I've been testing some of the best vacuum cleaners in Australia for a few years now and have come to appreciate just how much robot vacuums have improved. They began as a single-function autonomous cleaner able to do basic day-to-day vacuuming, but are now smart enough to do so much more... and then some.
One of those robovacs is the Ecovacs Deebot T30 Omni. The mouthful of a name aside, this machine was launched in May in Australia and I got to see a demo at the time. What fascinated me then was I could start it by giving it a kick, but now that I've actually used it in my own home – albeit just once as I've only had it a couple of days – I feel strongly that it's a contender for being one of the best robot vacuums you can get.
It manages to balance price, feature set and performance very nicely indeed. For a robovac that can vacuum, mop, empty its dust bin and mop water, refill with clean water, then wash and dry its mop pads, the T30 Omni is well priced, even at full price. It carries an RRP of AU$1,749 – which isn't bad when you consider similar bots cost upwards of two grand – but there's a limited-time offer available directly via Ecovacs' online store and Amazon that shaves AU$350 off that number.
That, dear reader, I think is a good investment. With the second Amazon Prime Day sale coming early in October, it's possible we'll see a bigger discount, but as with all things, there are no guarantees and I'd hate for you to miss this opportunity.
Basing this buying advice on just one test run is probably not what I should be doing, but that single cleaning session was in an apartment that hadn't been vacuumed or mopped in a while. Don't judge me, but I can get lazy, especially since there aren't any furry friends or little ones to create regular messes. I had my hair all over the bedroom carpet and a few caked-in stains on the kitchen floor. I had also accidentally dropped some tea leaves the day before in the kitchen and not bothered to clean up then.
After its initial mapping run, which took barely a few minutes and was accurate, I set the T30 Omni – that I have named Dirt Vader – to do two vacuum-only passes on the bedroom floor (which is wall-to-wall carpet) at Max suction, followed by a single 'mop after vacuum' run in the rest of the apartment (which is tiled).
All the hair in the bedroom was gone, at least to the naked eye and, interestingly, Dirt Vader returned to its self-emptying dock to clean out its small bin before doing the second vacuum pass. In the rest of the house, the vacuuming was impressive at the High setting, with not a single tea leaf left on the kitchen floor.
It was the mopping that truly impressed me. I was a little anxious that setting the mop pads to lift off my living room rug wouldn't be enough and it would leave damp streaks, so I set it to 'avoid carpets' entirely and Dirt Vader was very thorough in sensing the edges of said rug. Also, the mop pads extend out when an edge is sensed – whether it's a wall or the leg of a piece of furniture – and so it covered as much ground as I would with the Dyson V15s Detect Submarine that I've been using as my vacuum-mop so far.
I also found the stains on my kitchen floor gone after one mop session with the water volume set to High. Admittedly the stains weren't too bad, so I still have to more testing to see how it holds up with, say, dried curry on floor but, for now, I'm really glad the edges of my rooms are getting mopped.
All that and battery life was still at 48%.
The T30 Omni does its work relatively quietly too. I am yet to measure (in dB) what the sound output is, but it's a lot quieter than any of the older Deebots I've tested and it sure is quieter than the Dyson I use regularly, and that's with the suction at Max. I was watching an episode of Stargate Atlantis when it was vacuuming and I was able to enjoy the show without needing to up the volume too much.
After my floors were done, Dirt Vader cleaned itself automatically, emptying the dirty water, then washing and drying the mop pads with heat to avoid an ecosystem growing on them between sessions.
I'll be putting the T30 Omni through some more rigorous testing in the coming days and hope to have a full review done soon but, in the meantime, my first impressions are positive enough for me to able to recommend it before I've given my final judgement.
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