Hello, robot: Our top automatic vacuum cleaner picks

We're swept away by the rapidly more affordable robot vacuum cleaners. We list our our favourites and their pros and cons

Wet and dry performance. The iRobot Roomba Combo j7+ Robot Vacuum and Mop; €799, iRobot.ie.

I didn’t think I would ever put robot vacuums up first in a vacuum feature. But I’ve been blown away by their performance and competitive pricing.

Having run several little fellows around the showroom floors of Cork and Waterford, and taken a few test drives at Chez Kya, I can vouch for android vehicles as a superb addition to a household cavalry.

The very first thing to suck up, however, is that robots will not replace the performance of your main cylinder vacuum, upright or stick. You will always have lightning-fast charges over the parquet to deal with. Robots cannot climb stairs, loft onto upholstery, or dig into slender gaps. The power of the motors housed in most robots is also pitiful in the face of a standard manual machine engineered for deep carpet cleaning that thoroughly grooms out the pile.

Team the talents of these machines up together rather than cheerfully escorting the AEG cylinder to the landfill. Wet/dry machines are the latest and greatest in robotic help, and new models in the €900-plus bracket (largely Chinese-made and offered on Amazon) include new detailing like auto-fill for mopping tanks, and even warm-air-drying for hard floors. A good example would be the Roborock S7 at €1,300. For most of us, this is an insane spend for extra detailing we could cope with deploying a quick manual lick.

Keeping dust and debris at lower levels, a €300 to €500 robot can work tirelessly and schematically as you work, sleep or do something infinitely more interesting. Batteries now work for longer (cutting down on the return to its base to charge up), canisters have grown in litre capacity, and performance edge-to-edge and over a range of surfaces improves year on year. Many machines detect the load and empty their own tanks at the docking station. 

Brush bars are based on a typical vacuum, with powerful turbo-brushes that fire up when the machine detects a challenge, reserved for more expensive machines. Larger machines with larger brush bars mean fewer passes, but like a larger grass mower, they are also less nimble due to an increased girth. Variable-power and three- to four-stage cleaning mechanisms are standard across most machines, giving harder-to-clean sections of floor a little more welly. In case you’re wondering, those cute little whiskers seen on many robots are used to guide larger dust and debris towards the vacuum head.

This is one odd category of appliances, where you don’t necessarily get what you pay for. The navigation talents of both smart “mapping” capable robots and randomly operating robots (that rumble over a set grid pattern) can be disappointing in even prestige machines.

All robots come with basic IR sensors to prevent them from colliding with larger things on the floor. Rising through hand-held remote control, pricier models with enhanced smart technology use fuzzy logic, cameras, and onboard laser guidance to travel, scan, and actively map the room. Recalling where they went, allows the user to further enhance their rug rally with app-tickled instructions for the journey.

These machines “recognise” the room, and are savvy to your habits and time preferences. Plugging in to charge takes some of the joy out of automated domestic service, so look for models that return to their base to charge. As with all battery-operated devices, charge times vary.

The robot is not a shape-shifter and, at a set height and width, has to be able to pass easily through chairs’ legs, under sofas, and between rooms. Ensure the robot you invite in is matched perfectly to your terrain (you may need to shift the odd piece for a slightly different layout) or is technologically clever enough to steer clear of trouble. The cheapest models tend to spend a lot of time kissing corners. Just like a battery mower, every machine will have an indicated sq m average for a single run between charges together with a charge time. Networked machines with a high degree of app-based instruction capabilities cost more.

iRobot Roomba Combo j7+

Starting high, my favourite has to be the iRobot Roomba Combo j7+ Robot Vacuum and Mop. Investing in the dry/wet talents of two machines, it’s so versatile, requires only infrequent physical “rescues”, and has branding that’s a proven favourite with real-life customer reviews. Intuitive navigation includes the selection of no-go areas, important where delicate rugs are best left alone.

