Customer Ratings & Reviews

I recently purchased the new Roomba Plus 505 Combo Robot Vacuum & Mop with the AutoWash Dock, and honestly, I'm loving it! After getting the Roomba 105 with the auto-empty dock for our upstairs a few weeks ago, I knew I wanted something even more powerful for downstairs. We live in the city, have a dog, and often have family over who don't always remember to take their shoes off - so keeping things clean can be challenging. One of the biggest highlights for me is the combination of the LiDAR sensor and the Clearvision AI cameras. This is currently the only model that has both features, and together they make navigation and obstacle avoidance fantastic. The vacuum maps our home accurately and typically moves around effortlessly. Sure, sometimes the pathfinding can get a bit quirky, but overall it's impressive. It’s really nice to see Roomba stepping up their game, catching up to competitors, and rebranding as a more modern and user-friendly company. My only real frustration was during the initial firmware update, which seemed to take forever. The app kept saying the update was "almost complete" with less than a minute left, but I ended up having to force-close and reopen it. After doing that, the vacuum was immediately ready to go, and thankfully, it’s been smooth sailing ever since. The mopping feature was surprisingly good - the back-and-forth scrubbing motion cleans much better than I expected. That said, the dock's water bins do feel a bit cheap for the original price point ($999), though I managed to get it on sale for $599, which helped ease that disappointment. I was also initially skeptical about the single brush roll design, but Roomba definitely stepped up the suction power compared to previous models, and other brands. It picks up dirt and debris without needing multiple passes, performing just as well as other vacuums I've used in this price range. Overall, I'm really happy with this purchase and can't wait to see what new products Roomba brings out next!

A huge step in the right direction for Roomba, this had a new App that brought a lot of new room and mapping changes which were needed, obstical detection and a refreshed user interface. I would have liked an onboard twater tank for the mop pads but, it definitely kept my hardwood floors clean with 2 German Sheppards and chocolate lab Still. If it were $100 cheaper it would be a solid buy but I have more value on customer service and parts arability so it was good for me.

Bentley has proven himself to be the best robot, only labor I have to do is add water and dump the old..my research has paid off!! The customer service at Best Buy was excellent as well!

We love our roomba! Coming from the 600 series this was a major upgrade! The mapping is a game changer! We couldnt be more pleased! We have a dog who sheds A LOT and this keeps the maintenance down from sweeping daily.

Definitely a MUST have! We upgraded our previous Roomba Vacuum to the all in one Roomba 505 Plus! This unit does it all! Strong Vacuum, dual rotating mop heads, self cleans and dries the mop heads and refills itself when it needs more cleaning fluid and continues to clean. My downstairs is all tile and my floors shine every day. Starts on it own at 10am and does its thing.

I love this robot. I have others but it’s my favorite because my house looks more cleaner and without damaging my wooden floor. My house has different floor textures. I’m very happy with it.

