The Best Shark Robot Vacuum
Shark's robo vac checks off many of the boxes you would expect from a machine in this price range. It offers a reliable cleaning performance and an easy-to use mobile application. It also creates accurate home maps.
It also comes with Matrix Clean Navigation, a system which performs two passes back and forth before moving to the side for full coverage. Its base is bagless, unlike many other robot vacuums.
1. Roborock S4
This is an excellent robot vacuum for floors that are not bare that comes with a huge dirt container and is able to remove debris. The app lets you manage cleaning and docking. Its smart pathing is very effective. The app gives you an overview of the cleaning process, with a map showing where the S4 was cleaned, cleaning time and battery life.
The S4's maximum suction is 2,000Pa which is similar to full-sized vacuums. With 19CFM the S4's side and combination brush is closer to the front of the unit than in other Roborock models, which may be a strategy to lessen clogging.
The S4's advanced navigation system is able to digitally map your home up to four levels. It will remember the areas it has already cleaned, making it easy to establish a cleaning schedule without having to manually move the robot between rooms. You can also mark off zones as no-go zones which will prevent the S4 from entering those areas during a cleaning cycle.
It was able to clean the entire floor of our home with ease and was very efficient on bare flooring. However, it was not successful in picking up hair from dogs which is a common problem for robotic vacuums. The only 8.5% of the dog hair it picked up was actually captured in the dustbin, and the majority was clumped up around the brushes and suction inlet.
The S4 is smaller and lighter than other Shark vacuums. This makes it easier to maneuver. It allows for tighter turning and avoid obstacles which slow down other robots. The low-profile design allows it to be placed under furniture. It has improved climbability for navigating flooring transitions and different flooring heights. It can reach the bottom of the stairs and is a great choice for homes with multiple levels. The app lets you set a schedule, and also includes a manual vacuum control. It also has the ability to automatically return to its charging base to charge between cleaning cycles. It comes with a massive 5200 mAh battery that is rated to run for 150 minutes or 2691 square feet between recharges in normal mode.
2. Shark EZ Robot Self-Emptying
This Shark robot vacuum is an excellent choice for pet owners looking for an efficient, user-friendly machine. Its bagless self-emptying base is a major plus particularly when compared to competitors that use disposable dirt bags in their bases. You can empty the bin over a trashcan by simply removing it. It can be messy, but you save money on the replacement bags.
The bin is large, meaning that the EZ Robot can handle a lot of dirt. It's also a good performer on floors that are clean, although it struggles with dirt that has been embedded on low-pile carpet. It has good navigational capabilities and a tiny footprint.
While the EZ Robot isn't as good as the Roborock S4, it's still an excellent option for those who want a high-quality and budget-friendly robot. It's well-built, has a wide range of features for automation, and boasts outstanding cleaning performance on carpets with high pile and bare floors. Its maintenance requirements are very high, and its recurring expenses are very high.
Another excellent feature of this Shark robot is its capacity to recharge and automatically resume where it was when it returns to its docking station after an entire cleaning session. This is an excellent feature, particularly when your home is big.
The IQ XL is also equipped with a number of other useful features, including the ability to remotely schedule home cleaning and review reports through the SharkClean app. You can also initiate, stop and resumptuate cleaning sessions by speaking through Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant. The row-by-row mode is also an important benefit. It will clean your home in neat rows, rather than a back and forth snake pattern like other robots do.
The IQ XL has a major disadvantage in that it is unable to climb over obstacles such as power cords. It might mistake them for solid barriers and fail to climb over them. It's also not as fast or efficient in navigating a room when it's filled with pet hair, which can make its brushes tangled and slow it down.
3. Shark AI Robot
This is a reliable robotic vacuum from Shark that offers a solid combination of features. It comes with a base that can hold up to 30 days of debris, and it also combines the cleaning power of the robot vacuum cleaner and a mop. It also comes with a precise matrix grid cleaning mode as well as advanced smart home integration, with support for Alexa and Google Assistant. You can set it up to clean on a schedule or on demand or set virtual boundaries to prevent it from entering rooms that may contain rugs or fragile items.
The Shark AI Robot carries out an excellent job of cleaning floors, picking up debris like rice easily. It has a hard time getting rid of bulky, large debris from carpets with low pile and is unable to maneuver around furniture that is large. It does come with a do-not-disturb mode, so you can program it to work when you're at home and it won't disrupt your routine.
It also makes use of LiDAR to map your home. This allows it to locate and navigate around obstructions more precisely than devices that depend solely on gyroscopes or an infrared sensor. This allows it to avoid crashing best robot floor cleaner into fragile objects and to optimize dirt collection on different surfaces. The LiDAR system also works faster than gyroscopes, which can cause the robot slow down and lose control when it encounters uneven surfaces.
It comes with a variety of other options, including the ability to control mopping with a remote, an automatic system, and multiple vacuum modes. It is able to recharge and charge while working. The biggest flaw is that it only maps only one floor. If you have two floors, it's going to need to be manually carried to those areas, and then programmed to repeat.
It can also be quite loud especially when in mopping mode. It also has a lot of parts that must be changed or cleaned regularly, which increases the cost of maintenance. The self-empty feature is a basic function that helps to reduce the cost of these items. It is also compatible with a bagless filter, which reduces the cost per year.
4. Shark ION Robot RV700 Series
The Shark ION Robot RV700 Series is a complete package that meets all the criteria you would expect from a midrange robot vacuum, including solid cleaning performance and a superb mobile app that produces accurate home maps. It also comes with a bagless basis which eliminates the need for annual dust bags replacement. In our cleaning test it was able to remove 97.8 percent of debris from hardwood and low-pile flooring, but was not as efficient with high-pile. Its ability to maneuver makes it easy to navigate through furniture and even climb onto flooring with high pile. It can also go over objects such as rug fringes and electrical cords without getting stuck.
The bristles with a helix-pattern pattern are strong enough to handle and untangle long hair strings, as well as other fibers and the brushroll comes with an adjustable edge that can be deployed when it encounters obstacles. Its thin design allows it to coast underneath furniture, and proximity sensors assess and adjust to obstacles. The app lets you schedule cleaning times or trigger the machine using a single button press. Its sound levels are average however, it can be quieted down by using a do not disturb mode or a custom-designed scheduling.
The RV700 is a bit more manual than the Roborock S4 or iRobot Roomba J7+. This is to be anticipated from an item that doesn't self-empty. But, it is more robust and easy to maintain, charges faster and removes more debris from the floors, including high-pile carpeting. Its navigation system can create virtual boundaries and detect obstacles which makes it the ideal option for "set it and forget it" robotic cleaners.
The RV700 Series doesn't have a the cliff sensor, which prevents it from falling down stairs, which may be a concern for those living in homes that are taller. It's not able of mopping and vacuuming at the same time and you must switch between modes within the app. The RV700 Series offers a cheaper alternative to more sophisticated Roborock and iRobot robots with self-emptying capabilities as well as cliff detection. Its most appealing feature is the possibility of being recharged and emptied when docked at its base. This makes it an excellent choice for those who don't wish to empty the onboard dustbin each time they use it.