seems to work well, with minimal stains left on the mop pads even after cleaning the coffee. 

Navigation is excellent, as I'd expect from this brand. The Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra mapped my flat quickly and accurately, making setup nice and straightforward. It's smart enough to recognize which room it's in and promises to be able to identify 73 objects, including pet waste, shoes and mirrors (this last one has consistently been an issue for robovac owners with floor mirrors in the past, so is a welcome addition here).

On test, I found object avoidance was a little inconsistent. I left a sock (black) and a cable (white) on my light grey carpet. The Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra tried its very best to vacuum up the sock. And while it successfully identified and avoided the cable (providing a snapshot for me to approve in the app – shown above), it then went on to repeatedly got stuck on cables during general cleaning, needing manual rescuing. 

Note that if you activate Pet Mode, the robot will exercise more caution when avoiding obstacles – so it'll be less likely to hoover up your cat, but might also provide a slightly less comprehensive clean as a result (your choice). 

I also found the voice assistant to be unreliable. This robovac frequently failed to understand basic commands, included in the list of approved commands ('Return to dock', 'Mop here'). Not that it should matter, but I don't have what might be considered a 'challenging accent', so I'm a little baffled as to why it struggled to understand me.

Roborock is known to have one of the best robot vacuum apps, and the app for the S8 MaxV Ultra didn't disappoint. It's well-designed, fairly intuitive to use, and does a good job of organizing all the many different controls it needs to offer. However, if you're new to robot vacuums, you may still find it a little overwhelming and confusing. 

• Performance score: 4 out of 5

Should you buy the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra?

Buy it if...

Don't buy it if...

How I tested the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra

• I used this as my main vacuum for 3 weeks
• I tested all the different modes and features
• I ran specific cleaning tests using different types of spillages

For my Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review, I used this robovac as my main vacuum cleaner for three weeks to gain an idea of how it performs on a day-to-day basis, including how easy it is to control and how good it is at cleaning in general. I tried out all the different functions I was able to, as well as running a series of specific tests to assess cleaning powers. These included seeing how well the mop coped with wet and dried-on sticky stains, and if the vacuum could handle large and small debris. I scattered common objects like socks and cables on my floor to assess the reliability of its obstacle avoidance features. I measured my findings against our experiences with other robot vacuums, and the Roborock's own claims about this vacuum's performance. 

Read more about how we test

First reviewed July 2024

Eufy X10 Pro Omni review: two-minute review

The Eufy X10 Pro Omni is a quality robotic vacuum and mop. It has excellent suction power, while also being pleasantly quiet in all but its most powerful setting, navigates around obstacles very well indeed, and even reports back with photos of objects it has avoided. The mopping system is especially good, with two rotating pads that press down onto the floor with 2.2lbs of pressure and spin at 180rpm. The result is a top-notch clean with no puddles or streaking.

The base station is larger than some others, including that of the Eufy X8 Pro, but is nicely designed and houses tanks for both clean and empty water for the mop. The robot's navigation system uses a camera and LiDAR to precisely map your home and quickly creates a floor plan that can be edited in the Eufy Clean app – it's then easy to name rooms and create no-go or no-mop zones.

As with other Eufy robots, the X10 can struggle to climb over larger doorway thresholds. This in itself isn't a major problem, but the issue is how the robot sometimes manages (more often than not, to be fair), yet sometimes fails. Some adjustments to your thresholds might be required if your floors are particularly uneven.

Overall, the X10 Pro Omni is a high-end robotic vacuum with excellent performance, especially when it comes to mopping hard floors. The base station is large, but offers a complete, hands-off cleaning experience.

Eufy X10 Pro Omni review: price & availability

• List price: $799.99 / £799 / AU$1,699.95
• Availability: Available now

The X10 Pro Omni sits above the Eufy X8 Pro but below its new flagship, the Eufy Omni S1 Pro. At $800 / £800 it's a little more expensive than the X9, but falls comfortably below the S1, to the tune of over $500 / £500. The X10 Pro Omni’s list price is also comfortably below that of the four-figure Roomba Combo J9+.

Splashing out a four-figure sum on a robotic vacuum might sound absurd – especially when entry-level models start below $300 – but such figures have quickly become table stakes, and at $800 the X10 Pro Omni feels like fairly good value. Especially when the new S1, which is also a robotic vacuum and mop with self-emptying of both its dustbin and water tank, costs a whopping $1,500.

• Value for money score: 4.5 out of 5

Eufy X10 Pro Omni review: design

• D-shaped vacuum with single side brush
• Two rotating mops
• Charge station empties bin and water tank

The Eufy X10 Pro Omni is a D-shaped robotic vacuum with a roller brush and two spinning mops underneath, plus a single rotating brush on its side for flicking dirt out from the corners of your room. When in use, the two mops push down with a force of 2.2lbs (1kg) and spin at 180rpm to scrub dirt away from hard floors.

The robot’s vision system includes LiDAR technology, so it can see just as well at night as it can during the day, and the mops automatically lift when it drives onto carpets to avoid getting them wet. A specially designed comb is intended to automatically remove hair from the roller brush, preventing it from getting tangled up.

A base station is included and charges the robot and also empties the dustbin, dries the mops with warm air and swaps out the robot’s dirty water for clean. Eufy says the base station's 2.5-liter dust bag only needs replacing every two months, based on a three-person household without pets, or 45 days with one pet and 30 days with two. It also states that the 3-liter water tank provides enough water to mop a 1,500-2,000sqft home two or three times.

Everything feels well made and it’s easy to get the robot set up and ready for its first clean. The base station isn’t particularly attractive – and it's also quite large. That said, I prefer the X10’s simple design over the transparent, glowing water tanks of the Eufy S1 Pro Omni.

The base station measures 18.1in (460mm) tall, but requires an extra 13.7in (350mm) above that to access the dustbin and water tanks. The station is 14.4in (366mm) wide and 18.9in (480mm) deep, including the ramp used by the robot to drive into its charging dock. The robot itself is 4.47in (113.5mm) tall, including the sensor housing, and has a footprint of 12.87 x 13.9inc (327 x 353mm).

As ever with Eufy robots, the base station needs about 20in (50cm) of free space either side, so it can drive up against the wall, and 59in (150cm) in front, where it needs space to drive out from the charger and orient itself before each clean. In reality, you can get away with placing the charge dock in the corner of a room, right next to a wall. The robot still works just fine, but won’t be able to clean between the station and the wall.

