Today marks a bit of a first for us here at GameSpace. Our team loves tech and, collectively, we want to bring you the most interesting tech we can find. Usually, that will be video game and PC related, but every now and again we come across something that’s genuinely interesting and we just need to share. Today’s review is exactly one of those things with the Roborock E25 robotic vacuum cleaner, one of the most genuinely cool gadgets I’ve used in months.
Meet the Roborock E25, currently available on Amazon for $299. This little baby is the middle of Roborock’s line, coming in between the company’s entry-level C10 and flagship S5. Compared to what was available in my local department store, however, it’s hard to argue that you aren’t getting a lot for your money here. With optical sensors and dual gyroscores, this little guy is able to navigate around a surprising array of obstacles, slow itself down when it senses something new in its environment.
Even though robotic vacuums have been around for awhile, they’re certainly new to our family. I’d be lying if I said it didn’t feel like something straight out of the Jetsons. This little disc not only features 1800pu of suction, which is enough to pick up even larger bits of debris our kids might leave on the floor, but also does so much quieter than a normal vacuum.
One of our concerns in adopting the E25 was how well its circular body would be able to clean in corners and along the edges of rooms. Roborock has planned for this. As the E25 maps out its space, it traverses the room in a Z-pattern, going back and forth in rows so it doesn’t miss a spot. Then, before moving along to the next room, it sweeps the perimeter with a small brush, whisking away dust and crumbs from the quarter-round right into its roller brush. From a sheer technological standpoint, this is impressive stuff. This little robot does a darn good job for being completely unattended and it gets better the more you use it.
Ours is located in the dining room, so right from the get-go, it’s navigating table and chair legs. I do have to pull these out a bit to give it enough room but even so, its sensors really impressed me. The optical array in its front allows it to slow down and not damage furniture. It’s front half is split into two pieces that remind me of nothing more than mouse buttons. When it bumps something even gently, it clicks and backs itself up to try a different approach until it finds its way around.
Real talk: with three small kids, two dogs, and three cats, our house can be a muddle sometimes; at least the floors. For something like the E25 to be useful, it has to be able to navigate that. Yes, we have to clear space. You don’t want it skipping parts of the floor because of a singing snail toy. At the same time, this little guy will navigate around and under furniture, doesn’t suck up my daughter’s blanket, and even manages to make it over my high-than-average wood transitions between rooms.
The other thing I was was worried about was how well it would work on our mix of carpet and hardwoods. Frankly, I’ve been impressed. I’ve read that robotic vacuums and even the E25 in particular don’t do as well on hard woods as carpet, but I’m consistently surprised at the amount it picks up that you just don’t see with the naked eye. In a single day, it will fill a good quarter to half of its dust bin. I’ll turn it on to clean up the crumbs from my kids’ dinner. It will proceed to make me feel like I need to pay more attention to my house (and I do, as does my wife! She’s actually as much of a clean freak as a mother of three can be).
When I let it do a run of our carpeted playroom, I didn’t expect much having used the big vacuum only a couple days before. I was floored (and yes, that’s a vacuuming pun) at how well it worked. This thing has no right to be as quiet as it is. Even on its highest setting, I can happily let it run two rooms away and just barely hear it.
It also features a mop attachment. You’re able to fill its basin with water, which wets the mop. It works, but doesn’t offer the same kind of great performance as the vacuum function. If you need a quick spot clean, it’s good. For grimier messes, you’ll want something a little more intensive.
The best part about this is that you can set it on a schedule using the Mi Home app. Every night at 1AM, the E25 will wake up and prep the house for the next morning. Thanks to the Carpet Mode feature, it’s able to detect when it’s in a carpeted room and will ramp up the suction, just for that room. With every run, it creates a map of your home to create the most efficient route and ensure it hits every nook and cranny it can reach. You can then look back at this and see stats about how long the cleaning cycle went. Since it’s constantly tracking itself, you can see when the lifespan of its component parts is running short, like the HEPA filter or brush roller.
When it’s all done, the E25 will do its best to return back to its charging base. If you’ve picked it up and moved to to a particular room, say to do a bit of spot cleaning (which is its own function), it will return back to its starting point. This is the only area where we’ve had a bit of difficulty as it seems to get a bit confused with a wider floor pan. Even trying to return to its starting point, I’ll often get the notice that the vacuum isn’t able to return to base and needs assistance. Not a big deal if you’re using it during the day but it’s a bit annoying when it dies in the middle of the night and needs a few hour charge before doing breakfast clean-up.
Final Thoughts
The Roborock E25 is the first real robot we’ve had in the house and it’s honestly made our life easier. Once you get in the habit of turning it on and trusting it will do its thing is both a time saver and a stress saver. As a piece of tech, this thing is just darn cool and that’s why we’re covering it here today. If you’ve been waiting to make the jump, this vacuum has the features and performance to improve your daily life.