I’ve owned a few iRobots, Neatos, Roborocks, and now a Wyze robot vacuum and so far I am not impressed at all. The list of features matched my best robots and this may be the most affordable robot I purchased over the years. But I have been manually vacuuming after a Wyze run, because it does such a poor job. I know it is still a new product, so some items can be fixed with software/firmware. But there are some issues that really makes me want something else.
Mapping Issues
- During cleaning, the mapping will sometimes start adding on to my existing map and then the vacuum can’t find the charger. I’ve had to reset the map to prevent this from happening when I want to let it vacuum as I leave the house and find it back on the charged when I get home.
- Multi-floor mapping isn’t possible without resetting the map every time.
Charging Issues
- When the vacuum returns to the charger, it doesn’t always make good contact and charge so I’ve tried to start an uncharged vacuum numerous times. Maybe my kids are bumping it off the charger, but I don’t ever see them playing near it, so I think it just isn’t making a solid connection to begin with and slightest vibrations on the floor is sliding it off.
Smarthome Integrations
- No voice assistant smart home integration that I know of. Would love to just ask Wyzecuum to clean the kitchen instead of having to initiate via the app.
Cleaning Issues
- I often have crumbs left on our hardwood kitchen floor after cleaning, where other vacuums were better at sweeping the crumbs up. I’m not sure if this can be fixed with logic (the Roomba had a sensor that would detect if it appeared there was more debris/dirt to clean up).
Design Issues
- The width of the roller is narrower than other vacuums so Wyze takes longer to clean. I replaced my Roborock with this one and they are similar in size in diameter, so I’m surprised the cleaning path is narrower.
- The roller brush does not pick up as much other robot vacuums can. My other robot vacuums can suck up more variety of stuff (e.g. sparkly threads from a cat toy remain on the carpet after Wyze rolls over it).
I do enjoy the products that Wyze can make and I hope they spend time to address all of these issues over time.
2 Likes
I LOVE my Wyze Robo Vac! I’ve had a couple minor issues…but, overall…I effing love it!
1 Like
I agree with everything you said and then some. It’s almost to the point where I can’t use my vacuum. 2/3 times the mapping gets screwed up, so it just spins in circles. It won’t redock itself to charge at the end of a cleaning. Sometimes will hit the charger when vacuuming, causing it to be unable to find it when it’s done. Unfortunately, the list goes on.
Like you, I’m aware it’s a new product and I got in early. I love Wyze, and hope they succeed, but I really hope some fundamental functionality comes quickly via firmware or I’ll have to consider a different product.
1 Like
I’m using Deebot, Roborock & Wyze to cover my 3 floors (multi-floor feature is important for many but not for me). The Wyze actually seems to pick up more stuff than the other in my case. So far, I’ve been happy with it, the features I’d want to see are 1) pin-and-go spot cleaning, 2) safe zone or option to disable cliff sensors.
@vhoang99 Interesting that Wyze is doing better for you. What kind of flooring are you using it on? Are there many obstacles (chairs/tables/etc)? What setting do you have your suction power at (quiet/standard/strong)?
I’ve never thought about wanting to disable cliff sensors, but a friend had a roomba that wouldn’t clean his rug, due to the black edging it had… so that kind of “safe zone” feature is a great idea.
+1 I also want the spot cleaning option too. I forgot about mentioning that in my list.
My house is all hardwood and tiles with various kinds of rugs, that’s probably why I haven’t seen the return-to-home/charging issue reported by users with carpet. The Wyze is covering upstairs which is all bedrooms/bathrooms with typical furniture that you’d expect. I tried both quiet & standard and didn’t see much difference, never tried strong though. My first Wyze test run was on the main floor which was cleaned regularly with the Roborock and the dustbin is fuller than what I’d normally see on the Roborock. To be fair, this Wyze is new and the Roborock is about a year old now.
2 Likes
It is hard to believe that such a good company released this vacuum. It keeps getting stuck under my couch or under my dining room table, and when on carpet, it tells me its wheels are not on the ground when they are, and it can’t always find its way home and connect to the charger. Very disappointed.
1 Like
Agreed. I signed up to be a beta tester to hopefully get faster improvements. I can only hope they’re going to push an update soon because I have issues beyond what you’re saying that’s frustrating.
1 Like
I forgot to include my one of my biggest rants. I mentioned that it gets stuck under the couch and dining room table yet it doesn’t want to go under our enormous bird cage. There is lots of room under there and it is one of the reasons I bought this thing. Wyze has always been a good value, so here is hoping it stays that way.
