LG CordZero All-in-One Auto Empty Cordless Stick Vacuum review

One-minute review

The LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty Cordless Stick Vacuum is the latest addition to the brand’s CordZero range of some of the best vacuum cleaners that are cordless stick-style vacuums, which come with various attachments for cleaning carpets, hard floors and upholstery, with some models also able to mop floors. In 2021, LG announced that the LG CordZero A9 Kompressor stick vacuum was getting an upgraded docking station called the All-in-One Tower. This doesn’t just charge the vacuum – it also efficiently stores its accessories and provides a hands-free, self-emptying feature, with the contents of the dust bin automatically deposited into a HEPA-filtered dust bag.

Beyond the addition of the Aio tower, the Sand Beige LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty doesn’t seem to be much of an upgrade over previous models. Like those, it’s a wireless vacuum with Kompressor technology and Wi-Fi capabilities. Plus, it’s the first LG stick vacuum cleaner to come with five different attachments. The main difference between the LG CordZero All in One and previous versions is that the new tower charges the battery 30 minutes faster than the old one. It also comes with five different attachments, while other versions only included three tools. 

It’s a versatile cleaner that can be used on a variety of different floor types, or handheld for cleaning higher up – during our testing we used it to clean everything from dust under our couch to cobwebs on our 10ft ceiling. For the price, we thought the vacuum and mop heads would have better performance – or at the least be able to do both things at the same time, as is the case with models like the Tineco Floor One S5. The floorhead doesn’t suck up dust and dirt evenly across its footprint, with some dirt left uncollected towards the edges, and the mop head moves more dirt around, rather than cleaning it up. 

On the plus side, the upgraded docking station reduces the amount of maintenance required, and keeps the various accessories neatly stowed and organized. It’s a great addition, but we’d hope that LG’s next upgrade will include improvements to the stick cleaner itself.

Price and availability

•  List price: from $999  /  AU$1,299

The LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty Cordless Stick Vacuum is the most expensive model in LG’s CordZero stick vacuum range. It’s essentially the LG CordZero A9 Kompressor Stick Vacuum with Power Mop - a vacuum cleaner which is already in the LG Stick vacuum line-up - with the addition of a docking station that provides storage for tools and automatically empties the dust bin. And to confuse things a little, LG has named it differently in different markets; for example, in Australia it goes by LG CordZero A9 Kompressor with All-in-One Tower.

Other than the docking station, one of the most notable differences between the two stick vacuums is that the LG CordZero All in One includes five tools versus three tools that are provided with the LG CordZero A9 Kompressor. It also takes four hours to charge a battery for the LG CordZero A9, compared to 3.5 hours for the LG CordZero All in One. 

In terms of the price difference, the LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty Cordless Stick Vacuum, or LG CordZero A9 Handstick Vacuum with All-In-One Tower as it's known in Australia, costs about $200 / AU$200 more than the base model of the A9 series. We’re not entirely convinced that the new docking station, or its capability to charge the battery half an hour quicker, merits this premium, but as we’ve mentioned it does bring with it some useful features. 

In the US, the CordZero All in One Auto Empty can be bought directly from LG or via BestBuy, Nebraska Furniture Mart, Abt, and The Home Depot. It’s available from several stores in Australia, at least online, including Bing Lee, Domayne, Harvey Norman and Joyce Mayne. 

• Price and availability score: 4/5

Design

• 33.8oz / 1-liter dust bin; 1.6 gal / 6-liter dust bag in AIO Tower 
• Five attachable tools – a vacuum head, mop head, crevice tool, combination tool, and power mini nozzle 
• Can use as a stick vacuum or small handheld vacuum  

The LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty Cordless Stick Vacuum has essentially the same design as the LG CordZero A9 Kompressor Stick Vacuum. The only difference is in the design of the Aio Tower docking station. Both the vacuum and Aio Tower and finished in pale cream color which LG calls Sand Beige.

Let’s start with the LG CordZero All in One itself. At 6lbs / 2.7kg, this lightweight vacuum is easy to maneuver around your home. It’s 36 inches / 91.5cm long, but extends to about 44 inches / 112cm when the telescopic wand is extended (the mechanism to extend it is on the back of the wand which may be a tad confusing at first). The grip is comfortable, and the vacuum and mop head twists easily when you’re cleaning beneath furniture.

