Battling bot vacs: iRobot Roomba S9 Plus vs. Neato Botvac D7 Connected

[MUSIC] We got the dirt on the best robot vacuums. IRobot and needle are two of the biggest names in the business. And today we're putting their two top of the line models against each other. The Roomba S9+, the botvac G7. It's a head to head battle. Let's get cleaning. [MUSIC] [MUSIC] First up, a limbo contest. yes, I'm serious. We do lots of scientific tests on robot vacuums in our cool new custom lab. But sometimes you want a vacuum to fit under an ever lowering bar. Drinking a frozen mai tai during the test is option. Well, this is an anecdotal test that we do for fun. It also answers an important question when picking out a robot vacuum you want to know if it will fit under your furniture. This contest will show which back is better at doing just that. The measurements aren't exact but roughly 3.5 inches the Roomba made it under the bar and the Neato didn't. Could we have just used the tape measure? Sure, but Shut up. Okay, okay, let's talk about how good they are actually cleaning both our premium models, the D seven is $830, which is quite a bit Since you cannot find budget models for around 200 but the S nine plus is a whopping $1,100 on its own, or 1300 dollars with this fancy base station for that much money. You could buy a nice TV or a couple of game consoles or several smart speakers or a single monitor stand from Apple. So yeah It's a lot but the fancy base station cleaned out the dustbin for you so you have to maintain it less often. It moves the dirt from the bin to this bag while charges. You do eventually have to change the bag but probably only once a month depending on how much dirt you shed. All in all it holds around three bins of dust. Still, the feature doesn't mean anything if it can't clean your place. Fortunately both models are pretty good at that. We spread sand rice and pet hair over hardwood, low pile and mid pile carpet. We run the DAX and measure the weight of everything to see how much they pick up. Both models actually did great at all of the cleaning tests. It turns out if you pay more money for a robot vacuum, you get more cleaning power. Who knows? But who cares that they're both good. The real question is Which one's better? Both did so well on rice that we're calling it a time. But even mid range models nail that test on sand, we start to see some separation. The SI plus did particularly well on mid pile and hardware, the D seven was great at low pile and hardwood, so the better one for you as far as fine particles will depend on your carpet. We did lab tests on pet hair too. But first let's bring in an expert consultant to advise us on this issue. Pepper, Pepper stay, Pepper seat, Pepper, the dog everyone. Our expert. Yeah, Hi, we'll be as scientific as we can with this anecdotal test. We've got the same two rugs here. We're brushing peppers Western side for this one and Eastern pepper for this rug after a coin flip to determine which VAT gets which we turn them loose. [MUSIC] Thanks to our expert consultant, we know that both vacs make cleaning up pet hair and cleaning up after Pepper a little bit easier. Even at pet hair, they are both better than most robot vacuums. In the lab, Neato left some strands on both types of carpet. And the Roomba aced the test on all surfaces. So the battle for best cleaner was a back and forth contest of highly competent contenders. But Roomba edges out of victory with a great pet hair performance. Next up navigation. Yeah, you want your robot Butler to be good at grabbing dirt but its ability to fully cover your floors is just as important so it doesn't miss spots. Again both of these models are quite good at these tasks. We're able to take a look at their coverage pattern thanks to our test lab. Budget vacs basically just bump around until they hit something. This rumba uses an optical sensor To look for landmarks on the ceiling, and gauge the distance between walls. It vacuums with much more of a plan. The D7 goes one step further than that, it navigates using lasers. One, yes, we're gonna give it cool points just cuz lasers, lasers are neat. The lasers help it figure out the distance between objects, and the size of. Obstacles. As result it can maneuver around furniture neatly while vacuuming with a plan. The [UNKNOWN] plus comes close, but the neato seven cards, the better path and has freaking lasers. So let's talk speed. The guests are coming over and you wanna get the floor clean. Do you need to get the broom out yourself like a chump Or will your super fancy robot butler be able to handle the task for you in a reasonable amount of time. Fortunately those advance navigation systems help here. Ordinary robot vacuums can take over an hour to clean a small room because they're just bumping about and making it up as they go. These guys have a plan, and cleaned out test rooms efficiently. The robot took an average of 25 minutes, the D7 took 21. That's pretty good. But if you have a bigger floor you might still need to help a robot out, If they run on a battery made task, they can remember the spot where they left off And return right there after swing by the base station on their own, for a charge. That's pretty cool. It just might not help if your in laws are already on the way, and you need to convince them that you're not a slop. But side by side, the D7 wins here too. And we get the credit this victory to those lasers too. As the better navigation helps it work more quickly. We can turn our attention to apps smart remote controls It's the final category of this battle and we're rapping in all extras Lightning Run style both work with Amazon and Google. So you can start either one with a voice command to your smart speaker of choice that's a tie. The Roomba s nine plus cleans itself and empties its own dirt bin. Yes that's extra. But it's still cool point to Roomba. Both met flaws as they clean and let you schedule times to clean certain rooms. But the neato D draws these nifty no go lines. To start the vacuum from traipsing over your courts. The Roomba s9 plus lacks that ability though it does let you label your full plan with names like kitchen, living room, etc. Still, when you break it all down the D7 app controls are more practically useful point to needle. The Roomba can talk to other iRobot devices like this mop, called the Braava Jet M6. After the S9 plus is done vacuuming It can send them up into action to spray down the floor. That's awesome. But you need to pay 500 bucks for an extra machine so the room it does more if you're willing to pay, but in features especially on taking value into account and giving the victory in the extras category to need them. All right, let's recap. The S9 plus edged out the D7 as far as cleaning power is concerned. But the D7 was faster, and navigated more efficiently, and did just as well as Extras for less. So the Roomba s9+ is great. If money is no object, it's the best choice for you. But in terms of value, it's not enough of an improvement over the already expensive Neato Botvac D7. To justify the premium. Neato wins the battle and the [UNKNOWN] D7 is the high end robot vacuum champion. [MUSIC] [BLANK_AUDIO]