3 questions to ask before buying a robot vacuum in the Black Friday sales

Thinking of investing in a robovac? Here's how to narrow your options down

Features By Ruth Hamilton published 7 November 2024

The holiday sales are an especially good time to invest in a robot vacuum. While the Black Friday deals span anything and everything, small appliances are always well represented, and robot vacuums especially so.

Before you dive head-first into the Black Friday robot vacuum deals, it's worth narrowing down exactly what you're looking for. Robovacs range wildly in price and features. You can pick up extremely basic, low-cost models that just vacuum, and find their way by bumping into things and backing away. Or today's best robot vacuums pack all kinds of smart features and can operate almost entirely autonomously. But a model like that will cost you, and it won't be worth it for everyone.

To help you narrow your options down, I've put together this guide to address the three most important questions before buying a robot vacuum. If you need more guidance, head to my complete guide to how to choose a robot vacuum.

1. Should I get a model that can mop too?

Lots of robot vacuums have the ability to mop as well as vacuum. These are generally referred to as combination or hybrid models, and they can take care of mopping up liquid spillages, as well as getting your hard floors cleaner than a vacuum alone could achieve.

Even at the premium end of the market, don't expect these to do as thorough a job as almost any kind of manual hard floor cleaner. They're really just for surface cleaning - for example, wiping away muddy footprints or pawprints. While that can still be useful you should ask if that merits the additional outlay, because combo models are often more expensive.

If you do decide to go for a combination model, look for one with rotating circular mop pads – these tend to do a better scrubbing job than static D-shaped mop pads. There are also a handful of cheap models that just drag a wet-wipe across your floor, with results that are barely worth the effort of attaching it in the first place. If you're shopping at the cheaper end of the market, you might have to manually swap the backplate on the robot vacuum from the 'vacuum' parts to the 'mop' parts. Meanwhile, the priciest options have docks that can drain and refill onboard tanks and clean the mop pads, which brings me on to...

2. Do I need a self-empty dock?

The most basic docks just charge your robot vacuum when it runs out of juice. The benefit of this kind of dock is that it's generally very compact, and it's cheaper than going for something more advanced.

Get the best Black Friday deals direct to your inbox, plus news, reviews, and more.

Sign up to be the first to know about unmissable Black Friday deals on top tech, plus get all your favorite TechRadar content.

Contact me with news and offers from other Future brandsReceive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors