Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop assessment: high-tech cleansing is right here
Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop two-minute assessment
Launched to nice acclaim at Europe’s largest tech present, IFA (the place it snagged two awards), the Narwal Freo Z Extremely is a successor to the model’s Freo X Extremely. Important upgrades embrace twin RGB cameras, LiDAR navigation, and a rise in suction energy from 8,200 to 12,000Pa. In layman’s phrases, it’s higher at impediment avoidance and adaptive cleansing, plus it sucks up extra dust!
In my checks, I discovered the Z Extremely excelled at each mopping and vacuuming on onerous flooring (of which I’ve many) but it surely was much less cool on carpet. To be honest, I’ve examined a number of the very greatest robotic vacuums and am but to seek out one that may deal with dusty carpets in addition to the perfect guide vacuums for carpet, which all the time have extra energy and higher filters.
I liked all of the sensible automation, which meant I didn’t need to zone off carpets to cease them getting soggy or fear about what energy degree or velocity to set. As a germophobe I additionally actually appreciated how hygienic this robotic is; cleansing and drying itself after each session.
Its mapping powers had been additionally nice, however I might have favored a fast possibility for spot cleans. Many robots help you mark a zone on the map the place there’s a spill and ship the robotic straight there to wash. The one method I might work out to do that was in video mode, the place you may manually navigate the vacuum. The difficulty right here was the video was glitchy about connecting and sometimes flatly refused – not excellent if in case you have spilt one thing that might stain and desires speedy consideration.
I additionally had a number of bin-related points, and mopping was lethal s-l-o-w, however completely definitely worth the wait. Best for giant houses with principally onerous surfaces, the Narwal Freo Z Extremely fits tech-savvy householders who respect an built-in app and might get their head round fine-tuning settings. Technophobes and the impatient (and anybody on a finances) would possibly choose to steer clear.
Learn on for my full Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop assessment.
Narwal Freo Z Extremely assessment: value & availability
- Record value: $1499.99 / AU$2,499
- Launch date: October 2024
- Availability: US / AU
The Narwal Freo Z Extremely launched in October 2024 and at time of writing is available for purchase within the US and Australia, with a listing value of $1,499.99 or AU$2,499. That locations it firmly within the premium value bracket. There’s no getting away from it, the Narwal Freo Z Extremely is an expensive robotic vacuum sitting on the very high of the market in each Australia and North America. It can save you a number of {dollars} by ready for seasonal gross sales (the Black Friday offers usually embrace some huge robovac price-drops).
There are two equipment pack choices. Possibility 1 will set you again an additional $259.99, and prices of a complete raft of brushes, detergents, mud baggage and mop pads. Possibility 2 will get you a number of of the most-used equipment, for $100. You too can add a one-year prolonged guarantee plan for $79. Shopping for the equipment individually will quickly add up – a substitute detergent is $29.99 – so it’s price doing the maths earlier than you determine which possibility to begin with.
Whereas the Narwal Freo Z Extremely is an funding equipment, it’s going to prevent a LOT of time and it’s by far the perfect mopping robotic I’ve examined. I wouldn’t purchase it purely for vacuuming, however as a combo, it may be definitely worth the spends.
- Worth for cash rating: 3.5 out of 5
Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop specs
| Max suction: | 12,000 Pa |
| Robotic dimension: | 14 x 13.8″ / 35.5 x 35cm |
| Robotic peak: | 4.3″ / 11cm |
| Dock dimensions: | 17 x 18.2 x 15.2″ / 43.1 x 46.2 x 38.8cm |
| Mud bin quantity (onboard): | 0.3L |
| Mud bin quantity (base): | 2.5L |
| Water tank quantity (base): | 4.5L (clear) / 4.1L (soiled) |
| Base kind: | Cost, empty mud, empty and refill water, scorching air drying, mop pad cleansing, base station auto-clean, detergent allotting, electro water sterilization |
Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop assessment: design
- Fashionable robotic with mopping and vacuuming abilities
- Giant mop heads and spinning brushes for getting near edges
- First rate capability water reservoirs
Arriving in an enormous field, I wanted an additional pair of arms to unload the Z Extremely and was grateful for the hand grips within the base station when positioning the heavy unit subsequent to an influence level. It comes with a easy instruction card for first-time setup, in addition to a extra complete consumer guide. I used the previous to put in the aspect brushes, insert the detergent and add clear water. My daughter acquired quite a lot of satisfaction from eradicating a gazillion educational stickers from each the bottom station and vacuum unit.
