$100 versus $1,800: How much should you really spend on a robot vacuum?

SINGAPORE – In 2025, morbid curiosity led me to buy a $100 robot vacuum from Chinese tech company ILife. Surely, I thought, a machine at that price point was too good to be true.

Around 15 months on, here is my verdict: The ILife V20 – which has since been superseded by younger, hotter models – has been adequate in keeping my 527 sq ft apartment dust-free, but I am ready to upgrade to a more advanced device. 

Interestingly, the V20 is almost identical to the $420 Xiaomi robot that I bought for my parents’ household in 2022.  

ILife was reportedly once an original equipment manufacturer of robot vacuums for other brands, including Ecovacs, which might explain why it can make and sell machines similar to older models from other brands, and at such economical prices. 

But this scenario also illuminates the rapid advancement seen in the overall market in the span of just a few years. 

Where the concept of cleaning robots might have once been the province of speculative fiction – from Rosie the Robot in animated sitcom The Jetsons (1962 to 1963) to the mousy repair droid seen on the Death Star in the sci-fi fantasy epic Star Wars (1977) – they are now a genuinely useful tool for many households. 

American market intelligence company IDC reports that more than 24 million smart vacuum units were shipped worldwide in 2025, which was an increase of 17.1% from the previous year. 

Another eight million units in the more specialised segments – such as window- and pool-cleaning robots – were also shipped in 2025.

Chinese brands dominate the overall landscape, with IDC naming Roborock, Ecovacs, Dreame, Xiaomi and Narwal as the five biggest individual brands, in descending order.

As shown by my experience, these robots run the gamut in price, from the ILife V2 ($109) to the Dreame X60 Ultra Extreme Robot Vacuum ($2,339), plus plenty more in between, such as the Xiaomi Robot Vacuum 6 Max ($1,499) and the Dyson R2 Nurovi Wash+Dry ($1,199), both of which were launched in September. 

One key difference between price points is in the ways that emerging technologies like artificial intelligence are used – or are perhaps not used, in the case of budget devices – to enable more effective cleaning.

“Robot vacuums have moved from being purely mechanical cleaning devices to intelligent machines that can see, think and respond to the environment they’re operating in,” says Nathan Lawson McLean, senior design manager at British engineering company Dyson, whose robot vacuums have largely been developed in Singapore.

“Intelligence has to be in service of solving an actual cleaning problem. This means we’re leveraging artificial intelligence, vision systems and machine learning to allow the machines to understand the environment they are operating in,” he adds. 

While the technology has progressed past the perception of cleaning robots as bumbling devices that are constantly knocking into walls, there is still a long way to go before the era of the fully independent household automaton. 

“This isn’t a fully ‘set and forget’ appliance, regardless of which model you own,” Lawson McLean acknowledges.

“Loose objects – such as cables, shoelaces and other small items – still need to be cleared before a clean to avoid tangling. And consumable parts – such as brush bars, side sweepers, wet rollers or mop pads and filters – wear out and need periodic replacement.” 

And in some households, a cleaning robot may still end up being more of a hindrance than a useful aid.

As Xiaomi Singapore’s go-to-market manager Miao Xin says: “Robot vacuums may be less convenient in homes with multiple staircases, extremely cluttered floors, very thick rugs or insufficient space for a base station.” 

Whether you are looking to buy your first cleaning robot or to upgrade your existing machine, here are some other points to consider.

Is a higher suction power better?

Those who are upgrading from an older or budget robot to a newer or premium model – so perhaps advancing from 3,000Pa to 10,000Pa in suction power – will most likely see a strong difference in cleaning performance.

“Suction power is important, particularly for carpets, pet hair, larger debris and dirt trapped in floor gaps,” says Miao.

But she adds: “A higher Pa figure does not automatically guarantee better overall cleaning.”

These figures usually indicate maximum possible suction. There are no standard conditions for testing suction power, so testing parameters most likely vary between manufacturers. 

Miao says that “actual cleaning performance also depends on other factors like the main brush, airflow design, floor contact, anti-tangle performance and how intelligently the robot adjusts its cleaning strategy”.

Do all robot vacuums come with mopping functions?

Most machines sold in Singapore have some mopping capability, with the exception of the Dyson R1 Nurovi Dry robot vacuum ($749).

It uses a “twin-capture system” which differentiates between fine and coarse debris, says Lawson McLean. “Bristles on the brush bar mechanically sweep larger debris directly into the machine, while the vacuum motor focuses on capturing fine dust and smaller particles for more consistent cleaning across different debris types.”

It also has a side sweeper that extends by 27mm to help the robot better reach edges, corners and other less accessible areas.

How effective are the robot vacuums that do come with mops? 

In their current iteration, robot vacuums are not robust enough to replace deep manual mopping performed by a human. 

