Roomba i7 Review
The Roomba i7+ is one of iRobot’s top two products in its Roomba line next to the Roomba S9+. But is the i7 worth it without the Clean Base too?
Navigation
The iRobot Roomba i7 uses vSLAM for navigation, meaning it has a small camera that maps out your home. This means that you can name and label rooms and add no-go zones and clean zones (more on that later.) It goes in neat rows across the room, cleans around the edge, and then moves on to the next room. If it runs low on battery while cleaning, it goes back home to charge. It then goes back to where it left off to finish the job.
Cleaning Performance
It cleans really well. All Roombas, unlike every other robot vacuum, have two brushes, which do two things. They dig deeper into carpets and they pick more stuff. The Roomba i7 is really good for carpets because of the brushes. They lift up the carpet and such debris out from under it, allowing for a nice deep clean. They clean carpets really well, and the i7 picks up all the debris in a maximum of two passes. It is also really good on hard floors, picking up everything in its path. In terms of suction, iRobot does not give a lot of information. They say it has “10 times the suction of the Roomba 600 series.”. But given it’s performance, I find that suction power is not a problem.
App Features
This is probably the best thing about the i7. The iRobot app gives lots of features including no-go zones, clean zones, smart home integration, and scheduling. With no-go zones, it will clean where you want it to but avoid that box you drew. For example, if I wanted it not to get tangled in some cords, I could draw a box around where the cords are on the map. On the other hand, with clean zones, I could draw a box around the dining table. Then I could name that zone “Dining Table”, and I could send it to clean the dining table. The app also lets you connect it with Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa. This means I could say “Hey Google, tell Roomba to clean the dining table”. Then the i7 would clean the dining table and go home, thus making it even more automated. It also lets you schedule it to clean certain rooms at certain times, or when you leave the house.
Conclusion
The Roomba i7 is a great robot vacuum by iRobot is a great buy. It is a high-end vacuum with mapping and has a really great app. I would recommend this vacuum.