The greatest thing about vacuum cleaners is that you no longer need to push around a bulky upright. Robotic vacuum cleaners have taken the market by storm thanks to the level of convenience it offers to busy/lazy folks.
In the past few years, robot vacuums have evolved from having poor navigation to now being able to empty its own dustbin!
Shark is one of the lesser-known brands of robot cleaners, but their IQ series robots aren’t something to ignore. The amazing Shark IQ R101AE comes with an assortment of advanced features that put many modern brand-name bots to shame. Keep reading to see what we mean by this.
Suction
First of all, suction power is what the R101AE is all about. This IQ robot’s suction can extract small, medium, and large debris from medium-pile carpeting in a single pass.
On smooth floors, hardly anything can get past the R101AE’s awesome suction power. However, this isn’t an invitation to vacuum moist messes like kitty litter or oatmeal.
High-Efficiency Filter
Like most good robots, the Shark IQ RA101AE is fitted with a high-efficiency filter that the tiniest particles. Invisible pollutants like pollen and pet dander get trapped in the fine mesh and have no chance of escape. This is not a True HEPA Filter, so don’t expect up to 99.97% of dust and dust mites to stay in the filter.
At best, at least according to some, this robot has an efficiency rating of at least 95%.
IQ Nav Home Mapping
The new and improved IQ Nav navigation system is better than ever before. Based on Shark’s reports, the RA101AE can deliver up to 50% extra coverage by cleaning your floors row by row and room by room. The robot’s built-in sensors also create a digital layout of your home and track where it’s been to eliminate repeated passes.
Selective Room Cleaning
Using the Shark App on your smartphone, you can access the newly scanned layout of your home to instruct the RA101AE to clean a specific room. This handy feature allows users to focus cleaning tasks on high foot traffic rooms like hallways and living rooms without waiting for the robot to venture there on its own.
Improved Side Brushes
One of the worst things we’ve seen is a robot’s side brushes scatter dust and debris rather than pull them into the suction inlet. This problem is eliminated due to the angle at which the side brushes graze against your floors, as well the slower spin they produce to prevent throwing things aside.
These brushes also do extremely well at edge-cleaning and reaching far into corners, compensating for the robot’s classic disc-style design and its naturally weak corner-cleaning ability.
Self-Cleaning Brush Roll
While we’re on the subject of brushes, let’s not forget to address the main brush: the self-cleaning brush roll located on the belly of the robot.
This brush roll’s improved design prevents long strands of hair – either yours or your pet’s – from becoming tangled in the bristles, thus reducing vacuuming efficiency until the hair is snipped off with scissors.
When dealing with an excessively hairy beast, you can pop the brush roll right out to extract any stubborn strands in an instant.
Auto-Empty Base
The RA101AE’s main attraction is its self-emptying base. The original RA101 is this same model minus the base which vacuums out the contents of the robot’s dustbin. When the bot’s dustbin has reached capacity, it’ll head straight to the charging dock to allow the base to extract whatever’s in the bin before the RA101AE resumes its cleaning job.
Best of all, the self-emptying base has enough space to cover up to 30 days’ worth of dirt and debris. This robot is self-sufficient for up to an entire month!
Related Post: Roomba i6+ vs. Shark IQ
Runtime
The RA101AE comes with a massive rechargeable battery that supplies up to 180 continuous minutes of cleaning per charge (on standard power mode). With 3 hours of cleaning, the robot should be able to cover more than 2,000 square feet of space before the low battery indicator kicks in. When it does, the RA101AE will head back to its charging dock to refuel; after roughly 5 hours of charging, if its previous cycle was uncompleted, it’ll pick up right where it left off.
Pretty Loud
The loudness of the Shark RA101AE is quite odd. Sure, it delivers powerful suction pressure, but it can be quite noisy at times, especially when the rolls become tangled in hair.
However, this can be of some use during nighttime cleaning cycles. The last thing you want is to accidentally step on the robot while it’s vacuum your floors while you wake up for a glass of water.
Our Overall Recommended Robot Vacuums
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