Yeedi Vac Station review: An affordable self-emptying robot vac that also mops

Self-emptying robot vacuums are all the rage, and Yeedi has jumped on the trend with its Yeedi Vac station. This robot vacuums, mops, and self-empties its dustbin, providing about 30 days of automated cleaning before you must swap out its dust bag.

It also maps room layouts to enable customized cleaning, and it supports voice control through Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant, making it an attractive option for people who don’t want to break the bank for the luxury of fully automated floor cleaning.

This review is part of TechHive’s coverage of the best robot vacuums, where you’ll find reviews of the competition’s offerings, plus a buyer’s guide to the features you should consider when shopping for this type of product.

Both the robot and its auto-empty station are finished in matte white. There’s a 3D visual SLAM camera on top that the robot uses to map your space for more efficient cleaning routes. Under a lid, there’s a .45-liter dustbin and storage for a brush-cleaning tool. Underneath, there’s a roller brush, a side brush, and a .24-liter water tank that distributes water to the mopping cloth.

The auto-empty station stores a 2.5-liter disposable dust bag that can hold around 30 days of collected dirt and debris. The station doubles as the robot’s charging dock; the robot can run for up to 200 minutes before returning here to recharge its battery.

Yeedi

The auto-empty station requires a bit of assembly. You must slot the station into the docking plate and secure it with three screws provided in the box. Once that’s done, you need to attach the spinning side brush to its post on the bottom of the robot.

While you can start a cleaning job simply by pressing the auto clean button on top of the robot, pairing it with its companion app will let you take advantage of features like room mapping and scheduling. The app prompts you through this process, which requires you to scan the QR code on the robot with your phone’s camera and a generated QR code on your phone with the robot’s camera. Altogether, getting the Yeedi ready to clean took about 10 minutes.

The robot’s first cleaning of my downstairs level didn’t go particularly smoothly. Instead of backing off its dock as it should, it turned to its right and rolled of the side—a clunky maneuver akin to driving your car over a curb—then banged into a lot of furniture as it explored the room. Eventually, it settled down into a more efficient up and down pattern.

Michael Ansaldo/IDG

As it cleans, you can track its movements on a map of the floorspace in the app. It takes three to five cleanings for the robot to build a complete and accurate map, but once it does, you can section the room into cleaning zones and set virtual boundaries and no-mop zones.

The robot offers three suction strengths with a maximum power of 3000Pa. In auto-clean mode, it automatically (and audibly) boosts its suction when it recognizes carpet. It did good job sucking up dust and pet hair from carpets and vinyl plank flooring during my testing. Once the robot completes a cleaning job or its dustbin is full, it returns to its dock and the auto-empty station sucks the contents from the dustbin.

If you don’t want to use the auto-empty feature—if you purchased the Yeedi Vac Max, which doesn’t come with the self-emptying charging, but can upgraded later ($350 on Amazon)—you can turn that feature off in the app.

The mopping function is adequate for maintaining the floor between more rigorous cleaning with a stick mop. For these jobs, you fill the water tank and attach one of the supplied microfiber cloths, at which point the robot voice prompt lets you know it has entered mopping mode. The robot drags the dampened cloth across the floor as it moves, picking up most surface grime but leaving deeper dirt behind.

The Yeedi app keeps things simple with a clean, minimal interface. It displays the current map and cleaning details with a scrolling overlay that provides one-tap access to cleaning records, suction options, scheduling, and cleaning preferences. The app isn’t as sophisticated as some of Yeedi’s competitors’, but it provides all the essential controls and is easy to use.

Verdict

The Yeedi Vac Station delivered impressive results and made the arduous task of keeping my floors clear of pet hair and dust a whole lot easier. It’s a great option for anyone who wants to enjoy the luxury of automated floor cleaning, as well as anyone for whom popping open a dustbin can trigger allergies or other sensitivities. If you want something with advanced capabilities and are willing to spend quite a bit more, iRobot’s iRobot Roomba s9+ can save up to 10 floor plans and be linked with iRobot’s Braava Jet m6 robot mop for tandem cleaning.

• The Yeedi Vac Station automates vacuuming and mopping for easier maintenance of carpeted and hard-surface floors.

  Pros

  • Mops and vacuums
  • Self-emptying dustbin
  • Creates customizable maps

  Cons

  • Navigation can be clunky
  • Maps are primitive

Michael Ansaldo is a veteran consumer and small-business technology journalist. He contributes regularly to TechHive and writes the Max Productivity column for PCWorld.