Eufy makes several RoboVac models built on the same base as the 11S but with extra features. The 11S is quiet enough that you could easily forget that it’s running if you’re home at the time. We measured the volume on the bot’s maximum suction setting and found that it was just 57 dBc, a full 5 decibels quieter than the Roomba 694—that’s a major difference. On its normal suction setting, the 11S operates at just 53 dBc, sounding more like a fan than a vacuum cleaner . And since the 11S stops short of most obstacles, it avoids creating many of the bonking impact noises that the rougher Roomba 694 makes. Other basic Eufy models have slightly stronger suction and can be a couple of decibels louder, but they are still quieter than most competitors.
The Roborock couldn’t match the Roomba S9 Plus’ impressive ability to clean up pet hair, but it fared better than most. The S7 wiped hardwood floors completely free of hair and left only a few stray tufts on carpeting. The Roomba S9 Plus also struggled a bit cleaning sand from low-pile carpeting, earning a low average dust and sand pickup of 28%. While not the worst result we’ve seen (that honor belongs to the Ecovacs Deebot 600 at 18%), it’s definitely near the bottom. But we’ve put the current AI bots to the test in the real world, and they aren’t that good yet. Certain models are pretty good at avoiding certain obstacles, but none of them reliably avoid every kind of common floor clutter, and some models don’t deliver on their promises at all.
She hopes her neighbors read this bio because it would explain why she always has four video doorbells running simultaneously outside her home. Eufy RoboVac models are not meant to be dismantled and put back together—doing major repairs is impossible without breaking parts of the robot. It may end up cleaning more of your home than other bots just because irobot vacuum cleaner it fits beneath more stuff. The Q5+ dock can automatically empty debris from the bot into a removable bag. It will look stupid sometimes, and that can shatter the illusion that you have an artificially intelligent magic machine. Bots also tend to struggle with thresholds, certain types of furniture supports, and sometimes even floor-to-rug transitions.
This robot’s software is designed to enable it to recognize solid pet waste on the floor and steer clear of it. With a competitive price, plus rock-solid performance and intelligent navigation, the Roborock S7 is our new favorite midrange robot vacuum. It demonstrated about the same power to remove sand from hardwood floors (92.8%) as the Roomba S9 Plus (93%) and Neato D7 (95%). Reflects the average time it took the robotic vacuum on its max-clean setting to clean our greater than 600 square foot test room over 3 test runs. This system looks silly, and some people simply can’t stand to watch it.
We sent a privacy and security questionnaire to the companies that make our picks and compiled the key portions of their responses in the table below. In general, the owner data isn’t that sensitive, and the mapping data is unsophisticated for now. We’re more uneasy about what the companies may do with collected information in the future, such as selling it to third parties; the makers of our current picks don’t sell data for now, but privacy policies are always changing. Otherwise, our main concern is whether the little amount of sensitive data on a vacuum, such as your Wi-Fi network password, is stored securely (if it’s stored online at all), in case there are data leaks or breaches in the future. If you’re annoyed or creeped out by the whole thing, you can either buy a non-connected bot or just never set up your bot’s Wi-Fi—these bots all still clean a house automatically even if you don’t connect them to the internet. Keep in mind that you can’t use interactive mapping features without an internet connection.