Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra robot vacuum review

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra: two-minute review

Launched July 2024, the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra is a high-spec, feature-packed robot vacuum and mop with a self-empty base. For this model, Roborock has tweaked both its basic features to offer more efficient and effective cleaning, as well as adding fancier new bonus features. I put it to the test to see how it compares to the rest of today's best robot vacuums, and if it justifies its premium price tag.

Overall, I was impressed. In terms of cleaning, it did a very good job, delivering reliable suction and performing well in my tests with different sized debris. There are a lot of different options to offer precision cleaning, and useful features like the ability to sense carpet and boost suction accordingly, and the fact the mop pad can raise up to 2cm off the ground so you don't end up with damp rugs if you go for for the mop-first option. The rubbery rollers are great at gripping hair and propelling it straight into the dust cup before it has a chance to tangle, although the same cannot be said for the roller axles.

The mop takes the form of a singular semi-circle rather than dual rotating pads, and while the latter tends to offer more effective cleaning, the mopping here is still decent. I was especially impressed with the extra side mop, which did a good job of getting closer to the edges of rooms.

The base station offers automatic dust emptying and detergent dispensing, and will empty and refill the onboard water tank too. Furthermore, it can clean and dry the mop pads after every use, all of which mean less hands-on requirements from you. Mapping is accurate and fast, and the app is intuitive to use, making getting set up pretty speedy and straightforward.

The S8 MaxV Ultra is the first to feature Roborock's smart voice assistant, and while the chance to boss a robovac about is appealing, in practice I found it struggled to understand the most basic of commands. The extending side-brush designed to reach under furniture and into corners was equally unreliable. Like a shy turtle, it refused to emerge, even in scenarios when it was clearly needed. I'm hopeful that future software updates will improve or fix these bugs, though.

Roborock says that this robovac is able to intelligently identify 73 different common household objects to avoid, and if you ask it to, it'll even send you photos of these objects for you to approve. On test, results were mixed – it correctly identified some objects, although not every time it came across them, and it seemed to have a specific problem with socks.

Another use for that on-board camera is to enable this robovac to embark on a 'pet patrol' while you're out. It'll find and photograph your pet, and you can even talk directly to it via the two-way mic.

Also in this range is the Roborock S8 Max Ultra (no 'V'). It's a little less powerful in terms of suction (8,000Pa vs 10,000Pa for the MaxV – both well above average) and loses the intelligent voice assistant (although it does still have third-party voice control) and camera, which might appeal to those concerned about the privacy side of those features. It's also slightly cheaper.

I'd recommend the S8 MaxV Ultra robovac to someone looking for a high-spec machine that can deliver precise cleaning, and will work equally well on hard floors and carpet. However, if you don't want all those extra features – and especially given some could still do with a little refining – there are cheaper, less fancy options that will work perfectly well for general use. That's the short version; read on for my full Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review.

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review: price & availability

• List price: $1,799.99 / £1,725 / AU$2,999
• Launched: July 2024

At list price, the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra will set you back $1,799.99 in the US or AU$2,999 in Australia. In the UK, it's only available on Amazon at time of writing, at £1,725.63. This was the price provided by our Roborock contact, but it feels much more like a price that will fluctuate rather than an RRP.

While that price tag might make some wince, it's increasingly common for brands' range-topping robovac models to reach into the quadruple figures, and bear in mind too that anything that offers mopping and self-emptying on top of just vacuuming will be at the pricier end of the market, to start with. By way of comparison, the Roomba Combo 10 Max – another high-spec, self-empty robot vacuum and mop, launched in August 2024 – is $1,399 / £1,499.

You are paying a premium for features like the new smart voice assistant, though. If you don't need such a high-spec model, there are plenty of cheaper options about that will serve most people's needs perfectly well.

Robot vacuums often attract discounts around major sales events like the Black Friday deals, so it's worth keeping an eye out around then if it suits when you need to buy.

• Value for money score: 3.5 out of 5

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra specs

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review: design & features

• Sleek design with matte and shiny plastic
• On-board voice assistant, mics and camera
• Chunky but smart-looking dock with water reservoirs and auto-empty

The Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra's body is a combination of matte and shiny plastic. That combination of textures is more noticeable on the black version, rather than the white I tested, but the overall look is still smart and stylish. On top are three multifunctional buttons: a power button, a mop button and a home button. However, more likely you won't use these buttons at all, but instead will use the companion app or your voice to set the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra about its tasks. At the back are your charging contacts, plus ports for water to go in, and dirty water and dust to come out.

At the front of the robovac you'll find an RGB camera, 3D light sensors and an LED headlight for illuminating the way in dark rooms. In the centre, there's a raised puck, protected with a bump sensor, and housing the LiDAR and microphones for the voice assistant. This is Roborock's first voice assistant. You wake it by saying 'Hello Rocky', and it's designed to respond to a wide variety of commands: Start cleaning, Skip here, Empty the dustbin, Pause, Vacuum harder, Mop softer, Clean the living room, and so on.

