Are robot vacuums worth it? What one replaces and what it won't

Dreame's box promises 13,000 Pa, a brush certified for "100% detangling" and a dust bag lasting up to 150 days. Two of the three hold up better than the box deserves. Vacuum Wars bought one and measured it lifting 93% of the sand worked into medium-pile carpet. That's the highest of any robot on this page that lab has tested. It took 91% of the pet hair pressed in alongside, and wrapped none of the hair in the long-hair tangle test. The certificate is earned. The bag is the stretch. Dreame's five months is its own in-house calculation, and Wirecutter expects two to three. The mop is a pad that drags behind with no lift and no wash. Testers say leave it off, and so would we.

Dreame backs it for three years, against the one year most rivals offer. It carries no camera or microphone. Its manual even documents a way to cut the Wi-Fi entirely: hold the Dock button and press Power ten times.

Where it falls down is sight. Nothing on it recognizes objects, and it avoided none of the 24 in Vacuum Wars' obstacle course. Chargers, socks and, with a puppy, the thing you least want spread down the hallway all go under it. Testers also find it traps itself more often than pricier robots. In a home where someone tidies first, that's a small habit. Where accidents happen, it's the wrong robot. One lab has weighed its hair pickup. A second lab's measurements and Wirecutter's testing back the rest. That's enough for us.

If you'll clear the floor first and want your vacuuming done, we'd buy it. A house of mostly wood, tile or vinyl that wants mopping too is a different reader. For that home, get the ECOVACS DEEBOT T90 Pro Omni. A mostly carpeted home with high pile, a heavy shedder or the odd accident is different again, and our carpet roundup picks the Dreame X60 Max Ultra Complete for it. The full record is in our Dreame D20 Plus review.

ECOVACS sells it on 30,000 Pa and a roller mop that's flushed with fresh water while it works. The mop earns the billing. Vacuum Wars gave it 157 for dried stains, against an average of 108 across the robots in that review. It left just 0.35 g of water on the floor, well under that lab's average. Long hair never wound onto its roller, and it collected all the pet hair in that lab's carpet test. Its camera steered around 23 of 24 obstacles. Carpet is its weaker side. It lifted 81% of the embedded sand, against the D20 Plus's 93%. A three-month home test sponsored by ECOVACS found it sometimes jams on a thick rug.

Two neighbors are different buyers. Hard floors laid with deep rugs, under a pet that sheds hard, need the Dreame X60 Max Ultra Complete below, which lifts its chassis for thick pile and took the top edge-mopping score in one side-by-side test. Hard floors and low rugs with a house-trained shedder, someone who tidies first and a firm no to any camera aboard get the camera-free eufy Omni C28 in our pet-hair roundup and mid-price roundup. Our ECOVACS DEEBOT T90 Pro Omni review has the rest. Put the T90 in a mostly hard-floored house whose rugs stay thin and whose pet sheds normally, and we'd choose it over the D20 Plus.

Dreame advertises a 212 °F (100 °C) mop wash, and its own fine print puts that number at the heater inside the dock. RTINGS measured the wash water at 77 to 86 °F (25 to 30 °C), lukewarm by any kitchen's standard. The water boils somewhere your floor never goes. What matters for this page is better. At Vacuum Wars it lifted 89% of embedded sand and all the pressed-in pet hair. Its cameras avoided 22 of 24 obstacles. RTINGS found it reliably avoids pet waste, the main reason to pay this much. In an eight-pet home over six months, filmed in a video sponsored by Dreame, the bag lasted one to two months and the dock never clogged. The catch is that labs split on hair. RTINGS rated its pet-hair pickup only passable on a single pass, and The Hook Up called it average. Our Dreame X60 Max Ultra Complete review weighs the split.

One neighboring home is a different buyer. A long-coated dog that never has accidents, in a house with steps between rooms, gets the Roborock Saros 20 in our pet-hair roundup, and below. For everyone else whose carpet or deep rugs live under a heavy-shedding pet, or a pet that still slips up indoors now and then, we'd buy the X60.

TP-Link's datasheet promises a self-emptying bag good for up to two months. No tester has measured that, though Wirecutter's own estimate also comes out at about two months. On hardwood it's strong on cereal and kitty litter, and its dock fits an apartment corner. Smart-home users get Matter, too. Pet hair is where it gives up. One lab weighed it collecting just 40% of the pet hair rubbed into its test carpet. Its brushes tangle badly enough to need scissors. That's why rugs, not the pet, are the dividing line. In a small apartment with hard floors, no rugs to speak of, and either no pet or one with a short coat, we'd buy it. Once a pet is shedding onto rugs, you're a different reader. Our cheap-robot roundup gives a rug home with a shedding pet the D20 Plus above. If your place is compact, kept picked up and shared with a short-coated pet, our Roborock Q7 M5+ review covers the alternative. Our Tapo RV30 Max Plus review has the rest.

Roborock's spec sheet lists 1.8 in (45 mm) for one step, and testers keep beating it. One watched it climb 2.2 in (57 mm); another saw it cross 2 in (50 mm) in both directions. A maker that undersells its own robot is rare enough to deserve a mention. That covers the sunken den and the sliding-door track, though still not the stairs. Long hair didn't wrap its brush, which makes it a good match for a long-coated dog too. The catch is pet mess. RTINGS concluded it isn't dependable around it, and other testers watched it drive straight over the fake poop. If your floors change height and accidents do happen, you're the X60's buyer instead: it cleared 2 in (51 mm) at Vacuum Wars and steers around pet waste. Our Roborock Saros 20 review has the full picture. Where the floors change height, on hard floor or carpet, and the pets never have accidents indoors, we'd buy the Saros 20.