Lastly, the robot’s dust bin is easily accessible by opening the lid (which is held closed with magnets) and pulling it out. From there you can retrieve any debris that's got stuck and access the filter, which requires occasional cleaning. Water is automatically fed in and out of the robot when docked at the base station, so there’s no removable tank (as there is with the cheaper Eufy X8), and the mop pads can be removed to be cleaned and eventually replaced.

• Design score: 4.5 out of 5 

Eufy X10 Pro Omni review: performance

• Intelligent navigation
• Scales uneven thresholds (most of the time)
• Excellent cleaning performance

Before I tested the X10 with a set of specific tasks, I used the robot for a couple of weeks as any regular customer would. This included setting it up in my kitchen and using it to periodically clean individual rooms, along with the occasional whole-home deep clean.

Right away, the X10 impressed. The robot quickly and accurately mapped my apartment during its first exploratory clean, using the LiDAR sensor to work out where all the walls and furniture were, and even splitting the floor plan into rooms. I then used the app to name each room and set a no-go zone under the sofa, since there’s so much stuff back there I’m always worried about robotic vacuums getting stuck. The X10 never did, but I’d rather it doesn’t try picking a fight with the random DIY tools, paints cans and pieces of wood from our recent kitchen installation still lurking under there.

I also initially set no-mop zones for the carpeted bedroom and a large rug in the lounge, but soon learned to trust the X10’s ability to spot the difference between hard floors, carpets and rugs. A couple of weeks later, and it hasn’t once tried to inadvertently mop the carpet.

I’ve also been impressed with the robot’s navigation, and how it stops instantly if something gets in its way. Step in front of it and it stops on a dime, before quickly working out an alternative route. It’s also good at climbing over uneven doorway thresholds. Eufy’s newer and far more expensive S1 Pro Omni really struggled with thresholds and climbing from exposed floorboards to carpet; so much so that it sometimes completely failed to enter certain rooms.

The X10 is far better in this regard, but was still inconsistent in its ability to clear raised thresholds. When tasked with a whole-home clean it would manage just fine, but when asked to clean only the kitchen it would drive down onto the floorboards of the hallway, then repeatedly fail to climb back over the circa-2cm threshold. Sometimes it would succeed, only to drive back down and get stuck again.

As with the S1, I wouldn’t mind if the robot accepted defeat and admitted failure every time, but instead its ability to clear the threshold is inconsistent.

The vacuuming performance felt about on par with the S1, especially when turned up to Turbo or Max settings. While a fair bit louder than the Quiet and Standard modes, the more powerful settings produced a deep clean, reliably sucking debris, dust, hair and fluff out of carpets. I also found it works best when configured to vacuum each room twice with either the Standard or Deep intensity setting. I would say the X10’s vacuum performance is about on par with my Dyson V10, and I was especially impressed with its ability to pull fluff and hair out of carpet. That said, the Dyson still picked up some extra dust and hair when used right after the X10 had completed a job at maximum suction.

You’ll also still need a manual vacuum for areas that robots like the X10 simply can’t reach, such as tight gaps between furniture and the stairs. As ever, these robots are great for light, frequent cleans – and free up a nice chunk of your time in the process – but can’t replace a manual vacuum entirely.

I found a single pass with the Fast setting is fine for a quick daily clean, and I can see this working great for little-used spare bedrooms. But for my one-bed flat, where every room is used frequently, a more intensive clean works best. I also found it did a great job of avoiding all manner of obstacles. Eufy says the robot can recognize over 100 types of objects, from toys and cables, to clothes and the all-important pet mess. However, during one clean it mistook a small plant pot for a bin and a stray sock for a shoe. It also labeled a fireplace hearth as a "base" and steered well clear of it, missing a patch of carpet in the process.

The X10’s mopping performance is particularly good, thanks to how the mops press down and spin quickly. This is far more effective than the static mopping pad of the Eufy Clean X8 Pro, which is simply dragged around. The X10 gives hard floors a proper clean, and I like how it drives in a pattern that ensures the mops, which are at the rear of the robot, are pushed into corners and up against the walls at every opportunity.

Now for the specific tests, where flour, biscuit crumbs and oats are used to see how robotic vacuums perform in controlled conditions. First, I combine flour with biscuit crumbs and sprinkle the mix on a patch of hard floor, then ask the X10 to clean that area with its least powerful suction setting, which I recorded at about 62 decibels.

The X10 did an okay job, and took just a couple of minutes to vacuum the whole kitchen, but missed a few obvious patches of crumb mix. I tried again, this time using Standard suction (64dB) and with it set to clean the same area twice instead of once. I’ve found from other vacuum reviews that this makes a huge difference, as debris flicked around on the first pass is often collected on the second. The result this time was better, but some debris remained. 

Finally, switching up to Turbo suction (66dB) and enabling deep cleaning, where it drives a more thorough route across each room, completely cleared the crumb mix and left the floor perfectly clean. As for other sounds, the vacuum briefly hit a rather loud 82dB while emptying its bin into the base station, then settled down to 62dB for a minute to clean the mop, and a barely audible 42dB while the mop was dried with hot air.

I then performed the same test on carpet and saw similar results. The less powerful suction modes are best for frequent, light cleans of lesser-used parts of your home (like the spare bedrooms), while the more powerful settings work great in higher-traffic areas or for spills. I was again impressed with how well the X10 sucks debris out of carpet.

I was less impressed by how it handled larger debris. Like other robot vacuums, it had a habit of flicking oats around the room instead of collecting them up. The rotating brush does a decent job at collecting dust and hair, but fails to pull larger debris, like the oats, away from the edges of a floor and into the robot’s path. Instead it often does the opposite, pushing debris into the corners and up against furniture where it is more difficult to reach, especially on floors where the carpet slopes downwards at the edges.

Larger debris like this requires maximum suction, as even Turbo mode struggled to pick everything up – not including the oats flicked to the corners of the room. As ever, the conclusion is that robotic vacuums are great for simple cleaning but can’t match a manual vacuum for clearing up specific spillages.

Finally, I tested the mopping function by spilling a sugary drink and some hot sauce on a wooden floor and leaving the mess to dry. I set the robot to mop the kitchen and it did a fantastic job, completely removing the stains and using just the right amount of water to clean the floor without leaving any streaks or puddles. It then took just a minute or so to clean the mop, and spent a couple of hours drying them. As with the Eufy S1, the X10’s mopping function is flawless, and far better than the static mop of the X8.

• Performance score: 4 out of 5 

Eufy X10 Pro Omni review: app

• Easy to use
• Lots of configuration available
• Handy pre-set cleaning scenarios

Just like the X8 and S1, the X10 is controlled by the Eufy Clean smartphone app for iOS and Android. It’s one of the better smart home companion apps I’ve used, thanks to it being intuitive and easy to use, but with lots of customization available to those who want it.

