According to Ancient Greek overthinker, Aristotle, nature abhors a vacuum, which may explain why the great outdoors always looks such a mess, what with leaves all over the floor and wild animals just doing their ‘business’ wherever they like. At least in the UK.
But, for the rest of us, that dust and stuff isn’t going to simply redistribute itself, so like Ghostbusters of free-roaming filth, we need a way of sucking it up and containing it; we need a way of battling against the shedding of skin and hair that humans and their pets suffer so much; we need that very vacuum that Old Mother Nature has such a bizarre, unfounded issue with.
But more, so much more than that! To keep us from being bound by the dual bondage of mains plug point and length of lead, we need vacuums that break free from the conventional by offering power and performance in abundance, while existing gloriously cord-free. Yes, capable of cruising anywhere in the home or, indeed, out cleaning up the car/caravan, while offering an array of advanced dust-bustin' technology, I speak, of course, of the cordless vacuum.
Available in a mind-warping variety of shapes, sizes, configurations and prices, the cordless vac lets you suck where no vac has sucked before, reach corners that you previously considered unreachable, and clean crannies you previously thought uncranniable.
So, what’s to look for in the cordless vac of your dust-free dreams? Well, in short: weight, run time, power, charging time, ease of emptying, and flexibility. These I call the ‘Seven Pillars of Wireless Wisdom’ (with apologies to T. E. Lawrence) and in this latest commentaires du jour, I’ve selected and tested a top 10 of cordless contenders, each adhering to my – admittedly over-grandiose – septet of cordless sucker standards.
Best cordless vacuum cleaners at a glance
- Best for life on the edge: Black+Decker SummitSeries Select 21.6V Pet Stick - £299, Very
- Best for budget brushless: Tower VL60 Nimblevac - £99.99, Tower
- Best for facing floor filth with full confidence: Henry Quick! - £249, Henry
- Best for lightweight X-cellence: Halo Capsule X - £249.99, Amazon
- Best for keeping your menagerie immaculate: VAX ONEPWR Blade 5 Dual Pet & Car - £449, Currys
- Best for staying pretty in pink: Swan Lynsey Queen of Clean - £189, Asda
- Best for breaking out the big guns: Miele’s Duoflex HX1 Cat & Dog - £449, John Lewis
- Best for cord-free, carefree vacuuming: eufy clean X10 Omni - £799, eufy
- Best for non-nonsense all-home dust annihilation: Bosch Unlimited 8 Pet - £299, Amazon
- Best for a thoroughly modern classic clean: Hoover HFX - £369.99, John Lewis
Now, without further procrastination, forget Nature and her cheap, showy ways, peruse these electric brooms of choice and prepare to make at least one area of domestic drudgery a dust-disappearing near-delight…Shop now
Black+Decker SummitSeries Select 21.6V Pet Stick
Best for: Life on the edge
There is no denying that Black+Decker is a firm far more famous for its solidly dependable DIY devices, the brand’s extensive home cleaning range has also developed an excellent reputation over the years, particularly when it comes to its cordless vacs, of which the SummitSeries 21.6V Pet Stick is very much the latest and, indeed, greatest.
A nicely powered-up pup, with a 21.6V battery driving 45 minutes of deep-dive dust and hair removal between 4-hour 100 per cent charges, it’s one of the heftier units I’ve pushed angle around my dusty, possibly haunted, new house since moving in recently and disturbing dust and dirt like I’d opened an ancient tomb. But then that reassuring weight is tied to the capacious 750l bag-free dustbowl, the sneeze-saving six stage anti-allergen sealed filtration system, the tangle-avoiding anti-tangle beater bar, and the Edge to Edge technology that ensures it cleans right up to the smutty skirting boards.
Featuring a soft roller that makes it equally at home on carpet and hard flooring, a charge indicator helps you keep a dirt-purging eye on power, while a removable floorhead and a whole raft of essential accessories mean no crevice escapes investigation and pesky pet hair, whether loose of clinging to furniture, is a thing of the immediate past.