First Impressions At a glance, the Roomba Plus 505 Combo Robot appears to be high-class, premium, and well-designed, but once you touch and see it up close, you'll find it was a grand cost-cutting illusion. Yet all plastic, it is all well-made, and I don't worry about the build. The luxurious, textured patterns with a copper-accented logo, juxtaposed against smooth, glossy, and matte finishes, make for a truly pleasing and modern aesthetic that blends seamlessly with any home. The tanks are easy to remove and refill, thanks to sealed clipping lids. Setup is easy and self-directed, but a manual would have been beneficial. What You Get You will find an impressive floor cleaning machine that is intelligent, efficient, and seamlessly integrates into any smart home. A machine that handles floor mopping, sweeping, and vacuuming chores to lighten your load around the house. All carpets remain dry and clean, while all hard floors are washed and vacuumed daily for a fresh feel. Now, clean your floors once a week or every other week, just as you would typically, and this is considered maintenance in between. The box includes the robot, the AutoWash dock, an extra bag for the auto-empty feature, an extra set of mop pads, and the power cord. Everything comes in a neatly packaged box with no space or room for things to wiggle around. Setup Experience 4/5 After you've unpacked and placed everything, head to the App Store and download the Roomba app. You can fill the water tank, connect the magnetic floor mops, and prepare the vacuum for charging. Once it is plugged in and aligned with the charger, you will hear instructions to guide you. Find a space for the base and the robot near an outlet. Create a Roomba account, add your robot, name your robot, update the firmware, and then let it map the area. Very intuitive and straightforward to use. During setup, the app became stuck during the firmware update, and I had to close and reopen it to return to a functional state. Once I reopened the app, everything was easy to figure out and set up. App and Smart Features 4/5 The app is the newest upgrade, improving Roomba's overall experience. They have now addressed part of my issue with them, their OLD app. Roomba can still be seen as lagging in terms of technology and implementation here. Still, they are finally showing up with a respectable app and performance results on multi-surface areas. The app enables control and automation with virtual barriers and no-go zones, keeping things within your limits and helping you stay in control. Link it to your smart home and let this thing shine with voice commands for messes. It breaks rooms into zones and furniture as best it can. Helpful, but can be tedious due to the need for multiple taps to remove them and the inability to change them. Schedule cleaning daily by zones, rooms, or furniture. At night, a small headlight illuminates the front of the vacuum. The AI camera allows it to identify things on the floor that Lidar may miss. It is a bit loud at night on higher suction settings, so you WILL hear when it is mopping as it spins. How Well Does It Map? 4/5 AI Mapping was done quickly compared to other vacuums. It didn't bump into things like a drunk bumblebee bouncing from flower to flower; it was just a quick drive to each corner of the room, and the floor was mapped. It runs very smoothly, and the app is very detailed. It has settings and a path history on the floor. Obstacles are auto-flagged and learned using AI, and you can view them on the map in the cleaning history. Your cleaning history is logged, complete with travel path, start/end times, along with the floor plan and various lines marking the path taken while mopping and vacuuming. Once labeled, it remembers rather than reviews. Remove the obstacle after it is recognized, and watch it still avoid it. If this issue is resolved, it would significantly enhance the robot's efficiency, improve AI capabilities, and conserve battery. The rooms are auto-segmented, and the app attempts to place furniture and equipment to make the floor plan easier to refer to when cleaning. You can clean furniture and equipment like a refrigerator. In my kitchen, it automatically placed a sofa and an entertainment center after a few cleanings based on the appliances recognized on the counter. This includes two rectangular glass panels on the counter, a convection oven, and an air fryer next to it. The sofa, though, is befuddling, which is why I'm curious to see how this thing is trained and what influence, if any, we/the app have on the algorithm. Navigation Issues That Bug Me 3/5 Once it passes and maps an obstacle or object, it assumes it is permanently there. Looking at the cleaning history, I can see that it took some unnecessary paths, as though it was curious. Logically, not smart, but hey, it's AI learning my home. It appeared to be scared and ran from the living room. It would be working in the living room, but all of a sudden go to the kitchen, then return to the living room after it saw what it was looking for? Quite peculiar; I'm curious what it's doing or what it sees in AI, causing it to return to an already completed part of the floor. How It Actually Cleans 4/5 The vacuum has strong suction - they claim it's 70 times more powerful than their 600 series robots, and I can definitely tell the difference. It handles everything from crumbs to pawprints without issue. The mopping works well for daily maintenance, though don't expect it to replace your deep cleaning routine. The mop pads extend coverage by 18% compared to regular ones, and the mop extends from the robot body to touch the wall for edge-to-edge cleaning. SmartScrub mode provides extra attention to tougher spots. This feature is ACTUALLY good and cleans floors extremely well by applying pressure on hardwoods and floors. The AutoWash dock is where this thing shines. It auto-empties for up to 75 days and handles mop pad washing for up to 4 weeks. The dock continuously refreshes the pads and even has heated drying. Way less maintenance than other robots I've used, and for this, I can highly recommend it. I have to empty the dirty water tank every three days because we double-mop the floor after it is vacuumed. Smart Floor Detection 4/5 This is capable of handling all floors and rugs, as well as any combination thereof. With the array of sensors, it knows when it's on a floor and when it's on a carpet. I have a long runner in the kitchen that goes in front of the cabinet by the sink, and it stops mopping when it gets over that part of the floor once it's off the carpet. It then knows it can spin the mops again safely and will continue mopping the floor. When it encounters a corner or something similar, it never gets stuck; it just pushes its way back down flat. I recommend vacuuming first and then mopping to ensure the mops are dry on the carpet, but that is anecdotal, and there were no actual issues. Things to Know (Personal Experience) -Hair is an issue on the roller still, so you will need to take time and clear it out. Other vacuums have added things to remove and cut the hair, but this one does not. -It was very loud during the mapping, sounding like a piece of paper was stuck somewhere. I suspect it's the rubber roller. After a few uses, it became quieter, but it's a fact that when the mops are engaged, the noise level is louder than just vacuuming. -One night, it got stuck and said the cliff sensors needed to be cleaned. It was dead, and I had to charge it. Once it was charged and I restarted it, it worked fine again. The robot sensors were clean, so I'm unsure what happened there, but I must report it nonetheless. -The app needs more "furniture" options. Currently, it mislabels items because the library is too small. Hopefully, more will be added so we can further fine-tune the cleaning ability with voice and app automations. - The dock is pretty big, so make sure you have space! Things that Need Improvement -Should have a manual included in the box. QR is ok, but many users will prefer the manual. -Wetness control or sensors so the robot knows when it's time to spray more, rather than going off sq ft.. cleaned. -Use LIDAR and AI camera to rescan areas for obstacles throughout cleaning. -Sometimes it has curious navigation behavior - returns to already cleaned areas for unclear reasons, does nothing, then returns to cleaning. Bottom Line 4/5 OVERALL This is a solid robot vacuum and mop combo with decent performance that'll handle your daily floor maintenance with minimal fuss, thanks to that AutoWash dock. The suction power is definitely there, and the mop coverage is better than most. There are navigation issues, and the high price holds it back from being great. The navigation quirks can be annoying, hair collects on the roller if you have long-haired residents, and it's louder when mopping. If there are more than 1-2 people with long hair or animals, this will require frequent maintenance at the roller to prevent tangles. I am not sure why they didn't add a mechanism like others. Here's the thing, though - the price is quite steep! I wouldn't recommend this at full price, but it might be worth considering on sale for under $700. At full retail, there are better options available for the money, although this is a good machine. Perfect for busy households with mixed flooring who want to set it and forget it, but wait for a sale. Skip this if you have a lot of pet hair, require quiet operation, or frequently move furniture around during cleaning.

It does a good job at sweeping and mopping. The only downfall super loud.