The design of the Freo Z Extremely, and base station, may be very fashionable certainly, which is simply as properly on condition that it’s onerous to cover! Select from Galaxy White or Area Grey. All the perimeters are softly curved and, with its two digicam ‘eyes’ within the entrance, has the lovable vibes of Pixar’s Wall-E, which is strictly how I like my robotic vacuums. The varied lids and covers pop off with out breaking any fingernails, and all the pieces is straightforward to entry.
Beneath, this robotic has two giant microfibre fashion mops that Velcro on, in addition to two rotating aspect brushes which can be a superb size for moving into corners. The principle curler brush has a rubber flipper half in addition to brushes to swimsuit each onerous flooring and carpets, plus its anti-hair tangle design does really work. As I’ve two daughters and two spaniels who appear to molt year-round, I used to be delighted to swerve the odious job of reducing swathes of hair from round a curler. (Efficient anti-hair wrap brushrolls are a key characteristic amongst the perfect robotic vacuums for pet hair.)
One uncommon characteristic I’ve not seen anyplace else is a fluffy baseboard duster that attaches with Velcro on one aspect and is designed to assemble mud from the tops of your skirting boards because it goes alongside the perimeters of the room
The Narwal Freo Z Extremely’s base station has two giant containers for clear and soiled water. These are are straightforward to elevate out and in, however you will need to make certain the soiled water reservoir’s lid is correctly clipped on, or you could have to wash up a mini flood.
There’s additionally a mud assortment bag and compartment into which to fit the bottle of flooring cleansing answer that’s equipped. The bot does work with out the detergent module in place, which is helpful given they price almost $30 a pop. There’s a cool little window strip within the base that reveals the water being ionized. It’s not clear why the water must be ionized however should you like watching effervescent water, take a peek.
Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop assessment: efficiency
- Superb at impediment avoiding and navigation
- Nice at mopping, poor on carpet
- Self-cleaning is nice, however self-emptying hit or miss
The primary job any robotic vacuum has to finish is a map of the home, which this little magnificence did in 17 minutes – spectacular given we’ve got fairly a number of little rooms, and plenty of obstacles. (Here is extra on tips on how to put together your own home for a robotic vacuum, should you’re uncertain.)
The mapping was exact and correct. I favored how the map reveals the place the rugs and carpets are; usually it’s a must to add your personal, which requires some guesswork on exact positioning. I’ll talk about the App in additional depth later, but it surely was straightforward to call every room and arrange no-go zones and divide rooms. One other bonus of the Freo Z Extremely is the flexibility to select from a large menu that covers mop, vacuum, mop & vacuum, and mop then vacuum. Some fashions I’ve examined don’t help you simply mop.
As soon as I’d acquired to grip with the controls, I loaded up the water tank and tasked the Freo Z Extremely to hoover and mop my whole floor flooring, which is usually engineered wooden, with some terracotta, porcelain, luxurious vinyl and naturally rugs and carpet. Fairly various then.
Whereas it was doable to set my very own cleansing parameters, the Freo Z Extremely has an AI mode that makes use of varied sensors and cameras to routinely adapt to completely different flooring sorts and dust ranges. This takes the brainwork out of organising and ended up being my go-to mode all through my three-week trial interval.
The very first thing I observed was how good the Freo Z Extremely was at impediment avoidance – no banging into furnishings or corners and no dragging cables or canine toys across the flooring with it. (TechRadar’s article on how robotic vacuums navigate walks via the everyday approaches manufacturers use.) I by no means as soon as acquired a message to say the curler brush was caught, which is the standard warning {that a} robotic has eaten one thing it shouldn’t! It was additionally wonderful at powering over thresholds and the annoying chair legs I’ve that robotic vacuums often get grounded on, and spin like mad till sending a caught error message.
The second factor I observed was the way it doesn’t get terribly near the perimeters in mopping mode. When vacuuming, I might see the little spidery aspect brushes pulling canine hair and dander in from the sting however in mop mode there was a transparent inch or extra of bone-dry flooring across the perimeter of the room and any floor-level furnishings like our kitchen models and sideboard.
