8 best robot vacuum cleaners to mop floors and get rid of dust and pet hair

The best roomba iRobot makes, the combo j7+ is a self-emptying robot vacuum cleaner with an intelligent mopping function that automatically switches modes when it moves from hard floors to rugs and carpets.

Roomba’s best-in-class obstacle detection can spot and avoid common household hazards such as dangling cables, shoelaces, stray socks, toys and pet mess, meaning you can confidently set it going without having to “pre-tidy” – exceptionally handy in busy homes. The robot even sends you pictures of anything it’s avoided, so you can clear the space and send it around again (or, if you’re lazy, like us, dismiss the notification and promise you’ll get round to it later).

We would recommend choosing the version with the self-emptying charging base. It sounds like a jet engine when it’s emptying, but the bin holds weeks’ worth of dust and makes the robot basically fully autonomous. The mopping tank is small, so you’ll need to refill with detergent fairly frequently if you use it routinely. The app lets you reduce the amount of water being used, to help extend the mopping function further between refills.

Read the full iRobot roomba combo j7+ review

A great and relatively cheap robot vacuum cleaner, the eufy robovac 15C max lacks the ability to map out and remember your home’s floorplan. This means it takes a little longer to clean, as the robot can’t learn the most efficient routes around rooms, but the decent battery life means it eventually gets everywhere it needs to go. A lack of a mapping function also means you can’t set no-go zones, so you’ll have to remember to close doors to prevent the robot getting up to mischief.

The robovac 15C max has good suction for the price, and handles dirt and dust on hardwood floors and medium-pile rugs with ease. The sensors can tell when the robot moves from carpet to hard floors and adjusts the suction strength to suit the situation.

This mopping, self-emptying robot vacuum comes from networking giant TP-Link – probably best known for its internet routers rather than its home appliances. The Tapo RV30 plus has the clean and fussless appearance of a wifi hub, but the performance and features of a top-end robot vacuum.

Lidar navigation powers some competent obstacle avoidance. During our tests, the RV30 could navigate without bumping mindlessly into furniture, building a detailed map of your floorplan as it goes, to help it clean more efficiently on future runs. The mopping function is basic enough. You need to manually swap in the attachment any time you want to mop, and it will happily try to mop your carpets and rugs given half the chance. That said, the app lets you easily designate rooms, so assigning the vacuum to mop just the kitchen or the bathroom is straightforward.

The app also adds convenient features not seen in other robot vacuums in our list. You can tell it to only use the self-emptying bin during certain hours of the day (self-emptying is loud), and you can disable the physical button on the vacuum itself, so mischievous kids and dextrous pets can’t set it going.

The Tapo RV30 is also quieter than most, particularly on its weakest setting. Noise isn’t a concern if you set your vacuum to do its thing while you’re out of the house, but a less cacophonous vacuum should benefit those who spend more time at home.

Slightly more advanced than the entry-level robovac 15C max, the robovac G30 hybrid adds a mopping function and features improved navigation and route planning, so it’s faster and more efficient.

The mopping mode is more basic than the roomba combo j7+, which costs three to four times as much. Switching to this mode requires that you replace the dust bin with a water tank and reusable microfibre cloth, so you don’t get the fully autonomous mode of the pricier rival.

It’s worth mentioning that none of these hybrid robots does a particularly good job of mopping, because they lack any scrubbing action. Dried-in stains are beyond them, but the cloth can easily tackle puddles and small splashes. They’re particularly effective at keeping tiles looking tidy and staying on top of bathroom spills.

Another small drawback is the robot’s lack of app-based no-go zones. To control which areas of the home you don’t want cleaned, you have to attach special magnetic boundary strips to the floor. That’s not ideal, but otherwise the robovac G30 hybrid is an excellent and dependable cleaner with great suction power and advanced features for the price.

Whereas the Roomba J7+ is designed with a front-facing camera to cleverly skirt around unexpected obstacles, the Roomba S9+ is all about suction power and reach. It has a D-shaped body with a flat square front, meaning it can get right into corners to clean every last inch of your floor. It also has much wider brushes and a more powerful motor, giving it superior cleaning abilities versus the round-bodied Roomba J7+.

