Sweeping and mopping the floors seem to be a challenge, especially in this lockdown. In these uncertain times, most people are reluctant to call the house-help home to assist in the daily chores. We opine these Robot vacuum cleaners are a must-have accessory to assist you with sweeping and wet mopping.
We tried these and honestly feel they are a lifesaver and help to automate the daily cleaning chores. We particularly liked the schedule function where the robot goes about doing its job and delivers a cleaner home.
Our Top Picks for "Best Robot Vacuum Cleaners"
Best Overall – 360 S7 Laser Navigation Robot Vacuum Cleaner
Best Premium Pick – Roborock S5 MAX Robot Vacuum and Mop
Best for Large Homes – Ecovacs DEEBOT OZMO 950 Robotic Vacuum Cleaner
Best Budget – Xiaomi Robot Vacuum-Mop P
Best Robotic cleaner for dry mopping – Ecovacs Deebot 500 Robotic Vacuum Cleaner
What to expect from this Read?
Let us help you choose this utitlity accessory that is still at a very nascent stage in India. We list below the best Best Robot vacuum cleaners that are available online, do have a look at this list before you make your buying decision.
We reviewed 18 robot vacuum cleaners of different suction capacities, Navigation and mapping capabilities, mopping modes available, App ease of use, scheduling features, Voice control options, after sales service etc., for this exercise of finding the “Best Robot Vacuum cleaners”.
We narrowed down the list to the best 10 based on repetitive features and quality before finally coming up with the final list below of the 5 robot vacuum cleaners that met our stringent requirements.
PS – Of the top 10 we found that many had similar features to the one’s in our top 5 and eliminated them to the best five below.
We encourage you to glance through our Buying Guide to pick up the robotic vacuum cleaner that suits your requirements. This is also the basis of how we chose the below list.
Best Robot Vacuum Cleaners: Reviews
Best Overall
We loved this cute little Hybrid robot (Hybrid works for both wet and dry mopping). The robot works efficiently; this is aided by the LDS Lidar and SLAM algorithm. If these do not sound very familiar, let’s do some Jargon busting to simplify the terms.
Light detection and ranging (LIDAR) uses laser technology to map and are ideal for houses with lots of furniture. The robot can work smartly by choosing the best path, with Simultaneous location and mapping (SLAM) algorithm; they can avoid obstacles and work even in the dark.
Anti-collision sensors prevent the robot from damaging furniture or any obstacles. The anti-drop sensor will identify gaps and prevent any fall that could potentially damage the robot.
If you have a carpet at home and are worried about how this robot will handle carpets, You needn’t worry. The robot deals with carpets efficiently by automatically enabling the Max suction mode for deep cleaning when it steps on the carpet.
The robot has self-adjusting brushes to manoeuver uneven surfaces. The robot utilizes water optimally and in doing so, leaves no excess water stains on the floor.
The App can be used for area management and for setting off-limit areas, custom cleaning, setting different cleaning modes and for scheduling purposes.
The robot supports zone cleaning when a specific area has to be cleaned, the user can draw a rectangle on the map, and the robot will clean the chosen area. The 3200 mAh battery lasts for upto 2 hrs after its fully charged.
When the job is completed or if the battery power is running low (below 20%) the robot will retreat to its dock to recharge. In case the robot retreats to its charging dock in an incomplete cycle, it will automatically resume after its fully charged and complete the cleaning.
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✅ LIDAR and SLAM Navigation
✅ Memory Cleaning
✅ Intelligent room mapping
✅ Anti Collision
✅ Anti Drop
✅ App Control
✅ Virtual barrier setup
✅ Scheduling
✅ Carpet Mode
✅ Turbo Clean
What needs to be improved
🚫 Service issues in some parts of India.
Best Premium Pick
We recommend this Hybrid robot in the premium segment. This is definitely a pricy option compared to the other competitor products available in India at the time of writing this piece. But we must emphasise that its truly worth it.
