The cheapest robovacs will only have a dock for charging. Pricier models incorporate self-emptying of the onboard dustbin, and draining/refilling of the onboard water tanks. The very fanciest models offer automatic mop pad cleaning, and detergent dispensing for the mopping fluid.

Oscillating, spinning, or vibrating mop pads clean better than bots that just drag a wet rag around, but the new self-cleaning roller mops that are beginning to appear are even more effective. Auto-carpet sensing is also important since it prevents the robot from accidentally mopping your rug.

But they’re worth considering — especially if you have carpets and pets. I love self-empty docks, but sometimes you don’t have space for them, and if you like your robot to be out of sight (living under your bed or sofa), you’ll want a big bin and no dock.

Maneuverability: We watch as the robots make their way around our living room obstacle course—or home, in the case of at-home testing.

However, I think it's fair to assume you'll need to manually empty it more than you would a traditional, self-empty robovac, given dock dustbins tend to hold 2.5L or 3L of dirt.

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The mopping is also a cut above average. On test, we found the rotating pads very effective – great news if you're regularly dealing with muddy pawprints. The does-it-all dock will take care of refilling the bot's water tank, dispensing cleaning fluid, and cleaning and drying its mop pads, too, meaning minimal hands-on time from you.

This vacuum is able to sense dirt and boost its power to pull up more debris. And unlike some vacuums that can only clean when you move it forward, this one picks up debris moving both forward and backward.

The Shark PowerDetect AZ4002 offers both strong cleaning performance and convenient features. It’s stellar at cleaning bare floors, making it the ideal vacuum for kitchens, bathrooms, and hardwood floors. It also earned near-top-level scores in our carpet cleaning tests and automatically adjusts the speed of the brush rolls depending on the floor type.

Priced at more than $1,000, the Miele Complete C3 Marin is the most expensive canister vacuum in our ratings, but its high price can be justified by its exemplary cleaning performance. It’s a champ at handling bare floors and embedded pet hair, and it excels at capturing dust particles. Strong airflow makes its attachments especially effective.

While its mapping is very good, it Top 3 Automatic Vacuum Cleaners can take a really long time (Roombas use vSLAM, not lidar), and it doesn’t seem to adapt to changes in my home as easily as other robots.

Combo models might also have mops that can kick out from the side of the vacuum to get closer to the sides of rooms.

This isn't a cheap bot, and while I think the featureset and performance justify the price, it'll be out of budget for some. We have more affordable options in our roundup of the best robot vacuums for pet hair – although be aware that if you really want something up to the task, you will likely need to spend a bit more.

Another nice-to-have feature, AI-powered obstacle detection helps your robot “intelligently” detect and avoid clutter (and a potential poop apocalypse if it encounters pet waste). These models use cameras (worth noting) to see objects in their path and onboard processors to “decide” how to approach them based on what they see.