And with reference to edges, I’m sorry however the little fluffy baseboard duster on the aspect of the robotic is simply going to work if in case you have tremendous low baseboards. Like many heritage properties, the baseboards in our Victorian dwelling are fairly excessive so it doesn’t attain the tops, aka the one bits that want dusting.
The Freo Z Extremely doesn’t carry any water onboard, which is uncommon. As an alternative, it masses its mops up with heat, soapy water on the base station earlier than heading out to wash. I used to be involved this is able to end in dry patches of flooring, however the dampness ranges had been good – not too moist (vital on actual timber flooring), nor too dry.
The one draw back is it has to make repeat returns to load up with extra water, which may elongate the cleansing time, particularly in rooms which can be furthest from the bottom. For instance, it took 1hr 19mins to mop our utility and hallway, which is an space of simply 40 sq m. To hoover and mop the entire floor flooring, 68.3sq m, the Freo Z Extremely took a tedious 2h 41mins. Think about how lengthy it might take if I requested it to hoover after which mop, slightly than do it consecutively. I didn’t need to discover out! I’ve by no means examined a robotic that spends longer than two hours on the job.
When the robotic returns to base after mopping and vacuuming, it routinely empties the bin and cleans its mop heads after which dries them. The latter takes a few hours but it surely’s extremely quiet, so that you gained’t discover it. I did need to set the bin emptying to each run on the app, in any other case it clogged up and couldn’t self-empty itself. Hardly shocking given how microscopic the onboard bin is. Even then, there have been a number of instances the bin simply wasn’t self-emptying, regardless that it mentioned it was, which was irritating.
There are a handful of additional options – maybe probably the most fascinating one being that in Video mode you may see via your robotic’s ‘eyes’ and distant management it round your own home. Meaning you need to use it as a safety bot, or to check out pets and ship it off to particular areas. This mode is not approved by default, you will must manually change it on if you wish to use it.
Cleansing checks
When it got here to working our commonplace vacuuming checks – one utilizing a wonderful mixture of biscuit and flour, and one other utilizing oats to signify bigger particles – the outcomes had been a combined bag. The Freo Z Extremely did properly on the onerous flooring, finally anyway. It took at the least three passes and full energy mode to get all the pieces up.
I used a number of ‘no-go’ zones on the map to create my 1m x 1m check space, however the robotic nonetheless appeared to spend far longer cleansing across the space I had made my check spills than it did really coping with the mess. This led me to significantly query Narwal’s claims that it houses in on and targets dust utilizing its beady little cameras and sensors.
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With oats on carpet, the outcomes had been middling. The robotic pushed issues round a good bit and it took three runs earlier than they had been gone. The canine might have helped!
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On carpet, the wonderful combine removing was very disappointing. I gave up after three makes an attempt and acquired my cordless vacuum out. Though this is not nice information, I might argue that it isn’t usually you will expertise this degree of concentrated ‘mud’ and I used to be all the time proud of its carpet cleansing outcomes typically.
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Subsequent, I attempted out the mop perform by ‘spilling’ first Ribena juice after which ketchup, which I left to dry, on the porcelain tiles in our cloakroom (I didn’t need to danger stains on our timber flooring). These outcomes had been a lot better, though the dried-on ketchup required two passes to finish the job. In response to Narwal, this spectacular mopping is achieved through twin rotating mop heads that press down with 1.2kg of power and spin at 180 RPM. Different robotic mops I’ve used both simply drag a static mop pad alongside, or have a vibrating mop, this spinning tech is the closest I’ve come to mimicking actual mop work. And the outcomes present it.
Apparently, this robotic additionally analyses the waste water to determine if one other cleansing run is required however I needed to make that call myself with the ketchup; the Freo Z Extremely thought it was achieved after one try.
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To test navigational abilities, our ultimate check includes putting a sock (in an identical shade to the flooring) a shoe and a charger cable on the ground. The Freo Z Extremely completely nailed this check, not touching any of the objects however getting shut sufficient to wash sufficiently round them.
The Freo Z Extremely takes round 2.5 hours to cost, which is a bit speedier than regular, and has a run time of simply over 2 hours 15mins (in vacuum and mop mode), which is about the usual for a high-end robotic. It routinely returns to the bottom to cost if it runs low on juice throughout a cleansing cycle, which can be the norm. If I used to be asking it to do the entire home, it by no means managed on a single cost however I often sort out the dirtiest rooms (kitchen and hallway) extra steadily and that was simply achieved with out the necessity to cease to recharge.