Such configurability includes setting the X10 Pro Omni to clean whichever rooms you want, however you like. For example, you can ask it to vacuum and mop the kitchen with deep intensity, Turbo suction and medium water usage, and for it to make two passes on each stage of the clean, then head into the lounge and do a standard vacuum.

I especially like how you can create shortcut icons for specific cleaning scenarios. For example, you can create a scenario called Post-Meal Clean, where the robot will perform a quick, low-intensity clean of your kitchen (or whichever bit of floor space you want) with just a tap. There are also scenarios for deep or daily cleans for the whole home, and you can make your own too.

It’s also easy to split your home map up into sections and name each room accordingly, and to create no-go or no-mop zones to stop the robot doing anything wrong. The Eufy Labs section includes a couple of experimental features, including one called Smart Track Cleaning, where pressing the robot’s front bumper with your foot for three seconds turns it on and has it follow you, cleaning as it goes.

Lastly, the app can be used to manually control base station functions. This is handy for if you’ve had to pick the robot up and return it to its charger for whatever reason, or if you have disrupted its cleaning routine. With a couple of taps it’s easy to have the station empty the robot’s dustbin and wash then dry the mops – which it does very effectively by blowing them with air heated to 45C for around two hours.

• App score: 5 out of 5 

Should you buy the Eufy X10 Pro Omni?

Buy it if… 

Don’t buy it if… 

How I tested the Eufy Clean X10 Pro Omni

I set up the X10 Pro Omni and used it as my only vacuum and mop for a couple of weeks. During this time I let it create a map of my own, then named rooms and created no-go and no-mop zones.

I then experimented with all of the various vacuuming and mopping modes, before conducting several specific tests to learn exactly how well each mode performs, and how buyers can get the most out of their robot.

Read more about how we test

First reviewed July 2024

Eufy Clean X8 Pro robot vacuum: two-minute review

The Eufy Clean X8 Pro is a powerful robotic vacuum cleaner and mop with LiDAR for smart navigation and a self-emptying bin for hands-free cleaning. The setup process is seamless, with quick and accurate mapping. The app works very well indeed; it is quick, intuitive and makes it easy to adjust your maps and tweak settings, as well as create cleaning schedules and adjust the suction strength.

The vacuum performs well, with very high suction strength, intelligent navigation and the ability to drive over relatively high door thresholds and through medium-thickness carpets and rugs without getting stuck. However, the anti-tangle roller brush can’t handle human hair, and requires frequent manual cleaning.

We also encountered an issue where the robot got confused and added phantom rooms to the map, which required a factory reset. The mopping function is rather basic, since it requires manual fitting and doesn’t move or self-clean. It’s fine for frequent, low-intensity wipes of hard floors, but isn’t suitable for removing dried-on stains.

Overall, the X8 Clean is a compact but powerful robotic vacuum with a top-drawer smartphone app and impressive cleaning abilities, but it falls short compared to today's best robot vacuums when it comes to dealing with human hair. 

Eufy Clean X8 Pro review: price & availability

• List price: $649.99 / £599 / AU$999.95
• Availability: US, UK, Australia

The Eufy X8 Pro hit the market with a US retail price of $649.99, but at the time of writing (July 2024) Eufy’s own website has $250 off, taking the price down to a far more affordable $399.99. At that lower price it feels like excellent value for money.

Elsewhere, the vacuum is priced at a rather steep £599 from Eufy’s own UK website, but at the time of writing it’s just £290 from Amazon. Eufy’s Australia website has it priced at AU$999.95.

As with other robotic vacuum cleaners – and non-robotic ones too – there are some ongoing costs to consider. This includes the dust bags used by the self-emptying system, as well as consumable components like the robot's side brush and roller brush.

In a world where four-figure robotic vacuums aren't uncommon, some of the deals we've seen make the X8 Pro feel like very good value for money.

• Value for money score: 4 out of 5

Eufy Clean X8 Pro review: design

• Self-emptying charge dock
• Mop attachment fitted manually
• 4.5-inches / 11.4cm tall

The Eufy Clean X8 Pro is a circular robotic vacuum cleaner with an attachable mop. It can be bought on its own or, as reviewed here, with a self-emptying station for an even more hands-off experience.

As with many other robotic vacuums, the X8 Pro has a circular vision system on top. In this case the system is called iPath and it uses lidar and infrared technology to view its environment and work its way around your home. The top panel is also home to buttons for starting/pausing the robot, activating the spot cleaning function, and instructing it to return to base and charge its battery.

The robot measures 13.5 in (34.3 cm) in diameter and is 4.5 in (11.4 cm) tall, including the top-mounted sensor module. This makes it slightly taller than some other robotic vacuums, especially those with their vision system on the front instead of on top, so you’ll want to bear this in mind if you have any particularly low furniture. Eufy recommends creating no-go zones in the app to prevent the robot driving under furniture that is lower than 12cm. You'll also need to set no-mop zones in carpeted areas.

The hinged top cover lifts up to reveal access to the dust bin, which lifts out for manual emptying and filter replacement. Handily, the robot says 'dust bin removed' and 'dust bin inserted' to let you know what you’re doing.

Turn the robot over and you’re greeted by the centrally-mounted roller brush, single spinning brush for flicking debris out of the corner of your rooms, and two wheels.

Since this X9 Pro also works as a mop, the water tank is removed by sliding it out from the rear. You’ll need to fill and empty this manually, and also attach the included mopping pad when you want to use that mode.

The charging and self-emptying station measures approximately 15in (38cm) tall, and is 7.5in (19cm) wide and 6.5in (16.5cm) deep. It is designed to be placed up against a wall, and although not compulsory, it comes with a clear plastic mat onto which the robot and charge station can sit. The mat has sticky pads for fixing it to hard floors, or it can help protect carpets from the damp mop.

The station is more compact than some other models, not least that of Eufy’s S1 Pro, since that model also houses tanks for clean and dirty water. All you'll find in the X8’s base station is a compartment for the included 2.5-liter dust bag, which Eufy says should need replacing roughly every six weeks, depending on usage.

• Design score: 4.5 out of 5 

Eufy Clean X8 Pro review: performance

• Powerful but quiet suction
• Solid navigation capabilities, but sometimes fail to spot all debris
• Mopping is basic

My first task for the X8 Pro was for it to map my apartment. It did this very well, and soon beamed a floor plan back to the Eufy Clean smartphone app (free for iOS and Android). From there it’s easy to split the floor up into rooms and name them accordingly, and you can also have the robot create a map for each floor of your home, if applicable.

After that, it’s easy to either start the robot right away, or create a custom cleaning mode for each room. You can, for example, tell the robot to always use Turbo or Max suction power for the kitchen, pass through the bedroom twice at Standard suction, then clean the lesser-used guest bedroom once with Quiet mode, the least powerful of the four vacuum settings.

A mopping mode can also be assigned to each room, with three options – low, medium and high – on offer. These refer to how much water the robot uses, but since the mop doesn’t actually move (the robot simply drags it around), water quantity is the only variable on offer.

Alternatively, you can draw a specific zone for the robot to clean in, which is useful when you need to vacuum a certain bit of carpet, or when perhaps only the rug needs attention on an otherwise clean hard floor. For the most part, you’ll likely just set the suction power, enable BoostIQ (which increases power depending on debris quantity and floor type) and hit the Auto button. The robot will then vacuum the entire floor plan, before returning to base to empty its bin and recharge.

The robot can even be driven manually, using directional buttons in the app, but you’ll likely only use this once for the novelty value.

Before performing specific tests with carefully measured amounts of debris, I used the Eufy X8 Pro as if it were my own for a couple of weeks. This meant setting it up, then having it clean my flat on automatic mode every couple of days – and let me tell you, its vacuum performance was seriously impressive.

Unlike the (much) more expensive Eufy Omni S1 Pro, the X8 never failed to climb up from the floorboards of my hallway onto the bedroom carpet. The S1 was a bit hit-and-miss in this aspect, and would sometimes get stuck in a relatively thick rug, but the X8 just soldiered right on, turning up the suction when it encountered said rug, or clambering onto the bedroom carpet from the bare floorboards of the hallway. It sometimes got stuck among the frankly embarrassing amount of stuff under the sofa, but never failed to eventually free itself and carry on with the job.

I was also impressed with the X8 Pro’s ability to judge tight gaps, as it would pass through a half-opened door with just 0.4in (1cm) of clearance on either side. That said, it likes to gently bump into its surroundings, seemingly feeling its way around. This is mostly fine, and didn’t cause any damage, but it had a habit of squashing shoes under a bookcase in the hallway.

At one point it spent several minutes fighting with the power cable of a floor lamp. I can’t decide if it’s smart enough to repeatedly try and break free, or dumb enough to not realize what was going on. I suspect the latter, so while I admire the X8 Pro’s ability to keep on going without calling for help – as the S1 Pro does more frequently – I urge buyers to exercise caution and clear away cables before letting the robot loose. Incidentally, if it gets tangled up and needs your help, it stops cleaning as soon as you pick it up, then resumes when you tap the play icon in the app.

Eufy describes the X8 Pro as offering 'tangle-free cleaning', thanks to a roller brush and comb that 'detangles hair automatically', meaning there’s apparently 'no more need to manually clean the roller brush yourself'. This is not entirely true, however, as even in my pet-free home the brush became tangled with human hair after just a couple of cleans, resulting in the robot stopping and asking for help. This only took me a moment to fix, but had I not been at home it would have aborted its cleaning job and headed back to base.

Just 30 minutes later, and the X8 Pro again asked for its brush to be de-tangled, before failing for 15 minutes to find its way back to the charger. Even after I told it to head home via the app, it pondered around a couple of rooms before eventually finding the base station. I thought all was well, but the next morning realized it hadn’t parked properly, despite there being no obstacles, and therefore failed to charge.

I was disappointed by how the robot became tangled up with just a small amount of hair. It seems most hair manages to pass through the brush and into the bin successfully, but when just a small amount remains on the brush the robot stops and calls for help. Eufy promotes the X8 Pro as a vacuum for dealing with pet hair, but in my experience just a small clump of (admittedly long) human hair is enough to render it disabled. This is a shame, because it otherwise performed very well.

Now for the more specific tests, and to see how the X8 Pro’s twin, 4,000Pa turbines get on. My first test was to see how effectively the vacuum sucks up a dry, dusty mixture of flour and biscuit crumbs from a hard floor. The lowest suction mode (recorded at 65 decibels) did a respectable job and picked up most of the debris, but left a few patches. The X8 also managed to flick debris away with its rotating brush, rather than push it into its own path. 

I repeated the test with the next most powerful setting, called Standard and recorded at 68 decibels. It did a better job, but still failed to collect debris from in front of its base station. This is a common theme with the X8 Pro, as it seems unwilling to produce any suction while maneuvering in and out of the charger.

The same thing occurred when using the Turbo (67db) and Max (69db) settings. I found the solution was to set the vacuum to perform each clean twice, which is easy to do thanks to a '2x' icon in the app. That way, any debris flicked around on the first pass is collected the second time around. Smartly, instead of just following the same route twice, the robot covers the majority of the floor by zig-zagging left to right on its first pass, then up and down on its second.

I then tried to repeat this test on carpet but, bizarrely, the robot failed to find its way from the charger in the kitchen to the neighboring bedroom, a journey it had made many times before. Instead it drove around aimlessly for several minutes and began adding new, made-up rooms to the map, compounding the confusion. Since map editing only goes as far as merging, dividing and naming rooms, I had to delete the map for my entire flat and create a new one. There’s a ‘revert’ button in the app, but since this was grayed out it couldn’t be used.

I don’t know what went wrong here, as nothing was relocated or otherwise interfered with between tests. I had to perform a factory reset and have asked Eufy for input on what they think went wrong. I’ll update this review if I get a response.

With the flat remapped, the robot did a great job of vacuuming up debris from carpet, with standard suction and the two-pass technique working a charm, even on hair.

Next, I tasked the vacuum with clearing up larger debris, in the form of oats. I repeated this on the same hard floor and carpet as before, and it did a good job. The rotating brush still had a habit of flicking debris around the room, especially on hard floors, but this is a fault of pretty much all robotic vacuums. Perhaps they should only use their rotating brushes when driving along a wall, instead of in open space.

Finally, the mop. Unlike the much pricier Eufy S1 Pro, the X8’s mop feels like a bit of an afterthought. It has to be attached manually and, unlike the S1’s, it doesn’t move or clean itself in any way. You also have to fill and empty the robot’s water tank manually. In my tests it did an acceptable job of keeping hard floors clean, but this robot should not be used to mop up fresh spillages, as it vacuums first, then mops. Also, because the center of the mopping pad is thicker than the outer edges, it doesn’t clean evenly.

Instead, this is a machine for frequent cleaning – a little-and-often approach, instead of being called upon to tackle something more substantial. I imagine most buyers will relegate the mop attachment to a cupboard and accept that that’s a job they’ll have to do manually for best results. If you want a great robotic mop, the Eufy S1 Pro is far better suited.