This machine has two bins: One can handle just sweeping, and the other has the ability to dry-sweep or drop mechanical innards to act as a mop. There’s no danger of epic slurry spreads as seen on YouTube, iRobot guarantees your J7 machines can sense the mess and won’t swim through doggie doo. If it does, iRobot will replace the machine.

The iRobot Roomba Combo j7+ Robot Vacuum and Mop; €799, iRobot.ie.

Like all the top machines (€500 plus) the j7 is less likely to end up in a bumper-car trap, with precision navigation. It can “recognise” other troublesome smaller obstacles including shoes and power chords. However, there’s more. You can have a conversation with your diminutive employee through iRobot OS software matched to Alexa or Google Assist, on your mobile device. Introduce it to your virtual landscape and add instructions about where to use more power or where to make extra cleaning passes.

With voice-assist, you can even roll over on one elbow on the couch, and command the robot to go and clean up a teenage tsunami. It includes an edge-sweeping brush, dual multi-surface rubber brushes, power-lifting suction, and that first-of-its-kind mopping.

• €799, irobot.ie (other combos, independent wifi-connected machines for sweeping and mopping from €279)

Eufy RoboVac

NEXT to twirl across the stage as one of my favourite pill-box cleaners is the more affordable and basic model, the Eufy RoboVac G30 T2253V11. Engineered in China, the G30 offers sweeping and mopping in a single machine (with a quick unit swap), and an impressive range of settings including app-programming and voice assist.

The Eufy even reports back obediently to you in a daily cleaning history. With a generous 0.45l dust box and BoostIQ technology which automatically increases suction power, my only gripe is the five-hour recharge time which might prove frustrating in a larger home (rumour has it, the latest McMansions feature a stable of robots for every storey).

Good budget performance with surprising extra puff, the Eufy RoboVac G30 T2253V11, €349.99, soundstore.ie, with Eufy models nationwide from

The run time for this boy is three hours, which should cater to a reasonably sized one-storey home with teased open living spaces and corridors, determined by Eufy “boundary strips” rather than mapping tech. I’m impressed by its silent operation and drop-sense feature, which prevents Eufy from hurling himself down the stairs. Anker offers a large range of Eufy machines suited to different house sizes, and it prides itself on the easy set-up out of the box of all its products.

• Best price, €349.99, soundstore.ie, with Eufy models nationwide from €240

Miele Scout RX3

THE Miele Scout range is highly intuitive, mapping robot vacuum, always a favourite in reviews and consumer ratings, and it’s easy to see why. German-engineered, it’s a very good cleaner for hard floors and carpeting with a Quattro (four-stage) system of various brushes and rear suction, including a 20-arm swing-out corner brush that retracts when it meets a physical block.

My choice is its RX3 Home Vision suited to 120 sq m with a 170-minute run-time. With seven optical sensors, the Scout is very stable and designed for determined collision avoidance. If you have precious furnishings, your Scout politely measures the distances ahead, automatically navigating safely around them.

The Miele Scout RX3 with Home Vision, €849, miele.ie or €849.99 on the high street at Harvey Norman.

Scout is a good choice for complex room layouts with plenty of furnishings and going, as it packs a lot of mechanical muscle and smart technology into a very flat chassis and can scoot elegantly under the lowest Italian chaise and traverse thresholds of up to 17mm. The Home Vision version is a guard dog (well, let’s say a savage JRT) including HD on-board cameras that use object-recognition to send you live image feed to take a furtive peek as your personal R2D2. I like the two-touch start.

• It’s priced at €849, at miele.ie or Harvey Norman

Robot vacuums perform best as sweeping machines for hard floors in relatively open-plan roomscapes. Don’t expect them to swab down the floor on mop settings. It’s much closer to a spray and damp dust.

If you have a warren of small salons, multiple changes of floor covering and floor heights crammed with low-hanging furniture buy a couple of dust-busting mats, put them in front of exterior doors, and save your money for a great manual machine.