If you ask it to, the onboard camera will take photos of the objects that it has identified and elected to avoid. You can send it out to find and photograph your pet, and you can also conduct remote conversations with said pet via the microphones. (Sadly, I am lacking a pet to spy on / remotely harass, so wasn't able to test these features for my review.)

The addition of the camera and mics will be welcome to some, but perhaps not the most privacy-conscious of you. Note that while the mics are active by default, they can be switched off. The camera is not switched on as standard, and it's very difficult to activate accidentally as it requires manual pressing of the three buttons on the robot itself (rather than just an in-app toggle), and you also need to set up a password pattern.

If you don't want a robot that has an onboard RGB camera and microphones, the cheaper S8 Max Ultra version lacks the voice assistant and swaps the RGB camera for reactive 3D.

The shiny panel on the top can be lifted off (it's magnetic, which feels like an elegant solution) to reveal a Wi-Fi indicator light and reset button, plus a 270ml dustbin and washable paper filter, and a 100ml water tank. You won't need to access this bit too often, because it's all self-emptying, but on occasion you may want to get in there to clean the filter.

A note for those with bigger homes: the onboard dustbin is on the small side. You can increase empty frequency, but minimum duration is after 30 minutes of cleaning, so if you have high dirt buildup, this might not suffice. The same goes for the onboard water tank.

Flip your Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra over and you'll find the dual rollers. These are similar to those on previous Roborocks, made from a rubbery ridged material designed to grip hair and debris efficiently, without getting clogged or tangled.

Corners and room edges are notoriously tricky for robovacs to tackle, but Roborock's approach is to add a spinning FlexiArm that reaches out, ET-style, when the model senses it's approaching a corner or some low furniture. It's designed to assist the vacuuming process by flicking debris in the corners and edges of rooms into the path of the vacuum. This is listed as being unique to Roborock, but it's actually an approach utilized by Dreame in its X40 Ultra (review in progress).

The main mop is a little smaller than found on previous Roborocks (another potential down-side for those with bigger homes) and sits on top of two vibrating plates that create the scrubbing motion – these vibrate at 4,000 times per minute, which is quite a difficult metric to visualize, but certainly faster than I could do it manually. The mop pad can lift a generous 2cm off the floor when going over carpeted areas, and if you activate the automatic re-mopping feature in the Roborock app, it'll go over very dirty areas again.

Note: if your priority is mopping, you'd perhaps be better off with the Roborock Qrevo Master, which has dual spinning mops instead.

The mop pad is attached at one side, so while you can pull the Velcro-ed on bit to see the plates beneath, you can't remove it entirely. This seems like an odd decision, because it prevents you from, for example, putting it in the washing machine, if you wanted a more thorough clean.

There's also a spinning side mop – a new addition with the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra, designed to enable you to mop closer to your baseboards. Within 1.68mm of the edge of your room, to be precise. The mop has its own dedicated water outlet, but it is fixed in place rather than extending when it senses the edges of rooms, like the FlexiArm does.

Finally, underneath the robovac is a set of cliff sensors to prevent your robovac from throwing itself down the stairs, plus a carpet detection sensor so it knows not to try and mop there.

Moving on to the dock. Note that this needs to sit on a hard, flat floor (the instructions suggest wood, tile or concrete) and obviously it also needs to be near a power outlet, too. Although it's still quite chunky – unavoidable with self-emptying, mop-and-vac models – the design has been streamlined compared to previous Roborock robovacs, with the various reservoirs hidden behind covers.

The dock houses a 4L clean water reservoir, with a silver ion block designed to discourage the growth of bacteria. New to this model is a separate detergent compartment, which distributes your floor cleaner evenly and removes the need for guesswork when premixing your cleaning solution. There's a 3.5L dirty water tank and a 2.5L dust bag.

Within the dock you'll find a spinning brush roller for cleaning the mop. It uses hot water (Roborock says up to 60C) to sterilize and remove grease from the mop pads, and heated air to dry. While the mop is being washed, there's a sensor to detect how dirty the pad is, and extend cleaning time if required. There are also different cleaning intensity options you can choose manually.

You will need to refill the water tank manually. If you want to avoid that, there is a version that comes with a refill and drainage system. Be aware that this will require you to plumb in the base station, meaning you won't be able to move it.