Eufy claims up to 180 minutes of battery life, but I found half that is more realistic. As an example, 30 minutes of cleaning took the battery from 90 to 62 percent.

• Performance score: 3.5 out of 5 

Eufy Clean X8 Pro review: app

• Easy to set up and use
• Can schedule cleans and target individual rooms
• Offers lots of configurability

As with the pricier S1, the X8 Pro is controlled via the Eufy Clean app, which is intuitive to use and works really well. It’s easy to control how the robot functions (suction strength, which rooms to clean, etc.) and there are plenty of settings to adjust to help you get the most out of the robot. You can set a daily or weekly schedule, tell it to only clean a specific room, or clean a designated area of your choice. All that’s missing is the option to have the robot mop and not vacuum. Instead, no matter which setting you pick, it’ll first vacuum then mop.

The app also acts as a service center for your robot, clearly showing how far through their lifecycle each of its components are, including the dust bag, filter, side brush and rolling brush. The app tells you how many hours of cleaning each item is still good for, and there are links to purchase replacements. There’s even a tool to help find your robot, should it have somehow got itself lost under the sofa.

My only wish is that the phantom rooms plotted by the X8 Pro during my testing could be removed without creating a whole new map.

• App score: 4.5 out of 5 

Should you buy the Eufy Clean X8 Pro?

Buy it if… 

Don’t buy it if… 

How I tested the Eufy Clean X8 Pro

I set up the Eufy Clean X8 Pro in my apartment and used it as my only vacuum cleaner for a couple of weeks. After this, I conducted several specific tests to see how well it worked in each of its four suction modes. I also tried out the mopping feature and recorded the volume of both the vacuum itself and the self-emptying bin.

I closely observed how the robot tackled different types of debris and how it navigated between rooms with different flooring. 

• First reviewed: July 2024

Eufy S1 Pro robot vacuum: two-minute review

• View Omni S1 Pro at Eufy

The Eufy Omni S1 Pro (or just Eufy S1 Pro if you're not in the US) is a robotic vacuum cleaner and mop with a docking station that automatically empties the dust bin, replenishes the water tank with clean, ozonated water, dries the mop and charges the battery after each clean. It uses lidar to help with navigation around your home, creates accurate maps of every room (even across multiple floors) and employs the Eufy Clean smartphone app to let you set schedules and customize how you want the S1 to clean. I tested one out to see how it performs in practice, how it compares to the rest of today's best robot vacuums, and if it justifies its premium price tag.

On test, I found the S1 to mop hard floors incredibly well, thanks to its rotating mop that spins at high speed and pushes down onto the floor with 2.2lbs (1kg) of force. The S1 also does a good job of vacuuming, with four suction strengths available and two rotating brushes for getting into the corners of every room. The Eufy Clean app works very well, and so too does the docking station, which adds a cleaning solution to water before it’s pumped into the robot.

The S1 navigates effectively, driving close to walls without crashing into them and avoiding steps, while automatically raising its mop when driving over rugs and carpets. Its ability to clear raised room thresholds can be inconsistent, however, with the robot sometimes failing to enter rooms it has previously driven into without a problem. This can be fixed by turning off an anti-drop function. It also struggled a little when tasked with vacuuming up fine, engrained debris, and it sometimes failed to spot obvious, medium-sized debris.

The lower suction modes are quiet, the app is quick and responsive, and the battery life is excellent. Eufy insists that only its own cleaning solution is used with the mopping system, adding to the ongoing costs. It also sits in the premium price bracket – 

Eufy Omni S1 Pro review: price & availability

• List price: $1,499 / £1,499
• Launch date: June 2024
• Availability: US, UK, 

Eufy took the unusual move of launching this robotic vacuum and mop as a crowd-funded Kickstarter project. It raised a whopping $3.5m from almost 3,200 backers at the time of writing, with many backers paying $999 for their S1 Pro. The actual retail price is significantly higher, at $1,499 / £1,499 (it's not currently available in Australia, but that's equivalent to AU$2,699) from when the vacuum robot went on sale on 19 June 2024.

Being a vacuum cleaner and mopping system, there are several parts that can be replaced over time. Eufy includes several spares in the box – more on which later – but buyers should bear in mind that they’ll need to pay for replacement dust bags, filters, mops and brushes when the included ones wear out. Eufy also insists S1 Pro owners buy the company’s own hard floor cleaner, which comes in a $19.99 bottle specifically shaped to fit the S1 Pro. Other cleaners, Eufy says, may cause 'irreversible damage' to the machine.

The idea of a four-figure vacuum might be shocking to some readers (and it does sit in TechRadar's premium price bracket), but it's not so unusual these days, at least when looking at flagship models. The Roomba Combo j9+ by iRobot costs a similar amount, while the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra isn’t far off $2,000.

• Value for money score: 4 out of 5

Eufy Omni S1 Pro review: design

• Self-emptying charge dock handles dust and water
• Rotating mop applies pressure and self-cleans as it goes
• 3.78-inch / 9.6cm tall

With the S1 Pro, Eufy has gone against the trend for robotic vacuums with smaller, more compact docking stations. Instead, this is a robot with a large, imposing base station that houses the dust bin, as well as tanks for clean and dirty water, and a cleaning solution.

The base station is 67 cm tall and has a footprint of 38 x 47cm. I was able to tuck it into a corner of my small flat for a few weeks to conduct this review, but had to move a table to make sure the base station had the required 50cm of clear space either side. It’ll function without this clearance, but the robot won’t be able to clean between its charger and the nearby wall.

The robot itself is broadly similar to most other automated vacuums, albeit slightly taller than the Roomba Combo J9 Plus. The Eufy measures 9.6cm tall, 32cm wide and 34cm long. Turn it over and you’ll find a pair of heavy-duty wheels, a 290 mm rotating mop, a pair of spinning brushes for clearing dust and debris from the corners of your floor, and a rubber roller brush for scooping dust and debris into the suction system. This is all easily accessible without tools, by simply removing the top cover (which is held in place magnetically) then lifting out the robot’s dust bin.

Handily, the robot speaks aloud when items have been removed and installed. It’ll say things like 'dirty water tank removed' and 'dust bin installed' to help you quickly identify each component.

The charge base has a control panel on the top, complete with buttons for operating the robot and a display that shows animations to help with maintenance, such as how to replace the water tanks. It also says when filters and other components need cleaning. This means you can use the robot without even touching the smartphone app (once it has been set up, anyway). Printed instructions make the setup process very simple, and you’ll be up and running in just a few minutes.