On the handle is a battery life indicator and three buttons – the power button, Wi-Fi button, and Turbo button. On the side of the 33.8oz / 1-liter dust bin is a Kompressor handle, which you can use to compress the dust and dirt in the bin so that you don’t have to empty it as frequently.

The Aio tower is a standing rectangular cube, with hidden side doors that holds the dust bag and various attachments – a Power Mini Nozzle, Crevice Tool, Combination Tool, Mop head, and vacuum head. Unfortunately, the mop head attachment doesn’t fit inside the side doors and must be hung on the side of the tower. The stick vacuum sits in the center of the tower to charge and it automatically preset to self-empty into the hidden dust bag.

The Aio tower is as slim as it can be, but even so, it’s still somewhat bulky and will be noticeable in any space. It’s designed to be plugged into a power outlet, and since most outlets aren’t placed in closets, you’ll likely have to place it in the corner of your kitchen or laundry room. Those with small kitchens may find that the Aio tower takes up too much space, and while it can be stored away, it’s fairly heavy, so you’ll need to take care when moving it. 

Setting up the Aio tower and the stick vacuum itself is quite simple. The tower arrives mostly assembled – you’ll just need to set it on its base), and assembling the vacuum only requires you to attach the telescopic wand and the required head to the handheld unit. Most of the set-up process will involve learning the vacuum’s various functions and connecting it to the app. 

• Design score: 5/5

Performance

• Twisting floorhead and extending wand makes it easy to vacuum and mop hard-to-reach places 
• The main vacuum attachment doesn’t suction well in reverse or along the edges of the head in any power mode 
• Mop head does a poor job in removing heavy stains or thick grime 

The LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty Cordless Stick Vacuum is easy to use. Simply remove it from the charging tower, hit the power button, and it’s ready to go. 

We tested the vacuum on hardwood floors, vinyl floors, and thick (carpet-like) rugs, using the floorhead, crevice tool, combination tool, and mop head. The power mini nozzle is designed for picking up pet hair, but since this reviewer doesn’t have pets, we used it to remove hair from furniture and to clean out the floor of a car, both of which it did effectively. 

To vacuum hard floors, we extended the telescopic wand to a comfortable height. The floorhead is articulated, which makes it easy to reach under couches and other furniture with low clearance. 

Even on normal mode, the vacuum’s suction power was fairly good on our vinyl and hardwood floors, as well as the rugs. However, we were surprised by this vacuum’s poor edge cleaning at any power setting – it had difficulty suctioning dirt and dust towards the sides of the main head attachment. It also didn’t seem to catch dust, dirt, and debris when we rolled the vacuum backwards, which meant it was often only able to suction up debris and dirt when we rolled it forwards, and with the center of the head directly over the debris.

We often had to maneuver the vacuum head two or three times to pick up visible debris, which quickly became frustrating. Power and Turbo mode seemed to help slightly with this, but not significantly so. The vacuum head didn’t do a very good job of picking up the small dead leaves that fall from our indoor tree.

We cleaned our floorboards and window ledges with the combination tool. The soft bristles prevented any markings to our walls and boards, and we also appreciated that the wand’s light weight made it easy to reach to the top of our 10-foot ceilings to remove stray spider webs or dust with the crevice tool or the combination tool.

At 84dB – around the same level as heavy traffic or a powered lawn mower – the CordZero All in One’s noise rating in normal mode is at the higher end of scale for vacuum cleaners, and it’s even louder when set on the power or turbo modes.

When we were done cleaning, we docked the vacuum to the Aio Tower, which automatically sucked the dust and dirt from the dust bin into the tower’s dust bag. We didn’t need to use the Kompressor feature when vacuuming our house, but if you have larger areas to clean you’ll likely appreciate it.

Using the mop head is a rather more involved process. To start, we had to fill up the water compartment before reinserting it on the mop head (note that you can’t use any kind of cleaning product with the LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty, which could have been helpful in certain areas of our home). There are two mop pads, which you need to wet and then wring out before sticking them to the bottom of the mop head with Velcro pads. After attaching the mop head to the stick, we set the water output by pressing the manual button on the mop head. There are only two water output settings. They’re labeled as water droplets: a single droplet indicating a mild water output and two droplets for a higher water output.

