This Combo Robot Vac and Stick Vacuum Is a Mixed Bag

With a market flooded with vacuums and mops and models changing so rapidly, it’s almost impossible to feel confident about what you’re buying in the moment. For the last month, I have been testing the Ecovacs Deebot T30S Combo ($1199.99)—a robot vacuum and mop, in a self-emptying tower, combined with a stick vacuum. It’s a machine trying to do a lot; I’m going to discuss the parts as they compare to other vacuums and mops already out. 

A huge tower

The T30S comes in two variations: The first has a handheld vacuum with a few attachments, but without the extension for the vacuum, it’s merely a nice Dustbuster. (For about 30 dollars more, you can get a fully extendable stick vacuum.) 

The first thing you’ll notice about the T30S is that the base is monstrous—it eclipsed in size any other robot I've tested in the last year, particularly in height. Water tanks and vacuum accessories can all be stowed in the tower itself, which is handy—but even so, its size and width makes it harder to place in your home. There’s almost no assembly except for clicking together the ramp to the tower and stowing the accessories in a drawer designed for them. Pairing the robot to the Ecovacs app was also fast and streamlined. 

Advanced features in app, but lots of advertising

Open the Ecovacs app, and without fail you’ll be hit with offers and banners. They’re easy to click off, but still, it’s an annoying distraction. Otherwise, the interface for the vacuum works very similarly to other advanced robots out there including Roborock, Switchbot, and Dreame. Like Roborock, it has a voice assistant named Yiko and it works about as well as Roborock’s (which isn’t very well, but shows promise). Unlike other robots in this price range, the T30S lacks onboard video. The T30S is missing two of my must-have features on robot vacuums these days: remote control and pin and go, which you now see in almost all high-end models, including those mentioned above. Remote control allows you to control the robot using your phone, meaning you never have to go fishing for a bot under the couch again. You can simply drive it over to you. "Pin and go" allows you to mark a spot on the map and have the robot proceed to that pin and clean in that specific area. It’s a great way to quickly deal with a spill.

In its favor, the T30S had a feature I’m beginning to see more of: the ability to designate room cleaning priorities. In other words, if it's cleaning my bathroom and any other space, I can have it always clean the bathroom last. If it's cleaning the kitchen and any other space, I can direct it to always get the kitchen first. Another newer feature I like is the maintenance log for all the working parts, which gives you a status report of every single replaceable part. Other standard features like child lock, schedules, and intensity settings for your mop and vacuum are present on the T30S. 

A better mop than vacuum

Every household produces different kinds of detritus. A floor that only has some dust could use almost any robot vacuum with success, and might want to focus on models like Dyson, which are specifically designed to capture microparticles. Some vacuums are specially designed to grab pet hair. I, on the other hand, have "macroparticles": large stuff that is tracked in by the dog, or dropped during various crafting or cooking activities. If you have kids who drop Cheerios, for instance, you have a macroparticle problem, and it’s one that robot vacuums struggle with. The T30S struggled with macroparticles, getting stuck on almost anything larger than a popcorn kernel, which meant I had to come clear out the roller brush. But it didn’t really capture smaller debris that well, either. This could be due to a singular roller design, but I think it’s also due to the small size of the debris container. The T30S did not seem to return to the base once full to empty itself, instead stubbornly continuing its run, unable to pick up anything else. If you, like me, suffer from larger detritus, then this is not the vacuum for you. But I believe this could be capable of picking up pet hair and dust, etc. without a problem. 

More successful was the mop, which is handled by two spinning mop pads, much like the Roborock Qrevo line. While I still believe that mop pads, like the Roborock S8 are better for mopping than spinning pads, I thought the T30s did an admirable job, better than the Dreame L10 I recently reviewed, and on par with the Qrevo. Because the pads extend out from the robot, they’re able to get into corners and room edges admirably. I generally found that this was all more successful when I ran a complete vacuum run and then a separate mop run. 

Navigation issues might be more feature than bug

The T30S did something that surprised me: It moved through a curtained-off area. When robots used bump-and-go technology to map an area, they would go anywhere a little battery-powered motor could take them. New robots including the T30S use LiDAR (lasers that use light and distance to determine where to go), which means most robots these days don’t bump into things at all, and actively avoid them—they perceive obstacles they could get through or under as walls. So I was shocked to watch the T30S slip under a floor-length velvet curtain between my hallway and living room as if the curtain didn’t exist. While this is probably a bug (Ecovacs is still looking into it), I think it's a bug that could work in your favor if you have a space that previous LiDAR robots haven't "seen," whether that's a space blocked by a pet gate a robot could still slip under, someplace you're using a room divider, or a curtain, like me. While a bug could always get corrected, I think it's unlikely to happen, given that most companies just make a new robot altogether. In fact, this "bug" didn't exist on the Ecovacs Deebot X2 Omni, which I tried (and liked) just a few months ago.

On the downside, the T30S also stranded itself more than a few times once the job was completed. It struggled to return to the base, abandoning itself in hallways and other random spots, and although this only represents 15% of all the times I used it, it's still a consideration.

A near-miss on what could have been a killer feature

The hand vac included in the T30S makes you question how badly you want to use it. On one hand, it’s such a good idea to have a self-emptying hand vac; you never have to deal with a messy canister over a trash can. This one feature is what makes me prefer the Samsung Bespoke Jet AI vacuum over any Dyson I’ve tried, because you simply grab the vacuum all ready to go, clean, and then place it back on the dock, where it empties itself. Unlike Samsung, though, there are extra steps to use the T30S. You have to assemble it each time you want to use it, and then disassemble it to put it back in the dock, where it self empties. All the time and energy saved by the self-emptying feature is canceled out by the work to put the vacuum together and take it apart each time you want to use it.

At least when you get the T30S with the extended stick vacuum, you just remove the handheld portion to place it in the tower, and the stick and whatever accessory you’re using get docked on the exterior of the tower, so it's not as labor-intensive. However, this also means the tower now takes up even more space vertically and horizontally. 

Not a bad buy, but not the best buy

Despite all that, the truth is that if you were to buy a mid-range stick vac and robot vacuum, you’d still end up spending more than the list price for this combo tower. While I think if you want a better robot vacuum/mop you’d buy a Roborock or Switchbot, and if you wanted a better stick vacuum you’d get the Samsung Bespoke Jet AI, the Deebot T30S is going to work well for someone without major floor detritus who just wants a reliable bot to keep up with the daily dust, and wants a handheld vac nearby for things above ground level.