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GHI experts conducted early research on Dyson's new robotic vacuum cleaner-is it useful?

68% of Britons say they are not keen on or dislike vacuum cleaning. No wonder many of us are interested in the idea of ​​robotic vacuum cleaners. However, since their appearance, robot vacuum cleaners have been a bit fancy, and many of us are not sure whether they can thoroughly clean our homes.

There is also the issue of price: at the low end, the performance of the robot vacuum cleaner may be poor and meaningless. At the high end, they can be so expensive that only the most die-hard gadget fans can keep them.

Dyson 360 Heurist aims to solve these problems with a high-performance vacuum cleaner, which claims to have 20% more suction power than its predecessors. However, at £799.99, is it really worth the money? Our testers use its pace to find out.

Like most Dyson products, Heurist is well-designed. Its metallic blue shell looks very smooth and at the same time ensures that the vacuum is easy to spot. We like the headlights on the 360° camera of this robot-when the robot enters dark corners and under furniture, they can effectively illuminate the road.

It has very good clearance and can confidently pass under furniture that is only 1 cm higher than it. For example, if there is a duvet or blanket hanging on the bed, the vacuum will pass through from below and continue cleaning.

For the sweeping robot, its ability to vacuum on the carpet is very good, and it gets a perfect score. It can also vacuum on hard floors (such as laminate). However, compared with standard stick, vertical and cylindrical vacuum cleaners, the performance of robotic vacuum cleaners is not strong, although this is to be expected.

In terms of debris other than dust, we have seen mixed results. Although it scored very well in our larger fragment pickup test, it scored poorly in our finer fragment pickup test.

The tank track wheels of this robot are very powerful. However, we found that they are a bit too powerful and sometimes continue to push after encountering obstacles. This causes the vacuum to shake thinner furniture, such as lamps or hangers.

This robot is very suitable for houses with thick carpets and can pick up all the big debris and particles as well as most of the dust. This model runs fast and has a large dust collector, so a lot of work can be done on a single charge, and you empty it less frequently. 

This multifunctional sweeping robot can be controlled via the Neato app, Apple Watch, Amazon Echo or Google Home. In the test, D4 performed well in cleaning large particles, debris and pet hair. It can clean the entire room carefully and thoroughly, easily bypassing difficulties. 

A good budget option, it is not compatible with wifi, but you can use the remote control to set a basic schedule, which also reduces the need to bend over to open it. The Eufy model can be cleaned quickly and efficiently, easily picking up pet hair and debris of various sizes. 

What is impressive is that this robot will return to its docking station for charging. However, it occasionally struggles with this, bumping into the docking station instead of parking itself. In addition, when it does turn to the docking port, it may be insecure. Once, we watched the vacuum cleaner return to its dock and left it there between tests, and we came back disappointed to find that it was not properly charged.

The main body of the vacuum cleaner has a minimal user interface with only one button, so the vacuum cleaner must be controlled by an application. Our biggest problem with this vacuum is its connectivity. We found that the connection between Heurist and wi-fi is very poor, disconnecting every few minutes, which means we can't control it for a while.

The app may be great. We like the ability to name each room, to define areas and restrictions on the map generated by the robot, and the ability to schedule cleaning. However, the performance of this application is far below the standard.

Sometimes the app does not allow our testers to initiate the vacuum; it stalls, waiting for software updates that have not appeared. Sometimes, the app cannot connect to the vacuum cleaner at all. As a result of this, we were unable to use the vacuum cleaner on several occasions.

In some respects, this vacuum seems to be designed too well. Other robotic vacuum cleaners operate in a spiral mode that is efficient, close to the wall, and clean inward. Heurist is designed as a "learning" robot, which means it will not take the easiest route because it constantly recalculates its distance to walls and furniture. So instead of following the wall for two meters, it will stop and start when scanning the wall every few seconds. This resulted in 50 minutes to draw a map and 35 minutes to clean our test room. Compared with other robot vacuum cleaners, the results were poor.

At the research institute, we are often impressed by the powerful functions of Dyson vacuum cleaners. In some respects, Heurist is no exception, but it lacks robotics and connectivity.

In any case, there must be Dyson fans who will buy Heurist. If you can't stand vacuuming and just want to do it once every two weeks to grab any spot that the robot might miss, then this vacuum cleaner may be for you. However, at a price of £799.99, this is not a small investment, especially considering the major weakness of this vacuum.

The Dyson 360 Heurist Robot Vacuum is now available from Dyson for £799.99 and will be available on Currys.co.uk and Johnlewis.com on March 18.

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