When you press the power button, the mop pads spin as water is gently released. We used the lower water output on the hardwood floors, and the higher output on vinyl floors. In rooms like the living room and bedroom where there weren’t really any heavy stains or dirt, the mop head seemingly worked well, though we can’t be sure as it isn’t equipped with a dirt sensor. We particularly like that the mop head has a headlight, which made it easy to see where we missed dust and dirt in dark corners – it would have been nice to have a headlamp on the vacuum head too.

However, in our kitchen, bathroom, and near the back door (where we track in mud), the mop head had a tougher time cutting through stains, especially more glutinous ones. The pressure of the rotating mop pads isn’t enough to clean certain stains away even if you go over them multiple times.

Another issue is that the CordZero All in One can’t suction up liquids, and it also lacks the capability to vacuum and mop at the same time. Overall we weren’t particularly impressed with the mop head. It’s designed in such a way that the pads will pick up some dirt, but for the most part we felt like we were just moving dirt around the floors rather than picking it up.

When we’d finished using the mop, we had to remove the water tank and the pads. We emptied the water and let the tank dry out completely before putting it back on the mop head. The instruction book tells users to clean the pads by hand under the sink and then let them air-dry away from the sun. Hand-washing them isn’t easy, however, and we found it difficult to clean off all the dirt and grime with just water (again, LG recommends that you don’t use any cleaning agents).

When the Aio Tower’s dust bag fills up, we will have to remove the dust bag and replace it with a new one. When the dust bag in the Aio Tower is full, that app will notify you that it’s time to replace it. While we didn’t do this during our testing time, based on the instructions it doesn’t seem like a difficult task. It’s also recommended that you clean the tower’s filter at least once a month. To do this you simply remove it from the vacuum and clean it under running water (and/or with a brush) before letting it dry away from the sun. Replacement filters, dust bags, and mop pads are included with the CordZero All in One.

• Performance score: 5/5

App

•  LG ThinQ app works with Alexa and Google Assistant 
•  You can view weekly, monthly, and yearly cleaning history  
•  Smart diagnosis of faults 

The LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty Cordless Stick Vacuum and Aio Tower can be connected to the LG ThinQ app, which can also be integrated with Alexa and Google Assistant. Set-up isn’t difficult and, upon pairing the LG CordZero with the app, the vacuum appears on the app home page.

When you click on the CordZero’s screen, you’ll see that the stick is on standby. Here, you can see your cleaning history including how many times you’ve used the vacuum cleaner over past weeks, months, and years. It also tracks how long you use the stick for during each use, and which modes (normal, power, or turbo) you used. How useful this information is, and how many users will bother to access it, is a matter for debate; however, it’s there if you need it.

When the vacuum is placed on the Aio tower, the app will notify you that the battery is charging, and again when charging is complete. 

At the top-right of the home page is the familiar three-dot settings icon. Tap this to access the app settings (which only lets you edit the nickname and location), a filter cleaning guide, and the Smart Diagnosis page. The Smart Diagnosis feature can be used to diagnose issues with the stick vacuum and catch problems early. The app ‘examines’ the stick, and informs you on how to troubleshoot any problems. 

• App score: 5/5

Battery life

The LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty comes with two lithium-ion batteries. When the vacuum is docked to the Aio Tower the battery inside starts charging automatically. The back-up battery is placed in the top of the docking station, where it stays charged and ready to use. 

Charging time for one battery is about 3.5 hours. Both the LG app and the vacuum itself monitor the battery life and battery charge time, so you’ll be alerted if you’re in danger of running out of juice. 

That said, you would have to work pretty hard to run down the battery of the LG CordZero All in One Auto Empty. During our testing, we never came close to exhausting even one battery when vacuuming and mopping our 1,600-square-foot home. 

In addition to how long you use the vacuum for, battery life is also determined by whether you use the vacuum in handheld or stick mode, and on which power setting – Normal, Power, or Turbo. In handheld mode, one battery will last approximately 120 minutes in Normal mode, 60 minutes in Power mode, and 14 minutes in Turbo mode. In stick mode, one battery will see you through 80 minutes in Normal mode, 40 minutes in Power mode, and 12 minutes in Turbo mode. In our experience, though, there’s really no reason to use Turbo mode, and even if you do, you could probably vacuum and mop your whole house in 24 minutes (which is how long you’d get with both batteries in stick mode). 

• Battery life score: 5/5

Buy it if...

Don't buy it if...

• First reviewed: August 2022