The iRobot Roomba Plus 505 Combo Robot Vacuum and Mop plus AutoWash Dock is a fantastic home cleaning appliance. This dual purpose device helps to clean up the loose dirt and debris in our home with its automated vacuum cleaner ability, and then can also wet mop the floors to ensure a thorough cleaning around our hard floor surfaces. The AutoWash dock offers a fresh water and dirty residue water bay to help for easy liquid management. This iRobot Roomba Plus 505 will require the usage of the Roomba Home app, as my previous iRobot app wouldn't work to set this new vacuum up. This robot vacuum gives the thorough cleaning I have come to expect from iRobot Roomba products with a strong suction vacuum and a deep scrubbing mopping. This Roomba Plus 505 has a dualclean mop pad system that operates as independent mopping circles and can also extend outward to help get more edges in my home surface. This is an added technique that I haven't seen before and it helps to get more surface area cleaned in my home allowing for a more hygienic area. This also offers SmartScrub which gives you twice the deeper scrubbing ability to clean up tough messes like mud or stains on my hard floor surfaces. This ClearView Pro Lidar works very well in both daylight and lowlight night settings, as it continues to clean and analyze its surrounding area. There is also a new PrecisionVision AI Technology that assesses and analyzes objects and knows when to navigate around the object so your random items left on the floor won't disrupt the cleaning operation of the robot. There is an autowash dock that will allow for 75 days of auto emptying into the housing dock. The mopping pads can be refreshed with a new stretched and fitted mop. There is also a built-in heated pad for drying the pads after a cleaning cycle which is great to prevent moisture/mold and also keeps the mopping pads ready for a future cleaning. Connecting this Roomba Plus 505 is easy, as it can be paired with your smart home hub such as Google, Alexa, or Siri. The more you use this robot vacuum the more information it gathers to continually build a precise layout of your home map so that it knows what to avoid and which areas tend to get more dirty. It's continually adapting to the rooms and becomes more comfortable in the map and rooms as time goes on. Once again iRobot has created a robot vacuum that performs exceptionally well. It looks modern and offers a nice textured finish and colorway. I feel like this dock and robot can look upscale and not be an eyesore, due to its bold and modern design. The new Roomba Home app works well, but I wish the previous app was used so that I don't need 2 different variations of this app for different models of iRobot vacuums. Great vacuum and mop functionality, all within a sleek robot unit that provides a thorough clean.

What a great addition to the home! Honestly, this product just rocks. In a house full of lazy people who never want to sweep or mop, the Roomba comes through! It even goes over small ledges!

The robot cleans perfectly, but if the mops are working. The mops constantly stop working, so I need to reset factory settings. I bought it several weeks ago and have already done it twice. And mops still are not turning on.

After using the iRobot Roomba Combo Plus 505 for about a while now, I feel ready to give my honest, experience-based opinion Unboxing this thing felt a bit like setting up a piece of smart home tech from the future. The vacuum itself has a sleek matte-black finish, and the AutoWash dock is substantial. You’ll need a good amount of floor space for it think small side table size but it doesn’t look out of place in a modern home. Setup was very easy The app guided me step by step process like connecting to Wi-Fi, mapping the house and setting up the first cleaning routine. It did take a while for it to finish the first full map of my home, but once that was done, everything worked smoothly. This Roomba means business. I live with a pet who seems to shed like it’s his job, and this vacuum picks up everything—fur, dust, even random crumbs under the couch. I’ve used older Roombas in the past, and the suction on the Combo 505 is on a completely different level. iRobot says it’s 70x more powerful than their old series i believe it after using this. The edge cleaning is impressive too. It gets surprisingly close to walls and under furniture, which is a huge plus in my pet hair covered life. I’ve used combo robot vac/mops before, and honestly, most of them feel like they just drag a damp cloth around. This one is different. The Dual Scrub mopping system has two rotating pads that actually scrub the floor. You can see it doing real work, especially on dried-up kitchen stains or muddy paw prints.It also knows when it’s on a rug, and lifts the mop pads automatically. This actually works I tested it multiple times, and it never left wet streaks on my area rugs. Let’s talk about the dock. It’s the reason I wanted this model in the first place, and it’s a game changer. It empties the vacuum bin, washes the mop pads, refills the water tank, and even dries the pads with heat so they don’t smell. If you’re like me and hate maintaining your robot vac every other day, this dock makes it almost completely hands off. I basically just top off the clean water once a week and empty the dirty water maybe once every 10 days. That’s it, the dock is loud when it’s doing its cleaning and drying cycles. I schedule it for the middle of the day when I’m out of the house, so it’s not a big deal. But you wouldn’t want it running late at night.The LiDAR navigation is fast and precise. It moves methodically in straight lines, doesn’t miss spots, and rarely bumps into things. The object recognition is actually useful I’ve watched it navigate around socks, cords, and even dog toys without drama.You can label rooms, create no-go zones, and set custom cleaning routines from the app. Want it to vacuum the living room daily but mop the kitchen twice a week u can do it all, Easy Integration with Alexa and Google Assistant is seamless, and I even tested it with Siri Shortcuts it worked great. What I Love • Truly automatic: I barely touch it now. • Excellent mopping: Actually scrubs, not just wipes. • Pet-friendly: Handles fur like a champ. • Smart mapping & object avoidance: I trust it not to get stuck. • Quiet when cleaning: The robot itself is pretty quiet on normal mode. A Few Drawbacks • The dock is big: Be prepared to dedicate some space. • Dock noise: Emptying and drying cycles are pretty loud. • Initial mapping took time: It needed a couple of passes to fully “learn” my home. • Price: It’s a significant investment but in my opinion, worth it for what it offers. If you’re looking for a robot that can truly replace regular vacuuming and mopping, the Roomba Combo Plus 505 is probably the best you can buy right now. It's not just a cleaner it’s more like a cleaning assistant you can actually count on. It doesn’t need babysitting, and it stays clean itself, which is a miracle in the world of robot mops.It’s expensive, yes but if you value your time, have pets, or just want a low-maintenance clean home, I’d say it’s absolutely