The roborock has a high-capacity 290 ml water tank and coupled with the 640 ml large attached dustbin that can clean a 2000 sq ft house in one go. This is aided with precise water management control via the Mi app.
The user has complete control to select which area needs to be cleaned and the amount of water needed for efficient cleaning. The LIDAR navigation maps your home with an accuracy upto 98% optimised with sensors, accelerometer, odometer, infrared sensors, cliff sensors and compass.
These maps are available on the smartphone app for future use and its only a matter of a few taps to clean specific rooms or the entire house. In addition virtual barriers can be added to keep the robot away from cluttered areas or pre-decided areas determined by the user.
The robot not only efficiently maps the house but also optimizes the cleaning path for efficient cleaning. The HEPA filter of the dust collector filters and prevents the dust from mixing with the ambient air.
The 5200 mAh battery lasts for upto 3 hrs after its fully charged.
When the battery is low the robot automatically moves and recharges at its charging dock. If you live in an area that is sandy, the Roborock S5 will efficiently clean sand as well. Balanced or Max power; the robot does work efficiently in either mode. As expected, this one performs the best for picking up pet hairs and dust.
The Roborock mobile app gives complete flexibility to the user to control the Vacuum, water supply mode, schedule the robot, Draw virtual barriers, clean particular rooms or the entire house. The Roborock S5 is Alexa and google home voice controlled.
This maybe pricy but it definitely lives up to its price tag for its cleaning ability.
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✅ LIDAR Navigation
✅ Large 290 ml water tank
✅ HEPA Filters
✅ Anti Collision
✅ Anti Drop
✅ 5200 mAh battery
✅ Intelligent mapping
✅ Scheduling function
✅ App and Voice Controlled
What needs to be improved
🚫 After sales support and spares availability.
Best for Large Homes
If you have a large house and don’t want to opt for the Roborock S5 reviewed above. We recommend the Ecovacs Deboot OZMO 950 primarily for its 5200 mAh battery and optimal cleaning performance.
This robot is feature-rich and has a smart Navi 3.0 laser mapping navigations and technology. The robot will study your home’s path, and then it will pick the most efficient cleaning path to give great cleaning results.
Scan the QR code on the vacuum to link to Ecovacs mobile app. All the floor cleaning maps can be easily accessed from the Smart App. Once the maps are created, the user can assign the robot to clean a Custom area or a designated room via the App.
Virtual boundaries can be set for keeping the robot away from delicate artifacts, cables, or even the children’s room if needed. The mobile App can control the water amount to be used for cleaning. The App has the scheduling function to schedule the cleaning at a particular time or day of the week. The App is updated with regular OTA updates.
The Deebot has a main brush and, besides, has 2 side brushes. This is particularly important as there are many models, available with only one side brush. True, there are other factors also that make a good robot, but it’s convincing to see two side brushes.
The wheels and the roller housing are movable and auto-adjusts to the floor contours to give the best cleaning results. When it moves over carpets, the robot will increase its suction power to clean the carpet efficiently.
The suction power can go upto 24 Cubic Feet Per Minute, and coupled with the 430 ml dustbin, which is adequate for optimal cleaning. The high-efficiency filters allow the robot to filter out and prevent dust from mixing with the ambient air.
If there are doorsills at home, the robot can maneuver upto 2 cm barriers and swap between rooms. The anti-collision and soft cushion bumpers aides the robot in overcoming obstacles. The safe stair sensors prevent the robot from falling from heights, and when the robot encounters stairs, it will retract and continue cleaning other areas of the room.
We particularly liked the voice reporting function, where the robot alerts the users and gives real-time updates. Even the user can talk to Deebot through Alexa or Google Voice command.
At 5200 mAh, the battery can run for 240 mins on a full charge, which should be suitable for most households upto 2000 sq Ft. Suppose it’s a significantly larger house or in case the battery power runs out. In that case, the robot will automatically retreat to the charging station and resume from where it left out once fully charged.
