The iRobot Roomba 980 Robot Vacuum Cleaner

shark robot vacuum and mop vacuums eliminate pet hair, lint and dust from the floor before they can settle. They can also avoid obstacles like stairs and other obstructions, including tippy furniture.

Most robotic vacuums require regular maintenance. This involves emptying the bin (and sometimes, rinsing it) and wiping the cameras and sensors. Also, they need to be plugged into an electrical source. Many come with smartphone apps for scheduling, setting up settings and Heavy Duty more.

Roomba 960 by iRobot

The iRobot Roomba 980, the most recent in a line of top-of the-line robot vacuums, is a staple for any modern home. This model is extremely powerful suction as well as a HEPA filter that'll aid anyone who is concerned about allergies. It also comes with a large battery that can be cleaned for up to two hours and returns to its dock automatically once the bin is full.

It also has the feature of smart mapping which uses multiple sensors to help it suss out the areas of your home that require attention and create a cleaning path around them. This technology is extremely effective in navigating toys left on the floor or furniture legs sticking out from under things. It also has a sensor that snaps Roomba back to reality when it starts to wander away from its original location.

iRobot has also added a new set of rollers beneath the bottom of the Roomba that do not have bristles, and thus tend to resist tangles better than earlier models. These are also a little taller than previous rollers and are able to fit under low couches and beds and are designed to help this model navigate more easily on varying flooring types.

The Roomba 980 stands out from other high-end models by its brand new dirt detection feature, which uses a camera in order to detect embedded dirt. This is a nice improvement over the previous version which relied on the sensor-driven pseudorandom cover method to bounce around the room and clean it at least three times from different angles.

In our tests of its performance it was found that the Roomba 980 did well on both hard flooring and carpets. Its score on low pile carpet was excellent and it scored a good score on mid pile, too. It did a fair job of picking up pet hair, but it struggled with very long and thick pet fur that was clumped together.

Despite these minor shortcomings, the Roomba 980 remains one of our most efficient robots, and it's even close to being as expensive as the other top-of-the-line models in this list. It has a lot of features you'd expect from a flagship model, but doesn't come with all the fancy apps and Heavy Duty smart home integrations you'll see in other top models.

The iRobot Roomba is easy to set up and start working immediately. After removing the yellow bin insert and the battery pull tab from its undercarriage you simply plug it into an outlet on the wall or to its Home Base docking stations, hit the "Clean button" and let it job. It will automatically return to docking station when it is running out of battery or is full of debris. There are also indicators at the top of the bin that let you know when the bin is empty, or when it requires recharging, or if it loses Wi-Fi.