I’m absolutely annoyed with this product. We have had it going every single day. Or let me say try to have it going every single day, but it never even gets very far. It seems to not systematically go up and down in one room. It goes wherever it wants to, but it just finally after six days made it to the living room out of the kitchen. It constantly goes back to re-clean itself, but does not come out on its own or it stops in the middle of a room and we have no clue why because we’re not in that room to be able to hear what the problem isfor a $700 machine. It doesn’t seem to work as good as I thought it would if you have anything stuck to the floor it does not come up. The vacuum seems to work OK, but I’m not sure the scrubbing is even doing anything. So far the only place that I can find the solution for the Roomba is on Amazon and I’m still waiting for that to show up a week later so maybe that would help actually clean the floors but I also don’t understand why we have to keep calibrating re-mapping and why it doesn’t set itself going on its own. We have to constantly pick it up and put it back onto its dock and put it in the exact right way for it to actually charge. We had it on the charger overnight the very first night and the next day it still said it needed to be charged. I don’t know if we just got a bad unit, but I’ll try to take it and exchange it and write another review but so far for the price of this machine, I am in no way probably going to keep it.

The Roomba 505 vacuum robot is impressive in its own way. It’s well built and packed with smart technology. This particular model is a vacuum and mop combo. In addition to its suction roller brush, it has two rotating mopping pads and an edge-sweeping brush. The base station houses two water tanks one for clean water and one for dirty water as well as a dust bin and a compartment for storing extra dust bags. Setting it up is simple, especially if you’ve used a Roomba before, the process is practically the same. If you're new to the brand, you’ll need to download the iRobot app and create an account. The app guides you through the initial setup, which only takes a few minutes. Like most robot vacuums, the 505 needs to map your home first. I was surprised at how quickly it completed the mapping process. I’m not sure if it used a previous map from my old Roomba and updated it or just mapped efficiently on its own. Either way, the result was fast and very accurate. It even named some rooms automatically, like the kitchen, living room, and bedrooms. I did need to make a few adjustments, such as splitting the hallway from a room it had grouped together. The app is easy to use and allows you to customize the map, create cleaning schedules, and change settings. In the app, you can also track the robot's cleaning progress and view some of the objects it has detected along the way. When it comes to cleaning performance and navigation, the 505 truly shines. I was impressed with how it enters a room, starts by sweeping and mopping the edges, and then continues with the rest of the space. It gets close enough to pull debris from the edges and even extends the mopping pad outward to reach those areas. The LiDAR technology is very precise, the robot slows down and carefully maneuvers around objects, corners, and baseboards, unlike my previous models that constantly bumped into them and left marks. I was also impressed how it handles hard to reach spots. If it can't mop a spot going forward, the robot will actually go back to that same spot on reverse to reach it with the mopping pad. With a typical mop, we clean using a left-to-right motion. The 505 mimics this pattern by moving back and forth while mopping. It’s pretty cool to watch in action. This motion only happens when using the Smart Clean mode. In regular mode, it simply mops forward, which speeds things up. I even tested its spill detection by pouring some liquid on the floor and to my surprise, it recognized the spill, sucked up the liquid, and returned to mop the area again. The vacuum also identifies rugs and automatically stops the mopping function, lifts the pads, and increases suction power. It cleaned my rug so well that I could see the vacuum lines afterward. Another neat feature is night cleaning: the 505 has a built-in light that turns on in dark areas to help it navigate and makes it easier to spot if you're walking around at night. Despite being an impressive robot, there are a few trade-offs. The charging base is bulky, tall, and quite noisy, especially when it’s washing the mopping pads or emptying the dustbin. It also takes up a noticeable amount of space. When using the Smart Clean mode, the water tank may need frequent refilling depending on the size of your home. For example, cleaning just my kitchen and living room in Smart Clean mode took over two hours and required several returns to the base for water refills, compared to just 28 minutes on a normal cleaning setting with no refills needed. Compared to my other vacuum/mop robot—which cleans the entire house with only two or three returns to the base, the 505 is more water-intensive, but only in Smart Clean mode. Using the regular or light cleaning settings is faster and doesn't require refilling the water tank. On another note, if you use only water on high-gloss white floors like mine, it can leave streaks. To fix this, I added Roomba’s cleaning solution. The instructions recommend using 400ml per tank, which is nearly the entire 413ml bottle. Given how much water this vacuum uses, that could get pricey. Instead, I added just three capfuls to the tank, which was enough to eliminate the streaking issue. Overall, this Roomba 505 is a well designed and highly capable robot that delivers impressive cleaning results. While it does have a few drawbacks like the large charging base and frequent water refills in Smart Clean mode, its performance, especially in navigation and edge cleaning, really sets it apart. It’s smart, efficient, and surprisingly thorough. Best of all, it won’t leave those annoying bumper marks on your baseboard. If you’re willing to work around a few minor inconveniences, this robot can be a great addition to your home cleaning routine. In my opinion, despite the minor setbacks, it’s a 5-star product. In the box you get the 505 robot, docking station, 4 mopping pads, sweeping brush, dust bags, power cord and manual.