• Design score: 4.5 out of 5

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review: performance

• Overall, strong mopping and vacuuming performance
• Decent obstacle avoidance, but did still get tangled in cables
• Voice commands unreliable

Let's start with vacuuming performance. The MaxV Ultra promises extreme suction. Figuring out how to tell how much suction a vacuum cleaner has is easier said than done, but here it's measured in Pascal, and the MaxV Ultra has 10,000Pa of it – which Roborock says is 'industry leading', but the Deebot T30S Combo actually offers 11,000Pa on max mode. It's still very sucky though.

Generally, I found this robovac delivered a decent clean. There are sensors to detect when the robovac is on carpet and increase suction accordingly, and I found this feature worked reliably during my review period – I could hear the suction amping up when the robot trundled onto soft flooring in my home.

There are quite a few vacuuming options to cater for different cleaning needs and preferences. You can opt for a deep clean, where the carpets are vacuumed twice to form a checkered pattern, or Carpet First Mode if you want the robovac to tackle carpets first, before it does any mopping, so the mop pad will be dry for this part of the clean (the mop pads do lift when the vac is on carpet; it's just as a backup). You can also set it to boost suction power when navigating around pet supplies.

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra: oat test - YouTube

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To test fine debris pickup, I sprinkled cornflour on my medium-pile carpet. It picked up the surface dust but nothing more ingrained. I had similar results from my large-debris test – the robovac got most of the oats sprinkled on my carpet, but left a few. So not perfect, but still very acceptable. This was after just one pass – it is possible to instruct the robovac to do a more thorough clean.

The extending side brushes, however, could be improved. I have radiators that sit slightly too low for the robovac to get under them, but the spinning side brush did not extend to clean these areas – particularly unfortunate, as dust often collects here. I saw another review from someone who had the same issue with low-sitting cabinets. I also found that pickup on the corners of rooms wasn't great – the robovac doesn't really linger long enough for the extending brush to do its work, often leaving debris.

Roborock promises a 99.5% hair pickup rate in carpet mode. I have long hair, and rollers did a great job of tackling this on the carpet; filtering it straight into the dustbin rather than letting it tangle around the rollers. However, I did find hair got tangled on both the axles of the rollers and the extending side brush, the former of which was particularly tricky to remove.

Looking for the best robot vacuum for pet hair? I think this would be a good shout, with the combination of powerful suction and those grippy rollers. However, the small onboard bin might prove problematic if you have a pet that sheds a lot.

Moving on to mopping. Again, I was impressed. I found the mopping effective, with the robovac tackling both wet spills (coffee) and sticky spills (dried on honey) effectively. The hot mop cleaning also seems to work well, with minimal stains left on the mop pads even after cleaning the coffee.

Navigation is excellent, as I'd expect from this brand. The Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra mapped my flat quickly and accurately, making setup nice and straightforward. It's smart enough to recognize which room it's in and promises to be able to identify 73 objects, including pet waste, shoes and mirrors (this last one has consistently been an issue for robovac owners with floor mirrors in the past, so is a welcome addition here).

On test, I found object avoidance was a little inconsistent. I left a sock (black) and a cable (white) on my light grey carpet. The Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra tried its very best to vacuum up the sock. And while it successfully identified and avoided the cable (providing a snapshot for me to approve in the app – shown above), it then went on to repeatedly got stuck on cables during general cleaning, needing manual rescuing.

Note that if you activate Pet Mode, the robot will exercise more caution when avoiding obstacles – so it'll be less likely to hoover up your cat, but might also provide a slightly less comprehensive clean as a result (your choice).

Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra ignoring voice commands - YouTube

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I also found the voice assistant to be unreliable. This robovac frequently failed to understand basic commands, included in the list of approved commands ('Return to dock', 'Mop here'). Not that it should matter, but I don't have what might be considered a 'challenging accent', so I'm a little baffled as to why it struggled to understand me.

Roborock is known to have one of the best robot vacuum apps, and the app for the S8 MaxV Ultra didn't disappoint. It's well-designed, fairly intuitive to use, and does a good job of organizing all the many different controls it needs to offer. However, if you're new to robot vacuums, you may still find it a little overwhelming and confusing.

• Performance score: 4 out of 5

Should you buy the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra?

Buy it if...

Don't buy it if...

How I tested the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra

• I used this as my main vacuum for 3 weeks
• I tested all the different modes and features
• I ran specific cleaning tests using different types of spillages

For my Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra review, I used this robovac as my main vacuum cleaner for three weeks to gain an idea of how it performs on a day-to-day basis, including how easy it is to control and how good it is at cleaning in general. I tried out all the different functions I was able to, as well as running a series of specific tests to assess cleaning powers. These included seeing how well the mop coped with wet and dried-on sticky stains, and if the vacuum could handle large and small debris. I scattered common objects like socks and cables on my floor to assess the reliability of its obstacle avoidance features. I measured my findings against our experiences with other robot vacuums, and the Roborock's own claims about this vacuum's performance.

Read more about how we test

First reviewed July 2024