As one of TechRadar’s Homes Editors, I’ve been following the robot vacuum market closely for some time now. While I’m enthusiastic about efficient home cleaning, it’s rare I’ll get wind of any robovac news that will make me do a double-take at the press release. Today’s best robot vacuums are very impressive but rarely exciting.
As CES 2025 – the world’s largest consumer tech event – approached, I was expecting more of the same: robot vacuums that are more capable, efficient and intelligent than their predecessors, but nothing overly dramatic. I was wrong. The robovac brands are going truly off-piste this year, and I am here for it.
It started with a call about a robot vacuum with a giant mechanical pincer arm attached, and it just escalated from there. Next thing I knew, I was hearing about a bot that could hoist itself up on stilts to climb over doorways. Then there was a robot vacuum that wasn’t content with cleaning your floors, it also wanted to be able to deliver your granny a sandwich. Whether these innovations will turn out to be useful remains to be seen, but they’re certainly interesting.
Now CES has wrapped up for another year, here’s my pick of the most weird and wonderful robot vacuum innovations to debut at this year’s event.
1. Bionic arms
Roborock launched three new robot vacuums at CES 2025, but by far the most eye-catching was the Saros Z70. And that’s because it has a big mechanical pincer arm. This arm remains hidden beneath a mysterious hatch on the top of the bot until called upon, whereby it emerges to do its owner’s bidding. I got an early, pre-CES preview, and it was pretty mesmerizing.
At this point, the main function of the arm is to tidy away your mess. For example, you can instruct it to pick up anything it identifies as a sock and deposit it next to the laundry basket. This leaves the floor clearer for more effective vacuuming.
Perhaps more exciting is that this isn’t a technology of the far-flung future – last I heard, the Saros Z70 was due to go on sale in the first half of this year. Moving forward, Roborock seems enthusiastic about adding further functionality too – it’s working on training the arm to play with your cat, for instance.
While Roborock is furthest along in its journey, it’s not the only brand that’s experimenting with handy robots. Dreame used CES to demo a robot vacuum with a ‘Bionic Multi-Joint Robotic Arm’. Unlike Roborock’s efforts, this arm can pivot in various directions, theoretically enabling it to operate in tighter spaces.
On the SwitchBot event homepage, there’s a video showing a bot with two arms ending in human-looking molded hands. However, these aren’t addressed anywhere else, so I’m assuming the idea is still in the early development stage.
Read the full story: Roborock’s new robovac has a mechanical arm that can pick up your socks and maybe also play with your cat
2. Robovacs that can also be fans, air purifiers, security cams…
Many of today’s top robovacs can mop as well as vacuum. But what if that’s not enough? What if you want your robovac to keep you cool, or hold up a tablet while you make a video call? What if you want it to deliver a sandwich to your grandma? These are issues SwitchBot thinks are plaguing the general public right now, and it’s come up with a solution.
On its own, the SwitchBot K20+ Pro looks like a regular, albeit pint-sized, robot vacuum. However, dock it under the so-called ‘FusionPlatform’ and a whole world of possibilities opens up. SwitchBot has designed a range of attachments that fit onto this wheeled mounting platform, at which point the robovac essentially serves to drive these around.
So, you could pop a tray on top and use it to deliver things to others in your household, or you could mount a phone or tablet and turn it into a mobile tripod. It’s also compatible with a fan, air purifier and security camera. That’s about it for the current offerings, but SwitchBot seems keen that you experiment further, highlighting that it can be integrated with custom-made attachments, 3D-printed components, and third-party devices.
Read the full story: This robot vacuum can also bring you a sandwich
3. Tiny little robot legs
Robovacs are getting ever more capable, but they have always had one ultimate nemesis: stairs. Like The Doctor’s greatest foe, robot vacuums have remained cruelly bound to a single floor only. But Dreame is going to change that. Maybe.