The Roomba iRobot 505 Plus is the Roomba I’ve always wanted. It vacs. It mops. It empties its bin and even cleans its own mop pads. And most, most, most most importantly……it does not get itself into a sticky, compromising situation that requires human assistance. I’ve owned a few robot vacuums thus far, and each one has its own pros and cons. But one common theme for all of them has been the occasional mishap, requiring my intervention. They’ve even gotten smart enough to tell me in plain English what the cause of the issue is. So when I heard about this newer model that does everything my older vacs do and then some…..I was outright skeptical. I am no longer skeptical after running the 505 through its paces. The main difference in the 505 is its use of LiDAR, a far superior method of object detection and navigation. This Roomba is smarter because of that, and the result is a high performing robot cleaning machine. Hardware is only half the equation; the software that runs it has to also be just as good. And I was surprised and delighted to see that there is a new Roomba app for the newer models. It's both simplified and effective in practice. The app shows where your 505 is in real-time. No more guessing where it’s been or “did it clean that spot over there” type of thoughts. From the start of its cleaning session, a constant line is drawn on your floor plan, highlighting where your 505 has been, including mop cleanings and charge breaks. There is no question to be asked in regards to where it has been. Along its path, it will mark hazards as hazard cones, and it doesn’t bore you with the details of each hazard. It pretty much tells you, “I saw something here, but go check it yourself. Sorry to convenience you.” Other models may take pictures, which seemed cool at first, but the wow factor wears off quickly. This is the perfect balance of information to come from a Roomba app. Of course, the app also allows for some customizations, such as targeted rooms to clean, designated clean zones for higher traffic areas, and scheduled cleaning. This is all possible with the app’s map customization tool. This allows you to create sections within your floor plan and assign them names so you can tell the 505 why rooms you want cleaned. There’s even a setting to change the cleaning levels for both vacuum and mop. Needless to say, the app is a sure requirement to utilize the 505 to its fullest. So how does it perform and how well does it do it? Having 80% of my home as hard floors, mopping is a must for me. The 505 gives me the default option to vac and mop simultaneously. Vacuum is methodical, with straight line sweeps to maximize battery; mopping also follows a straight line, but incorporates a V-shaped motion with the main line as a pivot. When cleaning the edges of a floor, a pad will extend out and reach those edges. It kind of reminds me of a dog doing the fire hydrant maneuver, if you know what I mean. The mop pads appear to be always moist and stay that way until it goes back to dock for a pad cleaning. It is here where the pads are washed from water in the clean water tank and drained into the dirty water tank. I remember my very first run on my main floor. It did its initial run to map out my home, and it did it in less than 10 minutes. That’s a testament to the effectiveness of LiDAR. Then I let it rip through the night. The next morning, there was a definite feeling of cleanness on my feet. When I saw the dirty tank, I was floored. It was dark and murky water, and I felt so ashamed. With each run thereafter, I noticed the dirty water becoming less and less murky. A daily nighttime run has kept the floors clean. After two weeks, the only thing I had to do was empty the dirty tank and refill the clean tank with water. That is a tiny price to pay for clean floors. And not once, NOT ONCE, did this Roomba ask for help. Some notable things to mention is its self-emptying bag, which will need to be replaced every couple of months, depending on your flooring conditions (hard floor vs carpet). The main vacuum rubber brush and side brush as well as the mop pads will also need replacing at some point. The main rubber brush does catch a lot of hair, so you’ll have to manually remove them. iRobot includes a cutter tool to remove tangled hair on the brush. Also, the water tank is just that: water. A quick check of the website shows that you can add a small mixture of BravaJet solution to the clean water tank, but so far water alone has been effective. One last thing. She is pricey. Very pricey. And with that in mind, the main thought is to see what else is on the market, outside of iRobot’s walls. The market is indeed flooded with robot vacuums and honestly it has been very hard to tell them apart. What’s worse is that these robots undercut iRobot’s MSRP. As a fellow consumer, I cannot comment on the other offerings and can only vouch for the effectiveness of the 505. It has been nothing but wonderful here at home and from a pure product effectiveness’ perspective, I highly recommend it.

The 505 Plus Combo is a revolutionary jump from their prior vac/mop robots. I was using their last flagship model, the j9+, for over a year and while it was awesome at the time, it’s quickly became obsolete when other robot companies came out with rotary style mops and LiDAR paired with AI assisted cameras. Roomba isn’t the first to market with rotary style mops but I’m glad they finally caught on that it’s the superior mopping method for these robots…for now. And finally added LiDAR back! Cameras alone never did the job as good as LiDAR/Camera combo. I was getting fed up with the older j9+ because it lacked LiDAR and the fact that I had to change out the mop after a mopping run. Without LiDAR and only a camera, my old j9+ would periodically get lost and get stuck because of that. LiDAR is important if you want accurate mapping and be able to schedule vac/mops during the night instead of relying on daylight. I love waking up to a freshly mopped kitchen and straight vacuum lines in the living room. Robots that do not have LiDAR must be operated during the day and that can be inconvenient if you’re not consistently away at a certain time for the scheduled program. This 505+ not only has LiDAR, but it’s also equipped with their camera system to identify obstacles that the robot needs to work around. LiDAR alone can’t dodge charging cables, socks, etc. That’s why you want a robot with both LiDAR and a camera system. Pairing with the phone app is easy and the first step is for the robot to map out your home. I highly recommend picking up everything off the floor, including chairs, stools, etc for a first proper mapping run. Chairs can go back after the first mapping run. Mapping only took me 10 or so minutes and took me longer editing the rooms, no-go-zones, etc in the app. I created a routine to vacuum everyday at 3:00am and mop every other day. My main living level is 70% hard floors and the rest is rugs and carpet. This robot is smart enough to know where to mop and where to vacuum. In the new Roomba Home app, you can choose to vac and mop at the same time or vac first, then do a mop run after. The robot itself doesn’t have a wet tank. It wets the mop heads in the home base first, goes out and vacs/mops and comes back to the base to re-wet the mop heads when it deems necessary. This is a departure from what I’m used to with their prior models. I don’t notice any mopping wetness issues without having an onboard tank. I do use a robot specific mopping solution but according to Roomba, you can use straight tap water if you want to save some money. I like the mopping solution because it has quick dry elements to it and adds a nice fresh scent when done. The thoroughness of the mopping has been outstanding and easily gets all the kid messes and doggy paw prints off with ease with the rotary style mop head. Besides not having a wet tank in the robot, this 505 also only has one roller head to it instead of the dual rollers that Roomba has had in their models for the past few years. I’m not convinced that a single roller can out-vac a dual roller but I don’t have any supporting evidence to say otherwise. After a vac/mop run, the robot automatically returns to the base and empties the dry bin and washes the mop heads. It also uses heated air to dry the mop heads to keep them from getting smelly. It’s amazing to see how dirty the dirty water tank can get knowing that all the grime is off your floors. In summary, if you’re looking for a truly hands off auto vac/mop robot, this latest flagship model from Roomba is just the ticket. The auto emptying, auto washing mop heads makes this a robot that I only need to tend to about once a month…maybe even longer. I highly recommend this 505+ combo to anyone with a busy family like mine with young kids and pets. 5 out of 5 stars!