Entry-level and some mid-tier machines, such as the Roborock Q7 Pro Max+ ($599.90), use mop cloths, which are the equivalent of dragging a mildly damp rag across the floor: There might be decent dust pickup, but stubborn stains are likely to remain. 

Premium models do try to improve mopping capabilities in different ways.

Dyson’s R2 Nurovi Wash+Dry robot vacuum – a wet-dry variant of the Dyson R1 Nurovi Dry robot vacuum – is armed with two Reuleaux (curved) triangle wash pads which are designed to better access corners and edges than circular pads.

Dyson has also announced a third robot vacuum model, the Dyson R3 Nurovi Spot+Scrub UV (price to be announced), which is expected to be available in Singapore later in 2026. 

Instead of mop pads, it has a self-cleaning roller that spans nearly the full diameter of the device. Water heated to 70 deg C is continuously supplied to 12 different points on the roller, while wastewater and debris are simultaneously removed.

But as its full name suggests, the R3’s flagship feature is its stain detection and removal system, which incorporates AI, ultraviolet light and green laser-like illumination to detect and clean even invisible, dried-out stains.

The Ecovacs Deebot T90 Pro Omni ($1,899) also uses its own self-cleaning roller technology, dubbed the “Ozmo roller”. 

Heated water is delivered to the roller via 32 nozzles.

“The nozzles rinse the roller mop as it cleans. This way, grime doesn’t spread from room to room the way it tends to with (other) mopping methods,” says Michael Lim, Ecovacs Robotics’ head of marketing for South-east Asia and South Asia.

The roller operates at up to 4,000Pa of downward pressure – “roughly equivalent to the weight of 16 robot vacuums stacked vertically”, says Lim. This, in theory, makes for more aggressive cleaning of stubborn stains, especially when paired with high-speed scrubbing at up to 260 revolutions per minute. 

How do self-cleaning docks work?

As with the mopping function, most robot vacuums available in the Singapore market are equipped with a self-cleaning dock. 

For those who lack the floor space for a full cleaning dock, machines such as iLife’s A30 ($199) and Xiaomi’s Robot Vacuum S40 Pro ($369) are bundled with compact docks that charge only the robot and nothing else, but otherwise take up little additional space. 

There are different permutations within self-cleaning docks.

For instance, the Roborock Q7 Pro Max+ and the Xiaomi Robot Vacuum H40 ($299) offer only dust collection via a dust bag.

On the other hand, the Xiaomi Robot Vacuum 6 Max includes fresh and wastewater tanks, as well as a dust bag, which the brand says can take up to 75 days of debris before replacement is needed. 

The docking station also washes the robot’s mop system with water heated up to 85 deg C, before drying it with 50 deg C hot air. 

Likewise, the docks on Dyson’s new wet-cleaning models – the R2 and R3 – wash and dry their respective device’s mop pads or rollers with hot water and hot air in addition to being equipped with fresh and wastewater tanks.

But dust collection on the Dyson docks is not completed via dust bags. Instead, dry debris is sucked into a dustbin that looks similar to the bin on a typical cordless stick vacuum. 

This could be a drawback for users who want a device that is as low-maintenance as possible. On the flip side, “this reduces both the ongoing cost and waste of bag-based systems”, says Lawson McLean.

And for those newly buying or upgrading to these self-cleaning machines, he offers this pointer. “It’s normal for a new robot to return to the dock to empty more often in the first few months. New owners’ floors tend to have more built-up dust and debris than the robot will find later on, so the default bin-emptying frequency is set higher at the start.”

This setting can later be adjusted in the MyDyson smart app. 

Can robots navigate thresholds and rugs?

Higher-end models are generally equipped with rug navigation and threshold-climbing abilities (around 4cm to 6cm, depending on the brand).

That said, entry-level and mid-tier robots such as the Roborock Q7 Pro Max+ are increasingly able to navigate these obstacles. The shape, material and surface of the threshold will also affect actual performance.

How long should I expect my robot to last?

The consensus seems to be that a typical robot functions at peak performance for three to four years – assuming that the machine is regularly maintained. 

How often you might need to replace consumables such as filters will vary according to usage, but some apps will provide an indication of when they need to be replaced. 

When does a budget machine make more sense than a premium one?

As with all things, it depends on the priorities of your household. 

Budget-friendly cleaning robots are likely to be noisier while moving across floors and have more rudimentary navigation technologies and obstacle avoidance systems that rely more heavily on sensors than AI-powered vision systems.

Says Xiaomi’s Miao: “Entry-level devices cover the basics well, whereas premium models tend to have features more useful to households that are larger, have pets and/or multi-surface floors, as well as to users who want minimal daily input into the running and maintenance of their machines.”