The Best Home Vacuum Cleaner
The ideal vacuum cleaner for your home is a versatile, easy-to-use tool. The right model will also be quiet, light and efficient.
This pick offers great suction at a reasonable price it comes with a highly effective anti-hair wrap floorhead, as well as an odor-neutralizing puck. It has a large bin that is easy to empty.
1. Power
A powerful vacuum cleaner can efficiently manage household debris, making it easy to keep messes under control. Whether you have a pile of pet hair or a blocked kitchen drain, it must be able to clean up the mess with little effort. It should also capture fine dust and stop the growth of bacteria, ensuring clean, healthy air quality. Selecting the best model for your needs depends on factors such as the type of floor, household size and budget. Most common models are uprights, portable handhelds, lightweight sticks, and convenient robots.
The Black+Decker Flex Vac handheld vacuum is a light device that delivers incredible power. It is able to remove pet hair and larger debris easily and is ideal for households with multiple pets or large homes. It also has an easy-to empty debris receptacle to prevent the mess of cleaning up. The vacuum can be used as a mop to allow users to perform two jobs at the same time.
Think about a large upright or canister-corded vacuum for households with lots of furniture. These models are equipped with more powerful motors as well as a motorized floorhead that can handle carpets that are embedded and stubborn dirt. They are also available in various powers to offer different suction capacities and a longer life battery. If you or someone in your household suffers from allergies, it's a good idea you to select one that comes with a HEPA filter system.
2. Flexibility
The best vacuum cleaners can handle various tasks around the house from dusting to deep-cleaning carpets. They're typically light which makes them effortless to maneuver. They should also offer a range of attachments that will meet your needs.
If you have pets, think about the right vacuum to handle pet hair. They typically have a separate power brush that sucks pet hair off the main floorhead, directing it into the dust container to ensure it doesn't get stuck or wrap around the vacuum's brush roll.
Some of our top-rated vacuums have smart features that integrate with the home's systems or adapt to different floor types and levels of dirt. This is particularly crucial for people suffering from allergies, since these features prevent fine particles from getting recirculated throughout the air.
Vacuums are costly, but they go for sale during major events such as Black Friday and Amazon Prime Day. You can also find great bargains in the spring, when retailers plan sales to coincide with the annual spring cleaning.
The lifespan of a vacuum varies depending on the model you choose and the way you use it. The majority of our top-rated vacuums last an average of eight years. If you want to outlast your other contenders, pick one with a longer-term guarantee.
3. Ease of Use
A vacuum cleaner needs to be simple to use and maneuver, even during a long cleaning session. A lightweight, compact vacuum cleaner with convenient controls attachments, large, non-emptying bins are all crucial. This convenience is possible due to many options, including motorized power heads that clean carpets and rugs more effectively with a tall and wide floor head that can reach under furniture and a rotating nozzle to clean corners, and LED lights which illuminate the path.
For example our top pick in this category is the Shark Stratos cordless vacuum, was a breeze to maneuver and used the least amount of battery power during our tests. It also comes with an automatic suction adjustment, a sleek LCD screen with a battery indicator, and the ability for users to switch between Auto Eco and Boost modes.
The Stratos also took in ground coffee, kibble and flour effortlessly in our tests. It was able to handle carpets with low piles, removing the sand and rice in only a few passes. It also has a front brushroll which is soft to hold tiny particles and prevent pet fur from spitting out and a rear brushroll that is hard and digs into carpeting.
The budget-friendly Kenmore Elite also has a dual brushroll design that picks up wet spills and messes from hard surfaces. It's light enough to be able to be carried to and from the stairs and even across the house without breaking sweat. It's also less maintenance-intensive than many upright models with the HEPA filter that is easily removed and a disposable dust bag which can be changed when it's fully stuffed.
4. Versatility
The Levoit is a multi-functional model that can tackle most cleaning tasks. It doesn't have many of the features offered by higher-end models however, it does come with a number of important features that ensure it performs well for everyday use. It has a variety of cleaning modes that alter suction power and battery runtime (including Eco) as well as an 8-foot hose for reaching over floors, and a large easy-to-empty dust container.
The brush roll is made for capturing and sucking up hair without wrapping the bristles around it which makes it a great option for homes with hairy animals or even humans who shed many tears. The results of tests conducted on it also demonstrated that it can handle all kinds of debris including carpet with a low pile and hard floors It even managed to take out sand, rice and Cheerios from carpeting.
The Miele Flex Vac is a versatile cordless vacuum that has a powerful motor. It was especially effective at sucking hair from pets, and also picked larger particles, like cereal. However, it was unable to deal with more caked-on debris like car dust. It has a variety of attachments, including an electric power-nozzle that will quickly get rid of dirt and pet hair from upholstery.
5. Battery Life
A good home vacuum cleaner should run for at least an hour without having to recharged. For a cordless model, this is crucial because it lets you to take on cleaning tasks without stopping and restart the process.
Shark Stratos cordless vacuum is our top choice. robotvacuummops has an extended battery life as well as an impressive debris removal. The three cleaning modes Eco Auto, Boost and Eco allow you to control the power to allow you to clean for longer without draining the battery too fast. The vacuum comes with a sleek LCD display that displays if there's a clog or blockage, how long you have left, and the status of your battery.
This model is perfect for families with pets because the brushroll with no-tangle works well to remove pet hair. It's also effective in dealing with dirt and dust, although it struggled to remove small particles like flour from hard floors and was unable to remove coffee grounds from carpeting.
If you're looking to deal with wet spills then the Tineco Floor One S7 Pro is a fantastic choice. It is a bagged vacuum but has features such as an iLoop smart sensor that can detect dirt and stains; self-cleaning which dries the brush roll; cleaner edges that get into corners and along baseboards and a battery that lasts 40 minutes - longer than any other model we've tested.
6. Ease of Cleaning
The top vacuum cleaners make it easy to deal with messes. The Levoit LVAC-200, for example is light and compact but impressively powerful. In our standard tests, it sucked everything from kibble and ground coffee to dog hair. The dual brushrolls snatch pet hair and other large particles without spitting them out or wrapping them around the cleaner's head. This helps it avoid getting blocked. The motorized tool can also remove pet hair embedded in upholstery, even in hard-to reach places.
The Shark Stratos Cordless is another standout, as it handled pet hair and large pieces of debris effortlessly in our standard tests. The main floorhead features a soft front brushroll that captures small particles and dust, and the floorhead that has stiff bristles penetrates deeper into carpeting to catch larger dirt. And the dust cup holds plenty, and is easy to empty.
If you have a lot of carpet in your home, you might think about a large upright or canister vacuum with beater to get a deeper clean. Choose a versatile wet-dry vacuum, which can tackle the floors as well as messes caused by food or water, like the Miele C3 Cat & Dog or the Henry Hoover. These vacuums can handle a wide range of household debris from small pieces of food to huge messes, and might have more advanced features than the handhelds listed on this list.