I have been using my Roomba Plus 505 Vac and Mop and simply put, Love it. Over the years I have had different iRobot robot vacuum cleaners and even though they were and are great products, they simply were behind the curve, always trying to catch up and I think they have finally caught up with this new Roomba. So, lets go over what Rooma Plus 505 Vacuum + Mop with the Autowash Dock has to offer. Setup: The setup process for the robot was simple enough. Took everything out of the box, put everything together and download the “Roomba Home” app. So, this robot does not use the traditional “iRobot” app. This is where I ran into a bit of an issue. It took me about 5 tries to get the app to register the robot and once the robot was registered, I was finally able to start the mapping process. The mapping was completed without any issues and in about 10 minutes, Cleaning: This is where this robot shines. I absolutely love how amazing of a cleaning job this robot does. It offers great suction, picking up every little crumb and dirt in the house and getting close to the wall and corners without bumping into the walls and leaving scuff marks. The mop pad also extends out cleaning close to the walls and corners and empties itself out when needed and washes the pads depending on your settings, leaving your floors spotless. The robot offers multiple cleaning modes, such as Smart, Light, Normal and Deep Clean. There is a clean and dirty water tank on top, and since I have it set to clean every night last about 3 to 4 days on average and a dust bag which is supposed to last up to 75 days. The robot features a built -in light in the front which automatically turns on and off depending on lighting in the area. It also features an auto lifting mop pads so not to drag dirty mop pads all over your area rugs. Once all the cleaning is done, the robot will return to wash and dry the mop pads, so you always have a fresh mop pad every time. App: I am not a fan of the new “Roomba Home” app. In my opinion, the app is not very user friendly, I ran into issues first with the connection and secondly with the automation. For some reason it would not let me set up a schedule and would not save it and finally one day it just decided to save on its own, weird!! But it is working now. Also, you if you have older iRobot robot vacuum cleaners, they will not work with he new app, so you will have to use the old app, don’t know why they decided to go that route, but it’s just a hassle to switch between 2 different apps just to manage your robots. Hopefully, iRobot can look into this and fix these issues with an update in the near future. Overall, this is a great robot for keeping you home clean, that requires little human interaction, when the app wants to cooperate. If you are in the market, I would recommend that you check out the new Roomba Plus 505 Vacuum and Mop with the Autowash Dock.

