This Robot Vacuum Has High-End Features at a Mid-Range Price

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Credit: Product images courtesy of Dreame/Amazon

Robot vacuums are expected to do a lot more than vacuum these days: They can map rooms, mop floors, respond to voice commands, empty themselves, detect pets and people, and avoid pet waste on the floor. Many of the features above are reserved for the highest priced flagship models, but they are starting to trickle down to mid-tier models, too. The Dreame L10s Plus has settled into a nice mid-range floorbot option by having some of my favorite high-end features, while not allowing the core function—vacuuming—to suffer. If you ignore the mop feature on the Dreame L10s Plus robot vacuum and simply use it as a competent vacuum with all the bells and whistles of many flagship models, you’re likely to be happy with the value at $549.

What to know about the Dreame brand

I was excited to test the L10s Plus because Dreame has an exceptional reputation in the robot vacuum space; the brand offers a large number of models each year, though, which can be confusing and hard to differentiate. For instance, in additional to this model, the L10s Plus, there is an L10 Pro, L10s Ultra, L10s Pro Gen, and the L20, with only marginal differences among them. By spending fractionally more money, you might get some additional vacuum power or battery longevity and perhaps one additional feature improvement, like AI obstacle recognition over traditional LiDAR. This model, the L10s Plus, offers a self-emptying tower for the vacuum (but not the mop), as well as two removable mop pads and a very small water reservoir on the robot itself. 

High-end features

This was my first time using the Dreame app, and I was pleased with how easy it was to pair the robot and get it connected to wifi. An advantage to Dreame products is that this model works with every smart assistant out there, and it integrated into my Google Home setup easily. This means you can create automations involving your robot. Schedule a run after dinner or in response to your dog going through a doggie door. The app is where I was really impressed by the L10s Plus: Mapping options were as extensive as on the most expensive robot vacuums I’ve tested. You can create rooms and zones, manipulating the map to merge and divide areas. The map generated by LiDAR was impressively accurate after just the first run. You can customize the run settings for vacuum suction and mop wetness, as well as the route the robot will take, whether quick or standard deep clean. The app gives you concise information about when to replace parts and a number of customizations for control, including kid locks and do-not-disturb schedules. In particular, I loved seeing the remote control option, as well as a beacon to find the robot. Remote control has proven to be incredibly useful for retrieving robots lost under couches without having to fish it out manually. 

Reliable performance on small to medium debris

As a vacuum, I really liked how the Dreame performed. While not as rugged as the Roborock high end models I’ve tested, I thought the L10s Plus did a good job of picking up small- to medium-sized debris without getting stuck. Dog toy fluff presented a problem, so you’ll need to clear your floor of it beforehand, but in at least one instance, it was clear the L10s Plus had picked up a coin or screw and continued cleaning. I didn’t understand the path the Dreame took across the floor; it wasn’t a back and forth or S shape, but that’s not unusual, as many floorbots have unique algorithms they follow. The L10s got to 95% of the floor, missing a few spots here and there that I couldn’t find a reason for. Placing the robot in that spot, and then manually pressing the clean button allowed the robot to find and add that spot to the map so it was caught on later runs. The L10s Plus was average in how close it was able to get to walls in my home, meaning you’d have to return with with a handheld or broom to get up to the molding, but that’s expected for all but the latest floorbots with extending arms. While this model worked well on tile and low pile rugs, it actually did a great job on high pile carpet and sailed over low thresholds. The L10s Plus has the advantage of self-emptying into the tower, and it did a good job evacuating the entire chamber over the time I tested it. So many robots are talked about in terms of the power the vacuum itself has on the floor, but the power of the tower to empty the debris container is just as important, in my opinion. 

The mop isn't worthwhile

Where things fall apart is the L10s Plus mop. There is a wide variation in how robot mops work: At the high end, towers have tanks for clean and dirty water, and the tower will fill a robot with clean water, then wash the mop and remove the dirty water. In some limited cases, mops work like a Swiffer, where you attach a mop pad and the robot will drag it across the floor. The Dreame L10s Plus exists in a middle ground. There’s a (very) small container for water on the robot itself, so you’ll need to fill it many times over one mopping. The robot has two rotating mop pads, similar to those I’ve seen on higher end models, and the water will saturate the mop pads as the robot moves. As a mop, the performance is really so-so, and I was annoyed by how often I had to stop the robot to refill the reservoir. Spinning brushes aren’t as effective, in my opinion, as mop pads at getting up stains on the floor, and the combination of low agitation and not enough saturation meant that only wet debris was removed during the moping process. It might be worthwhile the keep the mop tank filled in case you need a quick spot clean, but it’s impractical to consider using this mop on a regular basis. 

It's a good value if you think of it as just a vacuum

Some of my favorite floorbot recommendations are models where you should ignore some features because the other benefits outweigh them—like the Switchbot K10+, which is my favorite vacuum but a lousy mop. Overall, if you are looking to spend under $600, I think the L10s Plus is a great value to get a decent vacuum with some of those additional high-tier features, even if you only use the mop once in a while for spot cleaning.