The new Dreame X50 Ultra Complete has tiny little feet that it can use to hoist itself up over steps. To be clear, it’s steps rather than stairs – it can climb over obstacles up to 4.2cm in a single bound, or 6cm tall in two. Even though it won’t be climbing the Eiffel Tower any time soon, it’s still a big step up (pun intended) for anyone with a taller-than-usual threshold between rooms.
Bots with feet feel like the logical conclusion in the growing trend for robovac brands trying to figure out more effective ways of dealing with uneven floors. Back in September, Roborock released a robovac with quadbike-like suspension, and Shark has one that’ll kind of twerk itself over thresholds – but Dreame’s approach looks especially promising.
Read the full story: Eat your heart out Daleks – Dreame’s newest robovac can climb stairs
4. Pop-up navigation pucks
Most leading robot vacuums have a raised central puck, which plays a key role in navigation, offering the bot a more complete view of its surroundings. That’s great, but the downside is that it also adds height, which means the robot might not be able to venture under low-lying furniture, where dust can quickly collect.
Roborock has found a way to solve this issue in its new Saros 10R (an armless sister model to the Saros Z70 I discussed above). This robovac has a navigation puck that pops up and down like a periscope. That means it can still use the brand’s tried-and-tested LDS system for mapping, without limiting where it can clean.
The LDS puck has an extra ToF (time-of-flight) sensor that points upwards to detect vertical distance. When the robot senses it’s entering a reduced-height area, the puck will retract, automatically emerging again when the surroundings allow. It also features a wide-angle vision module designed to offer improved mapping, meaning the bot is less likely to lose its way when its puck is down.
With the puck down, the 10R is just under 8cm in height. That’s impressively shallow for a robot vacuum, and short enough that it’ll be able to boldly go into the dusty depths beneath most people’s sofas.
Read the full story: Roborock’s new robovacs are determined to get under your sofa – here’s how
5. Moonwalking carpet cleaners
Robot vacuums tend to have less suction power than manual vacs, which means they can struggle to pull dust from carpets – especially if they’re of the deep pile variety.
Narwal has come up with a couple of ways to tackle this issue and added them to its soon-to-be-released Narwal Flow robot vacuum. Upon encountering carpet, the Flow will start in the usual way: driving forward and vacuuming. Then, things get a little more jazzy, with the bot backing up, Billie Jean-style, along the same section of floor. As well as tackling the ingrained dirt and hair from the opposite direction, this motion should also help lift the carpet fibers and release anything trapped deeper down. I haven’t seen this approach anywhere else, and it seems to make particular sense for thick carpets.
It’s not the only carpet-focused feature to grace the Flow. Finding itself on carpet, a cover next to the brushroll will descend, creating a slight vacuum (in the non-appliance sense of the word) in the area, and enhancing suction.
Read the full story: Narwal’s new robovac will moonwalk your floors to get even the thickest carpets clean
6. Bots with super-vision
Robot vacuums are getting ever more intelligent when it comes to correctly identifying objects they encounter, and responding appropriately. This is important because it means if the bot encounters, say a sofa leg, it knows to vacuum as close up to it as possible, but if comes across your sleeping cat, it will give it a wide berth rather than trying its best to suck it up.
The Eureka J15 Max Ultra takes things one step further because it can see things that are invisible. Or at least transparent.
Previous robot vacuums from this company used something called ‘IntelliView AI’ to intelligently tackle wet cleaning tasks. When met with spilled coffee, the bot would rotate, raise its roller brush to keep it dry, and prioritize mop cleaning to clear the liquid. The only problem came if you spilled a clear liquid because the ambient light could confuse the robot’s vision sensors.
However, the new IntelliView AI 2.0 is designed to recognize even transparent liquid spills. It creates two types of views – one using an infrared vision system and another an FHD vision sensor – simultaneously and in real-time. It uses these images to generate a high-definition image of the area, which isn’t as affected by lighting variations. The bot then uses AI to identify subtle differences in surface texture and reflections, thus highlighting any liquids, including clear ones. It then knows to respond appropriately and clear the spillage.
Read the full story: This new robot vacuum-and-mop is so eagle-eyed it can even spy clear liquid spillages