Overall I’m happy with the Roomba 505. As a vacuum/mop combo it’s very well suited to my mostly hardwood main floor. The navigation and cleaning is very good, but it still can get tripped up on things like light floor mats and cords and mopping and vacuuming does take a while with frequent return trips to the home base. It does its job well for the most part though with minimal interference required on my part. In the box is the robot, the dock, and an extra set of mop pads and a dirt bag in addition to the ones already installed. According to the manual, the dock requires a spot with 1.5ft of open space on either side and 4ft of open space in front of it. It also should not be in direct sunlight. I did have to make some minor rearrangements to our living room to create this spot and I suspect most people will need to do the same. The dock with the robot is about 14 inches wide, 17.5 inches deep, and 18.5 inches tall. The dock contains the auto-emptying dust bin and the clean and dirty water for the mop pads. The water tanks lift off easily and latch shut in a way that makes it difficult for them to come open by accident and they can be carried over to the sink to be filled and emptied. Both tanks have a dark tint to them, but the dirty water tank is even darker so you don’t have to look at it. The textured panel on the front of the dock lifts off to reveal the dirt bag, which can be slid out and thrown away when it’s full. There’s also a spot for the additional dirt bag that shipped with it to stay. On the backside of the textured front panel is also a cleaning brush, which I honestly would never have found if I hadn’t noticed the manual mentioned it was supposed to be included. The power cord connects at the back of the dock and is about 6ft long and there’s some cable management in the back of the dock to take up any excess length. The robot has a variety of sensors for detecting its environment, as well as a camera upfront and LiDAR up top. The bottom has the main brush roller, a single edge sweeping brush, and 2 mop pods. The top has a textured panel similar to the one on the dock that can be lifted up to reveal the dust bin and filter. The dust bin doesn’t appear particularly large and its size isn’t specified anywhere; I assume it’s around 0.5L similar to previous models. I’d say the overall build quality is good. It’s plastic pretty much throughout, but everything comes together and apart as it should and I didn’t find any deficiencies with the design. I will say simply from an aesthetic point of view, it doesn’t ‘feel’ like it’s a $1000 vacuum, but that’s a very subjective opinion. Getting the robot setup through the Roomba Home app wasn’t too bad. This is a different app than what the i3 I already have uses, which is kind of annoying that both vacuums cannot be managed in the same app. After assembling it and plugging it in, I was able to get it connected and updated in the span of about 30 minutes, with most of that time spent waiting on an update to process. After that, the first order of business is mapping out your space. My main floor consists of our living room, dining room, kitchen, 3 bedrooms, and 2 bathrooms. I was surprised at how quickly the robot was able to make its way around and it did not have to cover much of the floor at all in order for its sensors to see everything. This initial mapping process took around 20-25 minutes and after that I was presented with a map of my floor with some automatic room segmentation. It did a pretty good job of separating the rooms and even named a couple of them, but I did have to go in and give names to the rooms it didn’t identify and will likely do some further segmentation myself to break up the living, dining, and kitchen areas. You can also add furniture to the map as well and I’m not exactly sure what the purpose of that is and the placement/sizing seems limited. Once the initial setup is done you can setup lots of routines in the apps for cleaning particular spaces, whether or not to use vacuum only, mop only, or both, and other things. There’s a fair bit of automation and scheduling there. For cleaning, as I do with every other robot vacuum I’ve owned, I tried to prep my space for the robot to do its work. I picked up loose dog toys, clothes, pillows, etc. and put them all up to give it as much space to clean as possible and then I started the job in smart mode, which utilizes both the vacuum and the mop and engages them based on the surfaces it detects. The pathing was interesting to watch, and for my home it seemed to start with an outside-in approach for the first few passes in my living room before focusing in on other areas. The movement of the robot has this kind of shuffling motion, which as I understand is supposed to help with maximizing the cleaning by coming at the floor from different angles. The mop pads sit at the rear of the robot and can reach out a little as needed to get into corners and crevices. It kind of reminds me of a person reaching their leg out to get a scuff off the floor. The vacuuming performance seemed good and I saw most of the debris on my hardwood get sucked up no problem. My living room has a medium pile rug that when the robot moved up on top of it raised its mops to prevent them from getting the rug wet. The auto detection for this worked well, though it seemed to struggle a little bit in the tight spaces where it had to straddle the rug and the hardwood. Even with the mops touching the rug though they didn’t get anything overly wet. The robot doesn’t have a water tank and the mops are made wet by the dock and the robot returns at semi-regular intervals to get clean and re-wet the mops, so they start at wet and get drier as they go along. It did a great job of navigating and got itself in and out of spaces I wouldn’t have expected it to make it to, though there were a few moments with hanging cords that we had to pull out of the way and a light floor mat near our back deck that it tipped the corner up on and proceeded to tangle itself in. I think with just about any robot vacuum though there’s a certain treatment that you need to give to your space like pinning up loose cables, securing mats, etc. to make sure it’s running optimally. It did need to go back and charge once during its cleaning and resumed later. Overall, the first mop/clean run on just my living room area took about 3 hours and I was happy with the job it did and feel it could keep me floors clean as long as I’m running it at regular intervals. While running, I’d consider the robot to be pretty quiet; you can definitely watch TV while it’s running. When it goes to empty its dustbin in the dock it does get loud for a moment, but it doesn’t take more than a few seconds for the auto-empty to complete. I’d say the Roomba 505 is a good vacuum/mop combo. It’s not perfect, but it handles itself well most of the time. There’s a lot of competition in the robot vacuum space though and a lot of the Roomba competitors have met or even exceeded them in terms of features and capabilities over the past several years. It feels like the Roomba 505 is playing catch up a little bit in this regard, but I’d still recommend it based on my experience with it.