The S1 Pro's design means it empties its dust bin into a larger bag in the base station at the end of each cleaning session. It also fills its onboard tank with clean, ozonated water from the base station’s larger tank before each session, then empties itself into the base’s dirty water tank when finished. Eufy says the dust bag should only need replacing every couple of months, while the water tank managed half a dozen mopping sessions before running dry. Naturally, this will depend on your floor space and how much is mopped.

I was impressed with the quality of the Eufy’s hardware. It all feels very sturdy, but takes up plenty of space. I would have liked to see storage space in the dock for spare parts, as with the iRobot Roomba Combo J9 Plus, but that isn't the case here. To its credit, Eufy suggests the taller base station makes it easy to pick up and replace the water tanks, since smaller base stations mean stooping over.

Lastly, there's no option to plumb the base station into your home’s water supply, but Eufy says 'water accessories' for the S1 Pro are currently under development.

• Design score: 4.5 out of 5 

Eufy Omni S1 Pro review: performance

• Superb mopping abilities
• Solid navigation capabilities, but could fail to spot even larger debris
• Vacuuming is good but not great

As with any robot vacuum, its first task was to map my apartment. Our property has a lounge, hallway, kitchen and bedroom, plus a bathroom with a step, so the robot has access to every corner of the property, except for part of the bathroom. If I wanted to map that small section, I could have, since the app lets you save maps of multiple floors.

The S1 Pro quickly plowed into a relatively thick rug and got stuck, before calling for help. My bad. I’d not reviewed a robotic vacuum in this property before and, while the style of rug isn’t uncommon, it’s a little higher than the 25mm maximum carpet height Eufy says the S1 Pro can cope with.

Lesson learnt, rug rolled up and robot restarted, it quickly mapped the entire flat and returned to base, having not slipped down the bathroom step.

The Eufy Clean app now shows a very accurate map of my home, and it takes just a few seconds to separate the rooms into different zones and give them each a name. That way, you can tell the robot to go clean one room, or vacuum all rooms but one.

Eufy claims 8,000 Pa of suction power, which is the same as some of the brand’s cheaper robotic vacuums, like the Eufy X10. There are four suction levels to pick from, called Quiet, Standard, Turbo and Max, plus mopping settings of Soft, Standard and Deep, and the option to clean an area once or twice in each session.

You can also tell the robot to vacuum and mop an area, or just vacuum – since you won’t want it to mop your carpets. And on that note, the robot automatically detects carpet, then lifts the mop to keep it clear of the floor. There’s no option to mop only, so it shouldn’t be used to clear up large liquid spills, since it’ll try to vacuum the floor first.

Before giving the S1 Pro a set of specific challenges, I used it for a week as a normal robotic vacuum and mop. I found it very easy to use and the mopping results were fantastic. It really does a great job of cleaning wooden floors, administering just the right amount of water to not leave puddles or streaks, and cleaning the mop as it goes. Eufy says the mopping roller spins at 170 rpm and pushes down onto the floor with a force of 2.2lbs.

My varnished floors shone clean and, if more proof were needed, the murky contents of the waste water tank looked like it had been scooped out of the River Thames.

After vacuuming and mopping, the S1 Pro returns to its charger and empties its dust bin and water tank, then dries the mop. The emptying takes just a few seconds (but is rather loud, peaking at 79dB, compared to just 62dB when vacuuming on the quietest mode and 76dB on max suction), then the mop is cleaned and dried over a period of about 4.5 hours. There’s a quiet humming during this time, but at just 50dB it isn’t really noticeable.

As for intelligence, the S1 Pro’s ability to drive around obstacles is good. It uses what Eufy calls its 3D MatrixEye Depth Perception System to understand its environment. This comprises a camera with a 120-degree lens and a lidar system. I found the Eufy does a great job of driving close to walls and furniture while very rarely crashing into anything. It even uses a set of icons on the map to indicate where it has avoided some common items, like shoes and cables.

Moving to more specific tests, and the results were mixed. First up, I tested the S1 Pro on a mix of biscuit crumbs and flour. It had no trouble picking this up from a hard floor, even with the lowest and quietest suction mode, but had a habit of flicking debris into the corners of the room with its spinning brushes, which it then failed to collect. It also struggled to clear a floor threshold strip that had previously caused it no problems; I noticed how the robot tried a few times to drive over it, then drove more quickly and succeeded.

I repeated this test on carpet but the higher Turbo and Max suction settings were needed, and even then some of the flour and crumb mix was left behind.

During these tests the robot sometimes failed to enter one room. There’s a small, ~2cm threshold to clear between the wooden hallway and carpeted bedroom, and the Eufy managed this just fine on numerous previous cleans, but failed on this occasion, before succeeding on a subsequent clean.

I later learnt this hesitancy is solved by digging into the settings pages of the Eufy Clean app and disabling a function called Visual Anti-Drop. After that, the robot drove over thresholds with more confidence.Pictured below, this must be right on the threshold, so to speak, of what it’s capable of clearing.

I expected a little more from its vacuuming abilities during this test, and was left with the impression that, while good at performing a daily clean of an otherwise tidy home, the S1 Pro can’t be relied upon to clean a specific area of dirt, or a recent spill of food or other debris. I instead reached for my Dyson V10 and had the carpet spotless in just a few seconds.

Next up, I tasked the Eufy with clearing larger dry debris from the same wooden floor and carpet as the previous test. For this I used oats, and thankfully the Standard mode was enough to pick up almost every single piece from a wooden floor. The rotary brushes still flung some dirt into the corners, but it was mostly a success.

It performed similarly well on carpet, with most of the oats picked up and just a few left behind. Frustratingly, the robot declared the clean complete and shut down the vacuum with a bunch of oats right in front of it.

The large oats also highlighted a problem with the S1 Pro’s self-emptying system. It appeared to have done everything correctly, but when I picked it up a couple of hours later a load of oats, dust and fluff fell out from under the robot. I couldn’t see an obvious blockage and the dust bag in the base station was only around 20 percent full, but contained only half the oats it should have. The rest were caught up in the rotor, having not made it to the bin, and fell out.

I’ve now realized you need to set the robot to empty its dustbin every time it returns to the charger (an option in the app), instead of less frequently. Otherwise, debris will spill out when you pick it up, for example to move it to a different floor.

All that said, I need to reiterate just how good the mop function is, and how thoroughly it cleans both the floor and itself. I hope a future software update will suggest owners turn off the Visual Anti-Drop function if the robot struggles with thresholds.

Finally, the battery life seems very good indeed. On one particular clean, the charge level fell from 100 percent to 94 percent after 22 minutes of vacuuming an area of 140 square feet. Eufy says the robot can run for 3.6 hours and cover a space of up to 1,976 square feet on one charge.