Evidently, the “wheels not on the ground” issue can be due to your rug. If there are dark patches on your rug, the vacuum gets confused and thinks it’s hit an edge and trap itself there. Hoping for a firmware update that lets you create green zones or something so you can just tell it to trust you and keep going.
Interesting, as there are dark patches in our rug. Nice to know these things were thoroughly tested before being made available. They need to do a lot of upgrades to the programming. They need to make assigning rooms more intuitive and easier, make the thing find its way home without taking a detour, and make sure it does not tell its owner that it has mapped the house when there are four rooms it has yet to find. Very disappointing.
I have hit most of the problems discussed by previous comments. Few important ones in my perspective.
- Trouble returning to the charging base, it just keeps circling until the battery is down completely.
- Even after strong suction cleaning, visibly see lot of dog hairs left out on the carpet. This is the main purpose of vacuum.
- Very bad cheapo brush, lot of hairs gets tangled in it. Cleaning it is a mess.
- Battery goes down pretty quickly.
- Too noisy
It needs lot of baby sitting to clean the carpet floor, I am thinking this is not good use of my time and I expected a better system based on my experience with their Wyze cam. I have roomba in my first floor and here is a huge difference between the two, even though it does not have LIDAR based scan, I am not wasting time baby sitting roomba. Wyze’s brush system and cleaning is too inferior when compared to roomba’s.
I am not sure what to do with the system and some of it cannot be fixed by software updates.
1 Like
Nice summary! I know other robot vacs have different brush replacement styles, even plenty non-OEM options. Hopefully the Wyze vac will have the same too… because I agree that the bristles are really flimsy.
Pretty spot on with most of the issues. The fact that my Vacuum thinks it is somehow outside of my house according to it’s own map is a bit puzzling. This makes it take random zigzag vacuuming paths as it struggles to find itself.
The base design is probably the worst problem with the vacuum due to it’s inability to make solid contact with the charging contacts on the vacuum. The vacuum’s contacts will often slip under the base station connection with many failed attempts to reconnect itself. Many people will place the charging station on the carpet, and it does not compensate for the natural ‘dip’ where the carpet is fastened down to the floor against the baseboard. Most docking failures for me occur due to this, and I have to manually dock the vacuum. This ALONE is a deal breaker, because everyone will not have a non-carpeted area to place the charging station on. It may be less of an issue if you have thinner carpet.
The first step should be to make an adapter for the charging station that serves as a ‘foot’ to help stabilize the lightweight charging station. The lack of docking means no battery charges, no charge means no vacuuming, no vacuuming means deal breaker. The second step is fix the ‘lost in my own map’ because it too will make the vacuum unable to find the charging station since it is ‘lost’. It also makes it behave as a non-lidar based random vacuum. I assume this can be fixed via firmware/software since it was a behavior not previously experienced.
1 Like
Nailed it! I won’t run the vacuum if I have to dock it manually (I mean, what’s the point)? Hopefully this can be a firmware fix, but you made good points on the dock design flaws itself.
1 Like
I hope that Wyze is following and responds to everyone’s concerns.
I hope so too. I wanted to buy one or two more vacuums to cover each floor of my home. But, in it’s current state I can’t do that. Especially since they are $250 instead of $200 I paid, and the main problem is one that disables the device.
Nothing is worse than wondering why your vacuum isn’t running your schedule just to find it has slipped the charging contacts and it is dead. A base modification is the only way forward that I can see. It needs a weighted adapter. Hell, I’d even buy it if it worked, because my dock rate is like 30% or less without intervention, and that’s with a book of post-it notes behind it to help stabilize it. Otherwise, the vacuum just lifts the dock slightly up & back trying to charge, just enough so it can’t make contact. It will slip it’s contacts until the battery runs out.
Similar concerns over the app being Consumer Ready. App will not recognize some interior walls as walls, making some areas totally undividable. Frustrating and unacceptable.
The more I use it, the more frustrated I get. I ask it to clean the kitchen, which is six feet from the docking station, and it goes the wrong way. It circles the couch and goes back to the docking station (or tries). I ask it to clean the living room, and it does the perimeter and goes back to the docking station (or tries). If I just tell it to clean, it does a decent job wherever it decides to go. I think WYZE had expanded too quickly and sacrificed its quality. WYZE did respond, but it was generic and not at all helpful.
I just ran into an issue yesterday where the vacuum was doing circles trying to find its way back to the dock. I looked at the app and it had the rooms and dock mapped perfectly and the vacuum knew where it was on the map. I don’t understand how it could struggle on that simple task.
Seeing how often beta firmware is released for my cameras, I hoped the vacuum would be receiving updates more often as it learned. But it hasn’t been updated since Jan. 18. 