This provided more run time than the Dyson V12 delivered in our tests, at seven minutes and 45 seconds. The Shark Stratos Cordless was the first cordless vacuum to score a perfect 100 in our Carpet Deep Clean Test. While you have the choice between new and used products on eBay, you can also shop Certified Refurbished items. That means you get the same performance as someone who bought new, often at a significant savings. We also regularly monitor Certified Refurbished sellers to ensure they’re meeting our stringent quality control metrics. Shark has a diverse lineup of vacuums, and their naming convention can sometimes be confusing.
They’ll need at least 24 hours to air dry completely, but you can re-install them afterward. You’ll know the filters are due for a cleaning when the airflow or suction decreases. All that said, read your Shark vacuum’s user manual beforehand to make irobot vacuum cleaner sure your particular model has a rinsable filter, and to ensure there aren’t further guidelines. An extension hose also provides almost 11 feet of reach and makes it easy to clean drapes, stairs, or cobwebs without lugging the entire unit with you.
So far, we’ve tested over 30 Shark vacuums in The Lab and at home, evaluating them on their setup, maneuverability, noise level, effectiveness, and emptying process. There’s nothing worse than having to stop vacuuming to detangle its rollers. Many products today are built with tangle-free designs that make this a thing of the past — and they tend to work well with pet hair.
The Shark Stratos is a new line of vacuum cleaners from one of the best cordless vacuum cleaner brands there is. We reviewed the cordless model, but the new tech is also available as a corded and upright vacuum cleaner. The Tineco Pure One S11 was our previous top pick, and we still think it’s a decent stick vacuum. We also tested the new Tineco Pure One S15 Pet and the Tineco Pure One Air, its lighter, less powerful cousin, but both models allowed heavier debris to drop back out when we shut them off.
And even the fanciest models get tangled or trapped, and miss piles of dirt. The vacuum cleaner performed better at sucking up fine dust, but when we tried to pick up large debris it did take a few sweeps back and forth to scoop up all of the mess. The Shark WandVac is loud in use and the runtime is around a quarter of that offered by rival cordless cleaners.
While some can technically be used on area rugs, none of the models I tested impressed me with their rug-cleaning abilities. Most mop vacs are meant for cleaning hard surfaces and they’re safe and effective on sealed hardwood, vinyl, laminate, and tile floors. The Floor One S7 Pro has more advanced smart features than the S5 Combo too, and getting started is easy. When you power it on after charging for the first time, you’ll get a guided video tutorial on the 3.6” LED screen (which also indicates cleaning mode, battery level, and maintenance alerts). Once the clean water tank has fresh water and solution, you can begin the floor cleaning—and you barely have to push the thing since the motor is self-propelled.
It enables two of the vacuum’s convenience features, cleaning under furniture and storage. The patented DuoClean technology allows the Stratos Cordless to achieve a high seal on hard flooring surfaces. That seal translates into the ability to extract dirt that is deep in crevices while also excelling at picking up fine dust and debris on the surface of tile, wood, laminate, and other hard floors. The Shark Stratos also makes short work of vacuuming up larger debris on hard flooring and carpets too.
It’s not built to tackle large spaces, but for clearing pet fur from crevices around baseboards and other furniture, the Furbuster is hard to beat. Featuring both a motorized pet brush and built-in crevice tool, it’s the perfect way to get debris out of small spaces. Like all products on this list, it uses an anti-tangle roller design to eliminate clogs from pet hair and pet toys. Black + Decker also ensured the unit was easy to clean, with a washable filter and pre-filter. Paying more for a vacuum can get you a much longer-lasting machine (if we’re talking Miele or SEBO vacuums) or it can get you more convenience and longer battery life (if we’re talking Dyson cordless sticks). In the cases of Miele and SEBO vacs and Dyson cordless sticks, you’re going to get excellent cleaning performance.
Over months of use, we found that it easily and thoroughly cleaned up hair and cat food from carpet (although it’s not as helpful on hardwood). We were also impressed with the vacuum’s large dustbin—at 2.8 quarts, it’s the largest on this list. This vacuum can take a bit of time to warm up—when we tested it out, we found that it worked significantly better on the second run than the first—but once it’s going strong, you won’t be disappointed. It picks up both hair and food efficiently, and features an anti-allergen seal and HEPA filtration to keep the air fresh as you go.
On the other, bags can help a vacuum last longer by keeping debris out of hard-to-clean parts that will clog the machine and the motor over time. Air quality experts tend to advise that bags are better for people with allergies or asthma because they’re easier to throw out without spilling debris or kicking up a plume of dust. Bags will, however, need to be replaced several times a year, and if you have pets, they’ll tend to fill up faster, and the costs can add up.