• Performance score: 4 out of 5 

Eufy Omni S1 Pro review: app

• Easy to set up and use
• Can schedule cleans and target individual rooms
• Offers lots of configurability

The Eufy Clean app is impressive and makes it easy to control the vacuum, create schedules and split your home into zones. The latter works especially well, with the robot quickly mapping our flat and correctly splitting up the rooms and hallway. Once that’s done, it’s easy to tell the robot to clean an individual room, or draw a box over a specific area that needs vacuuming or mopping.

The app gives access to all four suction modes, both mopping modes, and lets you tell the robot how you’d like each room cleaning. For example, you could ask it to do an extra thorough job of the kitchen and hallway, while going easy on the spare bedroom. There are lots of settings to fiddle with, but it’s all intuitively laid out and neatly explained. The app is also used to create virtual walls and set up no-go zones to stop the robot entering certain areas of your home.

• App score: 5 out of 5 

Should you buy the Eufy Omni S1 Pro?

Buy it if… 

Don’t buy it if… 

How I tested the Eufy S1 Pro

I lived with the S1 Pro for a few weeks before writing this review. I let it map my home, then used it to keep on top of the vacuuming and mopping, leaving to clean every room on the standard setting every few days. After this, I carried out several specific tests to see how well it picks up different types of dry debris from both hard floors and carpet.

I observed how the robot navigated, how it avoided objects and steps, and how it managed with raised thresholds. I also kept tabs on battery usage and used an app to test how loud it is in all of its various cleaning modes. 

• First reviewed: June 2024

Eureka E10s: two-minute review

The E10s is Eureka's mid-range robot vacuum, offering every feature you need. Its vacuuming and mopping capability is complimented by a bagless self-emptying dust station, real-time mapping, and customizable cleaning schedules.

The vacuum strength can be adjusted to suit the debris that needs picking up, but even at the strongest 4,000Pa of suction, there was still litter left behind. Freshly dropped crumbs and dirt were generally fine, but more stubborn walked-in dirt couldn't be captured. The noise at this level of suction also becomes a problem, especially if you're trying to relax at the same time or make sure the children stay asleep. This lack of high-end performance means you'll still need one of the best vacuum cleaners for those deeper cleans, though generally speaking no robotic cleaner can ever live up the the best vacuum cleaners in terms of suction power.

The E10s took a while to map my house, but once it was finished, it was able to predictably find its way around each room without too much trouble. As with most vacuums of this type, getting into corners was a little tricky, although the rotating dual brushes helped extend the capture range.

At the end of a clean, the E10 found its way back to its charging station and emptied its contents. It did this reliably and without any mess spilling out onto the floor. Unfortunately, the vacuum was rarely able to deposit the full contents of its clean into the base station. This resulted in the need for fairly regular maintenance cleaning to keep everything running smoothly. The base station itself looks great, with a clear perspex front, enabling users to see whether it needs emptying without having to tamper with it, though some may prefer vacuum debris to be left unseen.

The mop pad feels like a half-hearted attempt at providing a premium feature. In essence, all it is doing is running a wet cloth along the floor behind the vacuum. The app allows you to control how much water it uses, something you'll need to be conscious of with hardwood floors. The mop was able to clean up fresh spills but couldn't push through deeper stains. I don't particularly mind this, as any mop that excels at this is likely to risk damaging the top layer of the floor. 

The mop automatically lifts when it's working in a 'no mop zone' which means the vacuum can move between surfaces without the user having to remove or insert the mop pad. That being said, the pad does attract a lot of unwanted dirt when traveling across carpets, which substantially limits its effectiveness when it then moves on to a hard floor.

Despite these small setbacks, the E10s is still a fantastic mid-range robot vacuum that will keep your house clean and tidy. At only $699, you'll get a largely effective robot vacuum, which will only require you to get out a standard vacuum cleaner or mop when performing deep cleans. 

Eureka E10s robot vacuum review: price & availability

• How much does it cost? $699.99 / AU$1,099
• When is it available? Available now
• Where is it available? Available in the US and Australia

The Eureka E10s costs $699.99 / AU$1,099, and you can buy it in the US at various retailers, including Amazon and Walmart. The E10 is also available in Australia. There are no plans at the moment for a UK release.

This price point puts it firmly in the middle of the market between the super-budget options and premium alternatives. For the price, you'll get a fantastic all-rounder robot vacuum cleaner that includes a mop pad for basic mopping capabilities. Its bagless technology means owners will also avoid the cost of replacement bags, making this an even more affordable option. 

The Eufy Clean X9 Pro is a little more expensive, but delivers better mopping performance. If mopping is important to you, then the Ecovacs DEEBOT T20 Omni is another great option. If you want one of the best robot vacuums that excel at everything, then check out the Roborock S8 Pro Ultra for $1,599 / AU$2,699.

• Value score: 4.5 out of 5

Eureka E10s robot vacuum specs

Eureka E10 robot vacuum review: design & features

• Bagless Self-Emptying Dust Station
• 2-in-1 Vacuum and Mop System
• Multi-Level Cleaning

The Eureka E10s vacuum and base station are fairly compact and were well packaged inside a relatively small box. Having unboxed everything, I proceeded to plug the device in, download the app, and connect the two, which took no more than 10 minutes. After leaving the device to charge for a few hours, it was ready to map my house.

The robot vacuum is a beautiful round shape made of premium-quality powder-coated dark grey plastic. The color and material will help to keep the case looking great and free from scuff marks compared to white plastic alternatives. 

At 13.8 x 13.8 x 3.8 inches, it is a little larger than I expected, but it really looks the part. However, it is on the taller side of the robot vacuum spectrum, so it's worth considering if there will be enough clearance room for the E10s to venture beneath lower furniture. The top of the robot includes three neat buttons for quickly turning it off, setting it to clean, or sending it back to the base station for charging. More specific and targeted cleaning tasks can be carried out through the app.

Two side brushes are easily inserted into the vacuum, which helps it cover a greater area of dust and dirt. This was particularly effective at the edges and corners of rooms. Without them, I think it would have struggled in these areas.

The mop pad sits at the back of the device and is attached with velcro and a thin rod that you slide into the main unit. The pad can be easily removed for cleaning and re-applying. The dust box is easy to remove and clean out, something that is regularly necessary due to the middling performance of the self-emptying process.

Moving on to the base station, we find an identical design ethos with pleasing curved edges and the same powder-coated dark grey plastic. At a size of 9.87 x 7.1 x 17.4 inches, it sits next to the wall and, after a while, just blends into the background.