In our tests it was noticeably better at picking up dust, dirt and pet hair than any other robot vacuum in our list, and while it doesn’t have a camera to help it steer clear of hazards, it retains all of the app-based smart features you’d expect from iRobot. That means you get floor mapping, efficient navigation, voice controls, no go zones, scheduling, and basic furniture avoidance.

The plus in the model name refers to the optional self-emptying bin, which is also where the hoover automatically goes when it needs to recharge. This larger bin needs manual emptying every couple of weeks, and the dirt is contained safely within a disposable dust bag. When the robot docks with the bin to empty itself, the self-emptying base uses an incredibly loud vacuum to noisily suck the contents out of the robot’s smaller bin, then sends the little guy back out for more cleaning.

The ruckus only lasts two seconds, and it’s obviously not a problem if you’re out of the house, but it can be startling when you’re not expecting it. Besides, if you know how to make a noiseless self-emptying robot vacuum cleaner, we’re sure iRobot would like to hear from you.

Read the roomba i3+ robot vacuum vs iRobot roomba s9+ robot vacuum review

With the longest battery life of any robot we tested and a substantial 700ml dirt bin, the D10 is capable of cleaning even the largest of houses. The D-shape design of the Neato lets it get into corners with ease, and scraped up even those bits that are hard to reach by hand. While it’s not the most powerful in terms of suction, we did like that it has a Hepa filter.

We found the app easy to use, and the setup was easy. In the app, you can see the maps it has made of your floorplan and then set no-go zones. You can also set schedules and tailor these down to how strong you want the suction to be and which room you want cleaning. We liked that this robot wasn’t too noisy – we had it running once we were tucked up in bed, and it didn’t wake us. The Neato D10 doesn’t have an onboard camera or mic, which is great if you have privacy concerns. The eco function, which uses energy more efficiently, is a nice touch too.

Read the full Neato D10 review

We found the app and mapping function of the eufys we tried to be among the best on the market. It’s fast and accurate; you can set no-go zones and spot-cleaning areas if you just want it to clean under your kitchen table after dinner, say. It also lets you see the trail of where it’s been in real-time. As you would hope, you can also set up regular cleaning schedules to suit your life. However, we realised that if you want to do multifloor cleaning with the X8, you need two docking stations, because the robot gets confused. You can buy additional docking stations, but with other RVCs, you don’t have to do this.

This, however, is the only real quibble we have about this vacuum. It is very quiet when operating. And it adapts the suction levels automatically based on the flooring type it’s working with – you can also change this manually if you want. We found it fared better on hard flooring rather than carpets, but it still did a fair job on the latter. Corners, under radiators and all those awkward spaces didn’t seem to phase the X8, and it got even tiny bits of dirt. It also swerved all the obstacles we left in its way.

We were intrigued to see how the Samsung robot vacuum would fare because it’s designed slightly differently from all the other models. It’s chunkier for a start and has a flat front and no spinning brushes at the side. It also has the most powerful suction of any robot vacuum we tried, which did mean it picked up plenty of dirt and debris around the home. After it has finished its cleaning cycle, the jet bot returns to the clean station dock, which then sucks the dirt out of the robot and stores it in a tower. You’ll need some dedicated space for this tower because it does take up a fair amount of room. But this means you have to empty it a lot less often, and it traps dust particles in the system rather than releasing them back into the air – great for allergy sufferers.

The gadget is controlled via the Samsung SmartThings app, and once set up, our vacuum got to work scanning and mapping the house with a good degree of accuracy. The object recognition function meant it successfully avoided toys, piles of laundry and whatever else was left out on the floor. It mounted thick rugs with ease too. You can also use the app to access the camera on the vacuum and see where it is in real-time – handy if it has got stuck or you want to check up on your pet (you can guide it remotely, too). We were impressed with how clear this image was. The jet bot senses what kind of surface it is cleaning and adapts its suction accordingly. It did a brilliant job both with hardwood and carpeted floors, getting all but a few scraps.