But if you run the bot at least a few days per week, your floors should stay pretty tidy. And again, we’ve found over and over again that such bots work well shark robotic vacuums in smaller spaces. So the first order of business for any successful robot vacuum is to avoid or at least escape from potential bot traps and hazards.
From there, you’ll just need to replace the bag every month or two (depending on use). At Kohl’s, we offer a wide variety of vacuum cleaners from Shark, all designed to keep your home looking its best. With self-emptying models, the dust bin size is not as important because the unit will simply return to its base to empty the dust bin and then go back to where it left off. An in-depth comparison of Shark vs. Roomba, some of the best vacuum brands. If you opt for a Roborock robot vacuum that you empty yourself, you can save a bit of money.
If you have plush carpets and a lot of hair to deal with, though, you’re likely to prefer a robot with better brush action and possibly stronger suction. Another advantage is that the Roomba 694 (like other Roomba models) has two counter-rotating brush rolls, mounted in a suspension shark canister vacuum system, whereas every other bot at this price has a single brush sitting at a fixed height. The Roomba 694 also has a dirt-detection system, which helps the bot reliably clean the most obvious piles of debris as long as it encounters those piles on its semi-random travels.
This robot vacuum is constantly learning with every run too, making it one of the smartest we’ve seen. There are a few caveats when purchasing a robot vacuum this cheap, though. For starters, the iLife V3s Pro is slow, taking more than 90 minutes on average to clean our test space — others took less than 30 minutes. Also, it can’t be controlled from your smartphone, so you have to use the included remote control, and you can’t connect it to Alexa or Google Assistant to turn it on or schedule cleanings. But, if these are #FirstWorldProblems you can live with, then you’ll be pleased to know the V3s Pro its great at doing the one thing it needs to do well, and that’s picking up debris. “You don’t need to shell out a grand for a good robotic vacuum,” according to Consumer Reports.
That said, there are a few negatives worth noting with this lower-price robot vacuum. It’s much more prone to getting stuck on obstacles than other models, and it doesn’t “learn” from its mistakes. On several cleaning runs, it got wedged in the same spot underneath the edge of the couch and needed help getting out.
Some people want to pick up their whole house after the kids are in bed, set up a routine, and wake up to a sparkling new house, like a bunch of elves came through in the night. I measured it at 14 inches high and 19 inches deep, which isn’t too big compared to other auto-empty docking stations. After I plugged it in and it charged, it mapped my (now larger) house accurately after one 20-minute mapping run—a huge improvement over my first Shark robot vacuum. IRobot was far from the only company to take note of the exploding demand. Some of these competitors, taking advantage of a trend in off-the-shelf robot components, sold machines that cost less than a Roomba, while looking an awful lot like one and offering many similar features.