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✅ LIDAR Navigation
✅ Large 290 ml water tank
✅ Good Suction mode at 24 CFM
✅ Anti Collision
✅ Anti Drop
✅ High-Efficiency Filters
✅ Good 5200 mAh battery
✅ Intelligent mapping
✅ Scheduling function
✅ App and Voice Controlled
Best Budget Choice
The Robot was available to buy via the crowdfunding mode since June. Compared to the pricier options out there, this one is priced at a budget. This Robot also is a hybrid model for dry and wet mopping.
The Mop P has LDS laser navigation; if you read our other model reviews, this is efficient enough to get the cleaning job done well and coupled with the SLAM algorithm, which spells efficiency for real-time mapping with high accuracy.
The Robot studies its surroundings and stores the cleaning path in its memory, reproducing it efficiently in future cleaning operations.
In terms of the suction, there is no compromise; the Robot has a 2100Pa suction that is available in some premium models.
Equipped with anti-collision, anti-drop, and other high precision sensors, the device can maneuver the house, avoids bumping into any obstacles or falling from stairs.
The Robot is fitted with a 3200 mAh that should be sufficient to cover most Indian households, worth mentioning is that even if the Robot runs out of charge, it will maneuver back to the charging dock to recharge and then resume from where it left.
The App can be used for area management, setting off-limit areas, remote control, real-time mapping, setting different cleaning modes, cleaning different rooms, and scheduling purposes.
The Robot supports zone cleaning as well when the user wants to clean a particular area. The Virtual walls setup is convenient when you want to keep the Robot away from distinct zones with lots of cable or delicate artifacts.
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✅ LDS Navigation
✅ 3200 mAh battery
✅ Smart motion
✅ 2-in-1 tank
✅ App-Controlled
✅ Good Suction mode at 2100Pa
What needs to be improved
🚫 The App is buggy
🚫 Wet mopping results are average
Best Robotic cleaner for Dry Mopping
We found the Ecovacs Deebot 500 Robot the best for dry cleaning. Unlike the other models reviewed above, this one is NOT a hybrid robot and can be used only for dry cleaning. If you are looking for a dry cleaning robot at a budget, this one is a good choice.
The robot does an excellent job cleaning the floor. It has three adjustable modes as per the user choice, the auto mode for everyday cleaning, Edge mode for cleaning edges and corners, and the spot mode is available if there is a particular area that needs to be targeted.
The Deebot 500 can be controlled by the app and also on Voice control via Alexa or Google Home. Scheduling and the cleaning modes can be done via the app. Besides, you can track the cleaning via the app.
The safe stair technology keeps the robot from falling off the stairs, and the anti-collision system makes sure that the robot handles obstacles well. The high-efficiency filters allow the robot to filter out and prevent dust from mixing with the ambient air. The large 520 ml dustbin and the excellent battery are suitable for cleaning the house in one go.
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✅ 3 Stage Cleaning modes
✅ App & Voice Controlled
✅ Anti Collision
✅ Anti Drop
✅ High-Efficiency Filters
✅ Auto Charging
✅ Scheduling function
What needs to be improved
🚫 A bit buggy when there is a power failure
Buying Guide to choose the Best Robot Vacuum Cleaners
How to choose the Best Robotic Vacuum Cleaner?
Cleaning Modes and the Type of Vacuum Robots –
A) The dry Vacuum cleaner, as implied by the name, is used for Dry floor surfaces only. Usually cheaper compared to the hybrid Vacuum cleaners for its limited functionality.
B) Wet Robotic Vacuum cleaner for floor cleaning can be used only for Wet mopping.
C) Hybrid Robotic vacuum cleaners are capable of Dry and wet floor cleaning and also the popular choice amongst most Indian households.