The debris receptacle is easily removed by pulling on the top handle and is largely made of see-through plastic, so you know when it needs emptying. The presence of a small LED light on the front of the base station tells you that it is connected to a power source.

The robot vacuum includes two metal connection points, which, when connected to the base station, allow the device to be charged. I found that the robot had no problems finding its way back to its home.

The vacuum is complemented by an easy-to-use, powerful app. This makes it possible to see the mapped area, specify rooms, and dictate the suction power and water level. You can also set up a cleaning schedule for automated cleaning at set times.

I found it funny that there was a 'Find My Robot' feature. I'm not sure whose house is so big that it might get lost, but maybe it could get stuck under a sofa or chair. I can't say I needed it, but the option is certainly nice to have.

• Design score: 4 out of 5

Eureka E10 robot vacuum review: performance

• Easy-to-use app
• Vacuuming for everyday cleaning
• Sub-par mopping

For the first test, I sprinkled a mix of crushed digestives and flour onto my carpet and hard floor before setting it to clean on its lowest suction power. At this level of power, the E10s was unable to pick up any of the debris. The flour and biscuits just got compacted into the carpet, meaning I needed to wipe the carpet afterward. 

It fared slightly better on a hard floor, although it still struggled to collect a meaningful amount of dirt. After changing the power modes all the way from gentle through to turbo, I found that at the highest power setting, it was able to collect most of the debris, although it needed two or three turns to do it adequately.

The second test with oats was very much the same story. The dual brushes helped to direct the oats into the vacuum, but the lowest suction wasn't strong enough to draw them up. The highest suction power was able to get up most of the oats.

The mop pad cleaned fresh spills nicely, although its effectiveness in mopping up spills rather than just spreading them around was completely dependent upon how wet the pad already was. More stubborn stains weren't effectively removed, largely due to the lack of oscillating or rotating mops.

In terms of noise, the robot vacuum reached 55dB on its lowest suction and 70dB on its highest. The former noise level just blends into the background, whereas the latter ruins a nice, relaxing evening. Because you'll want to use the highest suction level most of the time, you'll need to run this vacuum when you're out and about, during the daytime, or when you're doing other jobs around the house and are less likely to be bothered by the volume. 

The E10s boasts self-emptying technology that negates the need for bags. I was excited to use this feature but was disappointed by its performance. Dust, dirt, and debris became stuck along the route from capturing to emptying, and it quickly became clogged.

This made the vacuum largely ineffective, even at the highest suction power. This problem meant that I had to get in the habit of cleaning out the various parts of the robot vacuum before setting it going. I don't mind a certain amount of maintenance, but when you expect your robot vacuum to remove these tasks, it becomes a little annoying.

The performance of the mapping and navigation technology was second to none. The robot vacuum took a while to map out our house, taking a lot of wrong turns and stumbling over table legs, but after it was finished, the map was surprisingly accurate. The software did a good job of straightening out edges and producing a reliable map for the robot to follow. 

These types of vacuums can have a hard time navigating around the edges of rooms, constantly readjusting themselves to try and access all areas. The E10s was able to detect objects and brush up alongside them with a high level of accuracy. Rather than rotating and readjusting, it opted to push alongside these edges and therefore perform more efficient routes.

There are, of course, times when the robot became confused or tried to repeatedly travel in a set direction, but on the whole, it proved to be both reliable and predictable.

• Performance score: 3.5 out of 5

Eureka E10 robot vacuum review: app

• Easy-to-use app
• Room and zone mapping
• Cleaning scheduling

The Eureka app offers a high level of functionality while maintaining a relatively simple and intuitive interface. After performing the initial mapping, the app gives a full display of the scanned rooms and enables users to name rooms as well as set no-go or no-mop zones. The map also shows where the base station is to help you orient yourself.

Setting the robot to clean can be done in a number of ways. The easiest way is to select specific rooms on the map and hit the clean button. It is also possible to use the zones feature and create a cleaning area. For more stubborn dirt, it is possible to set the clean to be carried out up to three times. 

The final way to set a clean going is to use the Scheduled Cleaning feature. This lets you specify a time, a repeat schedule, and a number of cleaning cycles. It also allows you to specify which rooms are to be cleaned on that particular schedule. Finally, multiple schedules can be created to create a highly customized schedule.

Another feature is multi-floor mapping and thankfully, the robot is clever enough to not throw itself down the stairs. The only downside, albeit an understandable one, is that the robot can't move between floors and so will require manual moving before a clean occurs. This gets tricky when partnering multi-floor cleaning with a cleaning schedule.

I found the mapping and customizing of the resulting maps pretty intuitive, but after showing my parents how it worked, I realized that the process is not as straightforward as it needs to be for less tech-savvy people. There were times when the app went wrong or the robot struggled, requiring a certain level of intervention and troubleshooting. 

• App score: 4.5 out of 5

Eureka E10 robot vacuum review: battery life

• Battery lasts up to three hours
• Takes around 4 hours to recharge

The E10s is equipped with an internal lithium-ion battery that is advertised to last as long as 3 hours. The maximum battery life is only applicable when using the quiet setting for suction, and the life drops to 100 minutes when set to high suction power.

In practice, I found the battery lasted just over an hour when at its highest suction setting. Considering that the effectiveness of the vacuum requires it to be on this level, you shouldn't expect it to be able to clean much more than 600-800 square feet per charge.

It took around four hours to charge the battery from empty to full, an amount of time that is fine considering most people will only perform a maximum of one clean per day.

The robot will return to its base station whenever it needs a charge and will return to cleaning automatically when it has finished charging.

• Battery life score: 3.5 out of 5

Should I buy the Eureka E10?

Buy it if...

Don't buy it if...

Eureka E10: Also consider

If the Eureka E10s isn't for you, have a look at these alternatives.

How I tested the Eureka E10s

• Tested over several weeks
• Used all vacuum and mopping settings
• Tests included all floor types, including carpet and hardwood

I tested the Eureka E10s in my 600-foot home, which includes a mixture of carpet, hardwood materials, and a low-pile rug. Over several weeks, I set the robot out on several whole house cleans, and as much as possible, I tried to leave the vacuum to get on with the job itself. These cleans enabled me to see how the vacuum handled a wide variety of different debris and types of navigation situations.

I carried out some more defined tests, including a fine dust and larger debris test to check its vacuuming capabilities. The former was made up of crushed digestives and flour, with the latter consisting of oats. These helped me see how well the vacuum was able to handle different types of mess. 

We pride ourselves on our independence and our rigorous review-testing process, offering up long-term attention to the products we review and making sure our reviews are updated and maintained – regardless of when a device was released, if you can still buy it, it's on our radar.

Read more about how we test

• First reviewed: March 2024