The Roomba was the first robovac to market and iRobot has taken all its experience and created a great smart vacuum with the best mopping in the market. I don’t want to spend a lot of time telling you how easy the Roomba Plus 505 is to install or how great it looks or the quality of the built. Just take my word for it that iRobot has been making smart vacuums for a while and they have perfected the built and install. The Good: -What the Roomba Plus 505 does better than any other vacuum on the market is mop, the spinning mop pads do an excellent job getting rid of stains on hard floors. There was a juice stain that had been sitting for a day or so and the Roomba removed it with 2 passes. I was very surprised to see this as most vacuums I have used/seen wouldn’t be able to remove the stain. The reason is does such a good job is because of spinning mop pads, most vacuums use scrubbers which only move side to side. One of the mob pads will also extend out to help get closer to corners when mopping, speaking of corners the Roomba Plus 505 does an EXCELLENT job when getting right up to the edge. The lidar sensor on the vacuum is great as it helps the Roomba get as close as possible to the edge to make sure everything is clean. The Roomba also self-cleans the mopping pads and dries them with heat and does it quickly. Other robovac tend to take hours when drying the mopping pads and they usually never dry them completely, this was not the case with the Roomba Plus 505. -The Roomba has great suction and will pick up most things, the suction roller is made of a strong plastic so it should last a long time. The lidar sensor works excellent for sensing messes and will make extra passes when needed, I did notice that this works best if you have it set to smart sense when vacuuming or mopping. If you set it for light cleaning it is less likely to make extras passes. The Roomba also senses when going from hard floors to carpet and adjusts suction as needed, this also applies when mopping as it will left the mopping spinners so your carpet doesn’t get soaked. -The new Roomba Home App works so much better than the previous one, it does not stall like the old app and everything works instantly. Having owned 3 other robovacs one of my biggest grips was how long it would take for the vacuum to receive a command if I wasn’t on the same WiFi and this Isn’t the case with the Roomba Plus 505, everything works instantly. The app is laid out very nicely and the robot mapped out my home lay out quickly. You can easily edit rooms/title and add areas you don’t want the Roomba to do. iRobot says that the Roomba is a learning vacuum and uses data to suggest what rooms to clean and even how long it will take. I haven’t had a recommendation on this however I did notice that it automatically picked up where my dinning table was and added it to the map so I am hopeful the more I use it I will get updates for cleaning. The new App is full of features like scheduling cleanings for specific rooms or even around certain areas (dining room), these features while not revolutionary are great quality of life needs. -The Roomba Plus 505 also has a light which is HUGE as with my previous smart vacs if they were scheduled to work at night they wouldn’t do a good job unless lights were left on. Improvements -While the Roomba Plus 505 does a lot of things great there are a few downsides. One of them being that it cannot work on long shaggy carpets so be forewarned. -The 505 does not have the best lift when it comes to getting over things, when going from hard floors to rug it will struggle or bend the carpet. This is also a problem for the mopping pads if you have a carpet that is more fluffy. -No soap is used for mopping, this isn’t an issue for mopping as the spinning scrubbers work excellent but I do worry about the dirty water sitting in the self-cleaning tank. So you would need to empty it as its used or else there is a possibility of mold or unpleasant smells. Overall the Roomba Plus 505 is one of the best complete robovacs with great suction power, the best mopping system and excellent software. iRobot has been making robovacs for a while and has used all they have learned to make the Roomba Plus 505 easy to use and something you can just set and forget.

THIS… IS the Roomba Plus 505 Combo Robot, iRobot's next high end combo robot that promises to not only be able to vacuum, but also mop most of your daily mistakes with ease. This is something that I have been dreaming of getting, and, with three large dogs… something I NEED. From muddy paws, to my Great Pyrenees rouge furballs, to my wife's cooking mishaps… I can safely say this Roomba 505 is entering the home cleaning gauntlet. Let's take a look and see if iRobot has put together a friend in the fight, or a $1000 headache. Taking the 505 out of the box, it was immediately evident that I had encountered a new realm of home cleaning. The 505 robot not only looks sleek, but the base station really wraps this product together to make it look like the new generation for home cleaning robots. Something Roomba has done really well in the design of the base station is the accessibility to the clean and gray water tanks while still retaining its cohesive look. It really is as easy as picking the respective clean and gray water tanks, popping the lid, and refilling them. Both tanks hold about a gallon of fluid each and will last me for over a week of uninterrupted scheduled cleaning as well as several impromptu cleaning runs. Something that I wanted to note, you can actually add your own cleaning fluid to the clean water (which iRobot also sells) to help the 505 clean your floors. I found that adding it helped the 505 clean my floors ‘tougher’ spots easier regardless of which brand of cleaning solution I used (iRobot did not include any of their own solution in the box) as long as it doesn’t suds up easily. Moving onto the app, Roomba has a whole new one from their prior generations and WOW! From mapping to creating rooms to no go zones, iRobot didn’t just think of everything… they made it so easy! A cool feature that Roomba threw in the 505 was the ability to place furniture on the map, and then give the 505 the ability to spot clean around it, nice! The app does have a slight learning curve, but once you get the layout, it is very intuitive. It is one of those apps where it is very obvious from the start that the people designing the Roomba are also USING the Roomba as well. Now onto the reason we are all here!! The 505 not only tackled my house's mess, but is the first home cleaning robot that I have genuinely been able to confidently place and forget about! The 505 is cleaning my floors 4 times a week on a schedule as well as several other times throughout the week and it just WORKS! I was very nervous when I was receiving the 505 that it wouldn’t be able to clean the muddy paw prints, the troves of dirt my dogs bring in or avoid getting tangled on my great Pyrenees hair blobs. Not only has the Roomba 505 blown through my home's disasters, I have not had to intervene a SINGLE time EVER with the 505 outside of swapping the water tanks. The 505 has also been navigating my house and its plethora of obstacles just as well as it has been able to clean it, it has had zero interventions - period. Zero snags or tangles, no issues going over bumps and zero issues transitioning from my hard floors to sweeping my rugs. The darn robot even has a light on the front of it so you don’t step on it in the dark! Roomba has made the user experience so smooth that my wife has downloaded the app to use it on her own - wow! I have been in the home robot game for almost seven years now, starting with Roombas' very own M6 mop and S9+ vacuum. To say that iRobot has come a LONG way is an understatement. I was shocked to see how well iRobot has put both mopping, vacuuming and hands free automation into such a seamless package. If you are genuinely looking for a competent plug and play all in one robot, then look no further than the Roomba Plus 505 combo robot! If it can keep my house clean, then I am confident that it will be able to take on yours. Roomba has made coming home a so much easier, and I feel much better coming home from a long 12 hour shift at the hospital knowing my floors are taken care of! As with all robots, BestBuy has an awesome return policy, so there is no harm in testing just how well the Roomba 505 combo can take on your house's messes as it has taken on mine! Until next time :)