X

Moneual bows a new multitasking robot floor cleaner at CES (first take)

The new Moneual Rydis H68 Pro vacuums like a traditional robot vac, but it also has both dry and wet mopping attachments.

Katie Pilkington Associate Editor / Reviews - Appliances
Katie is a writer, a humor blogger, a Vietnam War historian, and an avid cook. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing and is hard at work on her first novel. When she's not writing about tech, she's reading about armored cavalry units in Vietnam, or teaching her labradoodle, Lola, to overcome her lack of opposable thumbs.
See full bio
Katie Pilkington
2 min read

With a sticker price of $499, the Moneual Rydis H68 Pro sits within the middle of the price spectrum in terms of robot vacuum cleaners, especially compared with the $799 LG Hom-Bot Square, the $699 iRobot Roomba 790, or the $449 Neato XV Signature Pro. Versatility, however, might make it a better value.

We’ve written about other Rydis models, like the U60 Pro or the H67 Hybrid. The H68 Pro seems to be Moneual’s attempt to up the ante. Where the H67 was a vacuum and dry mop in one, the H68 combines a dry mop, a wet mop, and vacuum functions.

With some small exceptions, the top side of the H68 looks nearly identical to its predecessor's. The H68’s body is 3.23 inches tall, giving it one of the lowest clearances we're aware of.

What matters most about the H68, however, isn’t what’s up but rather what’s underneath. In addition to the silicone-bladed roller and two rotating, sweeping brushes, the vacuum also features mop pad that covers nearly half of its underside’s surface area. Dry and wet mop pads are removable and interchangeable and you can use the H68 in vacuum, mop, or vacuum and mop modes. The mop pads reside on the back half of the robot vacuum, which is especially good for vacuuming and mopping at the same time as the dry mop pad can collect any fine particulates left behind by the vacuum.

If the dry mop pad is anything like the mop pad on the H67, and it appears to be made of similar if not identical material, it will catch and hold fine dust, sticky messes, or any fine particulates that the vacuum doesn’t collect. The water tank holds just over 6 ounces of water and the vacuum uses a self-dampening mechanism to wet the pad when the wet mop function is active.

Robot vacuums clean in different patterns, ranging from the seemingly random to the visibly linear. The H68 uses what Moneual calls Smart Vision Mapping technology to outline a wall-to-wall path. Its Deep Clean mode will covers the room horizontally and then vertically. For even greater coverage, Double Deep Clean mode repeats the Deep Clean cleaning path twice.

In addition, the H68 boasts Moneual’s ONR technology, which the company refers to as "shadow cleaning." This means that the H68 will detect shaded areas on your floor, such as under or behind furniture, and target them specifically for deep cleaning.

Given that it can perform three tasks, and two of them simultaneously, the H68’s $499 sticker price seems semireasonable. Moneual is unveiling and announcing this new bot at CES and the H68 Pro will be available this spring.