980

Have a house with 5 dogs. I’ve had a robot vacuum doing a run every day since ~2017. I haven’t had that fur buildup around the baseboards since. My model’s old(from around 2018) so it doesn’t have as good of suction as the new ones. I’m considering getting the vacuum/mop combo unit next. I will note that if iRobot hadn’t stocked replacement parts I might have a different opinion on old roombas(iRobot recently sold everything to the chinese factory that manufactured the units, so I can’t speak to the new models), because I ended up replacing a battery, both wheels, and the charging dock(all broken from non-manufacturer related issues). But they had how-to videos on the same site where you could buy the parts directly, so I was able to keep Scruffy going all these years. So I can’t give you a current recommendation for a brand or model, but I can tell you it’s pretty much a requirement for my house these days. Very convenient, turns a daily chore into a monthly chore of emptying the vacuum bag in the base. I’d say continue looking into it and if you’re looking at a premium unit, check on how repairing the unit is gonna go 5-10 years from now. I have a 2016 Roomba 980 that still vacuums my second floor every day. These can be long life appliances if you maintain them.

My Roomba 980 was going strong 10 years later (with some maintenance) and I only got a new one cos after my son was born I wanted a mop

I hope you are right about Dreame as I just got L50 pro Ultra. After almost 10 years with Roomba 980 my biggest fear is that these tech filled toys cant live half of that

Before my roomba 980 was on schedule. The got less use once our son was bornand we ran it less often so not to disturb his sleep. But as he got a bit older we upgraded to Dreame with a mop. Running it as often we can (and not forget) manually. Hard tondo a schedule as we need to pick up a lot of baby stuff before it runs

I still have the 980 and I think its amazing as a vacuum even though they discontinued cloud support. I also have a J9+ combo which I supposedly upgraded to a few years ago and its complete crap. It couldn’t find the base, it couldn’t refill the water tank. I ran the 980 after the J9 and it vacuumed a lot of stuff that the J9 missed. Irobot isn’t what it used to be. You don’t see it talked about because it’s bad now

I have a basic Roomba 980 that I purchased *refurbished* in 2020 that handles cat hair just fine. I’ve had 2-3 cats the whole time I’ve had it, and one was a long hair cat. Tile, LVT, or rugs - it doesn’t make a difference; it gets the fur up. I keep lurking and watching for the latest models so I can replace it when it croaks, but it refuses to die!

I have no experience with the current ones. Mine was manufactured ~6 years ago. But if you aren’t ready to get an expensive one yet, you might be able to start with a cheap one and see what you like or don’t like. I bet most will handle pet hair just fine. It’s long human hair that gets wrapped in brush and rollers on mine, and needs to be cut off! Pet hair has been zero problem, except needing to empty the dust bin more often, since it takes up more space than dust does.

I have been using roomba 805s, two 960s and two 980s without the app - no wifi connection. They are probably the best irobot made, but they are really old. I recently bought a Matic vacuum (there is a reddit group for it) since the security is much better than other new robots. That was part of the design criteria.