Well-priced too, at just shy of £300, the Black+Decker SummitSeries Select 21.6V Pet Stick is an excellent cordless choice for those not so much as ‘vac’ but ‘blitz’.
- Weight: 3.56kg
- Height: 101cm
- Power: 21.6V
- Run time: 45-minutes
- Charge time: 4-hours
- Collection: 750l dust bowl
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: Yes
- Pets: Yes
Buy now £299.00, Very
Tower VL60 Nimblevac
Best for: Budget brushless
Costing a penny under one hundred pounds, the VL60 features a nicely capacious 750-litre, bagless dust tank that’s nice and easy to empty, and features two power settings, the first for everyday mess removal and the second, beefed-up for more ingrained floor filth. It also, perhaps surprising for the low price, features anti-tangle technology – an absolute boon for those with shedding pets/housemates/spouses with long hair.
It also comes boosting a brushless motor, something which offers higher electrical efficiency and greater torque-to-weight ratio than “brushed” alternatives, which all sounds a bit Top Gear, but the upshot is that the VL60 can achieve more with less and also enjoy a longer working life, so it’s a win-win-win.
Running up to 35 minutes on a full charge and the lower power setting, a stainless steel HEPA filter captures and contains 99.97 per cent of particulates down to 0.3 microns in size, keeping allergens out of your air.
Light too at 2.3kg, the Tower VL60 comes complete with a wall mount, brush tool for furniture and a crevice tool for, well, tooling your crevices, obviously.
- Weight: 2.3kg
- Height: 45cm
- Power: 14.8V
- Run time: 35-minutes
- Charge time: 4 hours
- Collection: 750l dust bowl
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: No
- Pets: No
Buy now £99.99, Tower
Henry Quick!
Best for: Facing floor filth with full-confidence
You’ve got to love a Henry. I mean, it has a face, so it’s the law. Famed for being short, squat, smiley-faced trundle-arounds that are often the vac of choice of professional cleaners in offices up and down the country, the latest iteration of Henry has seen him go cordless and transform from a short, squat, smiley-faced floor-sorter caterpillar into a tall, slim, buff butterfly.
This is the Henry Quick!, available in red, white, grey or pet-hair-specialising blue, the smiling face is still in place, but now this powerful cord-free cleaner supplies superior suction, dust compaction to make full use of the cavernous 1-litre capacity quick-release pods inside, each featuring multi-layer filtration and a Dust-lock Seal, to ensure not a spec spills out.
Alongside the expected On and Off button, upfront you’ll also find a Power Boost button for when dirt has been well and truly ground underfoot deep into your loop pile, plus a Power Brush button for truly targeting the stubborn stuff.
Offering an epic run time of up to 60 minutes, the Quick! also charges at a hyper-rate, going from 0-100 per cent in just 150 minutes and, the cherry on the icing on the cleaning cake, Scent Capsules are available to pop in the top to leave your house smelling fresh, even if, after 60 minutes of intense vacuuming, you do not.
Adding extra convenience, a 2-in-1 Combi Tool swaps in for sweeping up on higher surfaces, a Crevice Tool helps you reach those otherwise inaccessible nooks and crannies, and a very handy LED headlight ensures you never miss a bit.
Add in an easy clean brush bar and a wall dock with accessory storage built-in, and the lean, mean Henry Quick!, currently on offer down from £300 to £200, turns tedious toil into something to, ahem, smile about.
- Weight: 3.2kg
- Height: 122cm
- Power: 25.2V
- Run time: 60-minutes
- Charge time: 150-minutes
- Collection: 1l pod dustbowl
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: Yes
- Pets: No (Pet version available)
Buy now £249.00, Henry
Halo Capsule X
Best for: Lightweight X-cellence
If you’re in the market for a vacuum cleaner that raises the bar to dizzying new heights of innovation, the Halo is the vacuum you’re looking for.
I reviewed the Halo Capsule Clean model for this fine, upstanding organ way back in 2022, and was left rather dazzled by its abilities, so it only stood to reason that I should attempt to get my hands on a review model of the exciting, all-new Capsule X. Did I say “exciting”? About a vacuum cleaner? Yes, yes, I did.