Water Tank of the Vacuum robot
1) Robot without water tanks – In these models, the Microfiber cloth will have to be manually wetted before commencing the cleaning
2) Robot with inbuilt water tank – In these variants, the microfiber cloth is automatically dampened by the inbuilt tank.
3) Robot which sprinkles water on the floor before cleaning the area.
The Type of Brushes – The single main brush robots are generally used for cleaning hard floor surfaces and even carpets. If you have carpets and rugs covering a large area of your home, then you may want to consider a robotic cleaner with dual main brushes that would help deep clean them efficiently. There are auto-adjusting brushes that adjust the suction power as per the floor/carpet requirements. Besides, there are brushless variants also available however we don’t recommend those models.
Surface cleaner type – The most preferred variants have the reusable microfiber cloth that can be washed and fitted back for numerous wash cycles. There are also some variants which have a sponge for surface cleaning, these are for one time use or need to be replaced frequently and not the preferred choice.
Filter quality – The quality of the filter quality plays a crucial role in the cleaning. Nera filtration system which uses thick multi-layer filters is most efficient.
Suction power – A very familiar term while buying any vacuum cleaner for that matter. Check the suction capacity of the Vacuum cleaner, the bare minimum we recommend is a robot having suction power greater than 15 CFM.
Size of the Dust collector – The larger, the better, the more area the robot can cover, and this also means less frequent manual intervention to unload the dust bin.
Some robots have dustbins which automatically empties in the bin usually attached to the charging base. For such models, manual cleaning is required from a fortnight to a month depending on the number of cleaning cycles used. There are also models available for wet mopping only which do not have a dust collector.
Cleaning modes available – The different modes as per availability in the selected model accomplish the following – Regular cleaning, Spiral Cleaning mode, Zigzag mode, Cleaning along the wall, carpet cleaning, Turbo cleaning which uses additional power, spot cleaning focusing on a particular area are modes which are handy features for difficult stain removal.
Navigation and Mapping of the Vacuum – Detailed cleaning history and navigation mapping of the entire house are ideal features. Virtual walls are invisible barriers that are ideal if you have a particular area where you do not want the robot to navigate to.
For example, an area with lots of wires and cords where the robot could get entangled and not only damage the devices the cables are connected to but also itself. This feature could also be used to confine the robot to a particular room.
Some barriers are provided with magnetic strips, where you need to stretch the magnetic strip on the prohibited area, which allows the robot sensors to detect and avoid those areas.
Navigation and mapping technology –
a) LiDAR – Light detection and ranging which uses laser technology to map and are ideal for houses with lots of furniture.
b) VSLAM – visual simultaneous localisation and mapping is camera-based and can vacuum larger open areas ideally in straight linear movement.
Other Navigation facilitators – Indoor GPS cube are provided separately for some models to optimise navigation. Sensors like Infra-red sensors, Gyroscope, Optical, North star sensors, elevation and Cliff sensors enhance the functioning of the robot.
Wifi Integration and App/Voice control – These models can be controlled using a smartphone app and reduces the dependability on the remote. Some robots can now be voice-controlled with Alexa and Google home, which gives the user additional flexibility to control the robot.
Scheduling function helps to schedule the robot for specific times during the day or the week.
Battery type and whether self charging – The type of batteries available in a vacuum robot are Lithium Ion (Li-Ion), Lithium Pol (Li-Pol) and Ni- MH. We recommend the Lithium Ion battery powered robots for its ability to cover comparatively larger areas in one charge. Also choose a robot that will automatically go to the battery charging dock incase its low on battery mid cycle.
Design of robot – The height of the robot plays a crucial role to navigate the hard to reach places like under furniture and cabinets with low clearance.
Shape of the vacuum robot – Don’t worry of them being round or rectangular. The side brushes of the robot helps to clean the corners and edges even in round shaped models.
Best Robot Vacuum Cleaners Price and Price Comparison
“Here you will find prices of all the products mentioned in this feature”
