I am a very busy person – that’s what my friends will tell you. I think I do just fine and have enough time to do some house chores, including cleaning and cooking (sometimes). But there’s one thing that I would personally never volunteer for brooming and moping and this is where I need some help.
Here’s where you can get a robot vacuum cleaner that can make your life simpler.
Xiaomi has recently launched its new vacuum cleaner – X10 – in India at Rs 29,999. For the price, the vacuum cleaner comes with one feature that’s perhaps the most important for users – the ability to auto-clean the dustbin and then save the effort of emptying it manually every time.
That’s not it. There are many other features that are pretty good for the asking price. For instance, it has 4000Pa of suction power, a laser navigation system, a 5200mAh battery pack and mopping function and multiple cleaning modes.
So, I decided to give the X10 a try as my daily house cleaning companion and this is what I think about it.
Getting started
Once you unbox the X10, you’ll find all the required attachments right in the box. There’s the X10 body, the cleaning brush, the mopping pad and the auto-cleaning dock. Put everything in place, plug in the dock and you are all set to start the pairing process.
Considering my house has a limited 15amp plug point, the included 15amp power cord did create a small hiccup with the setup process. I don’t recommend it, but I replaced it with one of my Windows laptop’s power cords and it worked. I don’t recommend doing it, Xiaomi must have thought something here. But having a 15amp port makes the placement problem for the vacuum cleaner.
The X10 is compatible with Mi Home app, and it is available on both Android and iOS devices. The setup process is quick and seamless, and I didn't face any challenges.
Mapping
Xiaomi X10 robot vacuum cleaner supports faster mapping and 10 minutes is fast enough for an 1800 sq.ft house that has a lot of obstacles on the floor. The mapping accuracy is decent too.
Well, it’s not as good as some of the more expensive robot vacuum cleaners out there that utilise multiple mapping techniques like LiDAR, phase detection and a camera to map the house faster and more accurately. But, for the price, the X10 did a pretty good job at measuring the house areas and corners for effective cleaning. It also detected things like dining table, sofa, bed, to the map.
That’s not it, there’s a multi-floor mapping feature as well. So, that’s a bonus.
Design
Design-wise, it’s pretty much identical to other robot vacuum cleaners out there in this price range. It is rounded and the dimensions are also on point - 353 × 350 × 98.8 mm. It weighs 3.3 Kg which is reasonable. It has wheels and can go to places on its own – of course on your command.
Turn it upside down and you’ll find the cleaning brush, the dual rotor, the cliff sensor, charging contacts, mop pads, wheels and a hole for the auto-cleaning dock to suck all the dust that has been collected in the bin.
Talking about the dock, it’s not that big, but big enough to hold a dust bag that can collect up to 60 days (about 2 months) of dust. Also, the suction power of the dock is 17000Pa and that’s a lot.
I was impressed with the dock design. It is not massive or too small to feel out of place. Fits well in my house and I think the design will work for most houses.
Cleaning performance, obstacle detection and more
Now that I have told most of the things that Xiaomi has claimed with the X10 vacuum cleaner. It’s time to test out its performance in a real house. And the best place to do it is to clean my kitchen floor – after I am done cooking. Yeah, I make a lot of mess. But I had one less thing to worry about with the X10 vacuum cleaner. So, I fired it up to clean my Kitchen.
The vacuum cleaner started as soon as pressed the start button and moved to the Kitchen area. I selected the “Vacuum+Mop” option. The X10 follows the typical row-by-row cleaning technique, and it started from the very beginning. Does both mopping and vacuuming at the same time and there’s the option to choose either one option as well in the app.
So, the vacuum performance is good – 4000Pa does appear to be working in favour of X10. The suction power is good enough to pull off atta and other dust and debris lying around the floor.
The cleaning performance in corners is reasonably good.
The mopping function is just basic here. There's no lift function, carpet avoiding or carpet mode to offer better cleaning for carpets. But the mopping function is fine, there's an option to choose between multiple damp modes. The water tank is big enough to capture the entire house in one cycle. But I like to add some cleaning liquid while mopping and that’s not the option here. So, I sprayed it manually and then used the X10 for mopping.
One thing about the X10, it has safety protocols in place, but it automatically reduces the speed when it detects an obstacle and that’s good and saved my furniture from getting damaged.
Also, the wheels are big, and the device can cross around 20mm while moving from one place to another place. This helped the X10 move from one place to another in my house without getting stuck on the carpet, rug or runner.
I tried all three modes and all of them work just fine. The Turbo mode does an impressive job at sucking all the dust on the floor. Also, the vacuum cleaner is mostly silent in the Standard or Silent mode. However, it gets noisy in Turbo mode, but that’s alright considering the 4200Pa of suction power it has.
Overall, the X10 does a good job of cleaning and mopping the entire house.
Battery life
Xiaomi X10 robot vacuum cleaner is backed by a 5200mAh battery pack. Well, that’s smaller than most smartphones these days, but it is more than enough for a robot vacuum cleaner.
Now, Xiaomi claims that the X10 can last up to 240 minutes of continuous cleaning in silent mode. But these are just numbers. I tested it out and the X10 can handle full mopping and vacuuming in an 1800 sq.ft. House in a single charge with Standard mode. However, switching it to Turbo mode can require a recharge.
Talking about recharging the X10, it’s relatively slower. In my testing, the X10 requires around 5 hours to charge from 0 to 100% and around 3 hours unless it resumes cleaning.
Mi Home app features
Mi Home app is Xiaomi’s smart home companion app for all IoT devices, including robot vacuum cleaners. I have said that the paring process is simple and seamless. But, in terms of features too, it also is equipped.
The Map generated is good and accurate. However, I like to rename the rooms and make necessary adjustments to the boundaries to make a robot vacuum cleaner, clean the way I want too. Gladly, Mi Home allows that and with Map restricted area feature, it also lets me assign places where I don’t want it to mop or vacuum. Also, the merge and split functions are a great addition here.
Other features include child lock, schedule option, DND mode and more.
There’s a dedicated Consumables Management option that keeps track of all the attachments like dust chamber, dust bag, brush health, filter health, sensor cleaning, etc. This option comes in handy to keep the X10 at its best performance.
Verdict
Xiaomi’s X10 robot vacuum cleaner is a good option for those looking for an affordable robot vacuum cleaner for daily house cleaning purposes. Its suction performance is impressive, and the added mop feature adds to the value. Although, the mopping performance could have been better. But the auto cleaning dock makes up for it. Apart from that, the battery life is good and is mostly quiet in Standard mode which is good for day-to-day cleaning.
All that said, if you are out there looking for an affordable vacuum cleaner that’s well equipped to handle daily cleaning needs, the Xiaomi X10 is a worthy option to go with.
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