Okay, first things first, the Capsule Clean had an ultra-light weight of just 2.6kg and an impressive capacity of a whopping 1.6 litres, whereas the new Capsule X has an ultra-light weight of just 2.6kg and an even more impressive capacity of 2 litres – yes, that’s a far bigger bag capacity and yet the weight remains the same! This impressive feat is achieved through the carbon fibre construction of the dust tank, in the same way that F1 cars use carbon fibre to remain as light as possible, and if you don’t find that fact “exciting” then you’re clearly dead from the hairline down.
Halo’s most powerful model to date, too, whether it's carpet or hard flooring, the X will have all the dust, dirt and hair – both human and animal alike – up and away in an instant, locking it safely behind the HEPA filter where it can do no further harm.
Running for 60 solid minutes between two-hour charges, the Halo X comes bundled with everything you could possibly need, including a removable 32V high-performance battery, an extension tube for reaching those out-of-the-way places, a full-size powered brush head, a crevice tool, a versatile combination tool for dusting and upholstery, wall dock, on-board accessory clip, charger, and even a free pack of five dust pouches.
Finally, the Halo X also has one more winning factor that sets it apart from the opposition, something called ‘Halo Equilibrium Engineering’, three words which means this vac has been designed to be perfectly balanced in use, making it even easier to use.
Yep, Halo has hit a high yet again, building upon a vac that was already pretty near perfect as was, and in doing so, creating a completely flawless floor cleaner that, all in the name, truly has the X factor.
- Weight: 2.6kg
- Height: 71.5cm
- Power: 32V
- Run time: 60-minutes
- Charge time: 2-hours
- Collection: 2.0l dust bowl
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: Yes
- Pets: Yes
Buy now £249.99, Amazon
VAX ONEPWR Blade 5 Dual Pet & Car
Best for: Keeping your menagerie immaculate
The ONEPWR Blade 5 Dual Pet & Car from VAX is the answer to the pet owner’s prayers, giving all floors the super suction treatment for far longer, thanks to two 45-minute batteries being included in the box, plus a sizable 0.7-litre bagless dust tank meaning less emptying between cleaning binges.
A heavier model, at 3.85kg, but we’re not here to weight-shame, the Blade 5 features a real-time digital display to show modes and battery run time, while the VersClean tech sees two rollers, one situated in front of the other, work in conjunction with each other to lift dust and debris for improved pick-up and work deep into carpeted floors to dig out more-stubborn dirt and, of course, pet hair.
Featuring a three-stage filtration system, up to 99.8 per cent of particles, down to 0.3 microns in size, are captured in the dust tank, never to see the light of day again, so if pet hair and dander have proven to be an allergy problem in the past, the Blade 5 will see you say goodbye to all the unpleasantness that comes with that.
What’s more on the pets score, the VAX also comes packing a mini motorised pet tool to let you get properly stuck in on tenacious animal evidence and anti-odour filter and antimicrobial protection, making it the ideal choice for homes housing countless hairy beasts and/or messy children.
Also, with the Vax comes a two-in-one crevice tool and dusting brush, a powered hose, charger, and wall mount, plus – wait for it – a free tool kit worth £50 that’s full of other accessory essentials to help you clean up the whole house over.
All in all, then, a powerful, flexible and do-everything vac, the VAX ONEPWR Blade 5 Dual Pet & Car is the absolute bargain of the vacuum world.
- Weight: 3.85kg
- Height: 104cm
- Power: 12V
- Run time: 90-minutes (2x 45-min)
- Charge time: 2-hours
- Collection: 0.7l dust bowl
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: Yes
- Pets: Yes
Buy now £449.00, Currys
Swan Lynsey Queen of Clean
Best for: Staying pretty in pink
Even as a man utterly out of touch with the cult of celebrity as I am today, I have heard fleetingly of the likes of Mrs Hinch and her regal contemporary, Lynsey, Queen of Clean.
