By Liam McCabe
Power cords got you wound up? We’ve spent more than 100 hours over the past few years looking into 73 different cordless vacuums, and after testing more than a dozen of them, we’re sure the Dyson V6 is the best choice. No cordless vacuum from any other brand matches the cleaning performance of the V6; in our tests, it picked up more ground-in dust and hair from our carpets than any competitor and cleaned up bare floors in fewer passes.
Who should get this
The best cordless vacuums now have enough cleaning power to match good plug-in vacuums, and enough battery life to clean small to midsize homes (roughly 1,200 square feet) in a single pass. Obviously, the best part about owning a cordless vacuum is that you have no cable to unwrap and rewrap during every cleaning session or catch on corners and doorways. So if you have ever skipped vacuuming because you’re feeling too lazy to unwrap the cord (guilty as charged), or your cramped floor plan makes cord-wrangling feel like a major chore, a cordless vacuum can be a life-changer.
But cordless vacuums have some disadvantages. Cordless vacuums always cost much more than plug-ins with comparable cleaning performance and can’t consistently match the cleaning performance of the very best plug-ins on thicker carpets. They also have shorter warranty periods and limited run times. See our full guide for more on the pros and cons of cordless vacuums. And if you need more help choosing the right vacuum for your home, we have a quick guide for that.
How we picked and tested
For our main pick, we looked for a cordless vacuum that cleans as well as a good plug-in. That means it should suck up noticeable debris from bare floors and short- or medium-pile carpets in a couple of passes, as well as some of the less-noticeable fine dust and hair that accumulates deeper in carpets over time. We stuck to models that met the following criteria: an 18-volt battery or greater, a lithium or lithium-ion battery, at least 15 minutes of run time, strong customer ratings, and a two-in-one design or a hose with attachments.
After winnowing down the possibilities based on specs, we decided to call in four vacuums for testing, ranging in price from $ 180 to $ 300: the Dyson V6 (base model), the Hoover Air Cordless Lift, the Hoover Cruise and the Black Decker Smartech HSVJ520JMB.
Some cheaper picks lack features but work fine to tidy up smaller spaces. So we called in a few budget-friendly models for testing as well: the Hoover Linx, the Hoover Air Cordless 2-in-1, and the Anker HomeVac Duo. We also called in the Dyson V8 Absolute, an upgrade vacuum with extra battery life.
We tested at home, using an evolving procedure to measure cleaning performance, handling, and ease of maintenance. Cleaning trials included cat litter, baby powder, cat hair, steel-cut oatmeal, and lentils, sucked up from wood floors, laminate floors, tile floors, low-pile area rugs, low-pile knit carpets, and medium-pile rugs. We tested open-floor pickup, as well as side suction from corners and baseboards. And we tried to measure the strength of a vacuum’s airflow by seeing how much debris it can clean up without actually driving over it. We also double-checked battery life and tested vacuums for maneuverability using a timed slalom course.
Our pick
Dyson makes a handful of V6 variants that some people might want to consider depending on their flooring, but after looking at all the configurations we think the base model is the right choice for most people because it works well on almost any surface and (most days) costs less than the others. For more on why we like the Dyson V6, see our full guide.
A tried-and-true choice for modest messes
The Linx is a competent floor cleaner, a little bit more capable than others at its price. It can pick up visible debris from bare floors and debris sitting on the top layer of short rugs and carpets. The side brushes flick particles away from baseboards pretty reliably. The Linx is not strong enough to suck up much of the fine dust in your carpets—nothing at this price is. But if you’re mostly cleaning bare floors and area rugs (which you can pick up and shake out by hand from time to time), using the Linx is a fine way to keep your floors tidy. If you’ve only ever used a cheap vacuum anyhow, the Linx will seem normal.
A budget model with a longer battery life
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