Noise-wise, I’m fairly noise illiberal and as I do business from home, I don’t like having noisy robots rattling round the home whereas I’m making an attempt to focus. Fortunately, I discovered the Freo Z Extremely one of many quietest robots I’ve examined, particularly in mopping mode, with my decibel meter App recording between 60-70dB max. That is method under the noise ranges you’ll get from a daily vacuum, but when they nonetheless trouble you, simply schedule the robotic to work when you’re out of the home.
Upkeep
I discovered the Freo Z Extremely straightforward to wash and keep, the interior bin pops out for emptying, if it hasn’t emptied routinely into the bottom station, and the mop heads are routinely washed with scorching water and dried after each use. That is vital to forestall micro organism breeding within the mop heads and earlier than being dragged throughout your own home. All this self-cleaning did imply it rattled via the clear water within the tank and I needed to refill it earlier than most cleansing runs, however that’s a small value to pay I’d argue.
Like all robotic vacuums, it’s vital to maintain the sensors and charging contacts clear, which is a simple wipe-over job. The curler brush didn’t clog within the three-week check interval, but when that they had, they do clip out very simply. I additionally didn’t fill the mud bag within the base station but it surely simply clips out and pops straight within the bin when full.
Narwal recommends cleansing the filter as soon as every week, which includes clipping it out from below the highest cowl on the robotic and tapping out the mud – easy. It ought to be changed each three-six months.
- Efficiency rating: 3.5 out of 5
Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop assessment: app
- Very straightforward to work out with out help
- Numerous choices to customise cleansing (or not)
- Mildly glitchy connection
The Narwal Freo Z Extremely app is user-friendly and intuitive (I by no means wanted to make use of the Assist Middle), making it straightforward to create customized cleansing schedules, regulate settings, and monitor cleansing progress in Actual Life. Be sure you join utilizing a 2.5GHz wi-fi hyperlink, not 5GHz.
When you love a simple life (as I do), you may clear in Freo Thoughts mode, which leaves all the selections about energy ranges, patterns and passes to the robotic. When you’re a management freak, every cleansing program comes with varied adjustment choices, reminiscent of mopping humidity, protection precision, detergent use and many others.
You may select which rooms to wash, however I additionally favored that I might set the cleansing sequence for a full dwelling clear. For instance, I set it to begin within the kitchen, then hallway, then eating room (the place my desk is), in order that it will get these rooms I spend most time in achieved first (whereas I’m taking the children to highschool). You too can cut up rooms, merge rooms and add no-go zones.
The app additionally supplies cleansing historical past and notifications to make sure you keep knowledgeable of cleansing progress. I did expertise numerous delays between opening the app and the robotic syncing, however we’re solely speaking seconds. And it usually irritated me that there was no Spot Clear possibility however which will properly include a software program improve.
Do you have to purchase the Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop?
| Attribute | Notes | Rating |
| Worth for cash | Premium bracket, though filled with tech. There are higher all-rounders on this value bracket. | 3.5/5 |
| Design | Combo vacuum and mop with very fully-featured base. Smooth styling will enchantment to fashionable tastes. | 4/5 |
| Efficiency | The mopping is superb however vacuuming abilities are ample at greatest. | 3.5/5 |
| App | Solely the sluggish syncing lets this wonderful easy-to-use and function-filled app down. | 4/5 |
Purchase it if…
Do not buy it if…
How I examined the Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop
I examined the Narwal Freo Z Extremely Robotic Vacuum and Mop for 3 weeks on the bottom flooring of my four-bed historic dwelling. Except for thick-pile carpet, we’ve got all method of flooring sorts from porcelain and terracotta tiles to vinyl and engineered oak. I ran the robotic in varied rooms, in each cleansing mode, day-after-day and tried cleansing in each computerized sensible mode and totally personalized. I additionally set schedules and carried out managed checks the place I had the robotic vacuum flour, crushed biscuits and oats from onerous flooring and rugs, in addition to mop moist and dried on spills from the porcelain tiled flooring.
Learn extra about how we check
First reviewed November 2024