Indeed, when someone has made a name/living for themselves (like the beloved Mrs Beeton) writing books on domestic cleaning and talking about it ad nauseam on the likes of This Morning and RTE, then you should probably hold that person’s respect for a vacuum cleaner in high-regard. And so we have, hence stood in my hallway right now, after a vigorous carpet and wooden floor go-over, is a vac vision in pink, the Swan Lynsey Queen of Clean Pink Hyper Plush Lightweight Cordless Vacuum.
Yes, pink, but the Swan is far more than just a gimmicky blushing beauty with a celeb attachment, it’s actually a highly accomplished vacuum, with a ludicrously light weight of 2.6kg (same as the Halo), a 30-minute run time, a 0.5-litre dust tank, a HEPA filter to save your sneezes, an excellently efficient single-cyclone system, and with non-celeb attachments, such as upholstery and crevice tools, plus a Hyper brush designed to dismiss even the most ground-in dirt and dust.
For added convenience, heads can be changed quickly and easily via a foot pedal and even come featuring headlights to keep filth firmly within your sights.
And what price to pay for all this power and performance, ringingly endorsed by a bona fide TV-tripping domestic goddess? Why, a paltry £130! I mean, even if you have some odd aversion to the colour pink, like the Anti-Barbie itself, for those seeking undoubted value for money, the Swan is an absolute shoo-in.
- Weight: 2.6kg
- Height: 110cm
- Power: 21.6V
- Run time: 30-minutes
- Charge time: 3.5 hours
- Collection: 0.5l dust bowl
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: Yes
- Pets: No
Buy now £189.00, Asda
Miele’s Duoflex HX1 Cat & Dog
Best for: Breaking out the big guns
One of, if not the, most respected luxury appliance brands in this or, indeed, any other known world, Miele doesn’t mess around when it comes to spec, and as such the Duoflex HX1 Cat & Dog is a performance powerhouse.
Delivering high suction to make short work of dust-removing donkey work, the HX1 is light and manoeuvrable at 3.1kg, features a surprisingly compact 0.3-litre dust tank, and can provide up to 55 minutes of continuous cleaning between 3.5-hour charges.
As powerful as a corded Miele vac, the HX1 serves the cat and dog-containing home with absolute aplomb, thanks to the inclusion of an Electro Compact brush for removing pet hair and a hygiene filter with 99.99 per cent dust retention capacity keeping any would-be airborne allergens safely out of your face.
Good to go on both carpeted and hard floor surfaces, the Miele’s MultiFloor brush automatically adapts the speed of its roller when a change in flooring is detected, so you always have just the right amount of power at your fingertips.
And, of course, being Miele, the build quality and design is superb, solid yet light, stylish yet functional, whilst the included accessories - MultiFloor electrobrush HX-EB 20, HX-DB dusting brush, HX-UN upholstery nozzle, HX-CN crevice nozzle, and Electro Compact HX-EC 20 cover every area of the home.
- Weight: 3.1kg
- Height: 125cm
- Power: 25V
- Run time: 55-minutes
- Charge time: 3.5 hours
- Collection: 0.3l dust bowl
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: Yes
- Pets: Yes
Buy now £449.00, John Lewis
eufy clean X10 Omni
Best for: Cordfree, carefree vacuuming
Okay, I may have gone slightly off-script here, but technically the stunning new X10 Pro Omni from eufy is, for all intents and purposes, a cordless cleaner; the fact that it also happens to be an advanced robovac too, notwithstanding.
If your intolerance of domestic work goes beyond getting tangled up in cords, then outsource such onerous effort to the eufy which, navigating automatically to and from its charging base station, can glide around the carpets and hard floors of your home, quietly disposing of dirt and dust for up to 173-minutes per sucking session, before returning to charge to 100 per cent power again over the course of six hours.
A powerful player in the vacuum stakes, the eufy’s AI can recognise and avoid over 100 objects around the home, so you’ll never need to work about it vandalising your stuff while you’re out, and if the X10 Pro Omni encounters some stubborn stains, it’s also a robomop, capable of cleaning 1500-200 sq. ft. of floor, automatically filling with clean water and ditching the dirty back at the base station with no finger-raising required from the likes of you. Similarly, featuring a 2.5-litre dust tank, the eufy empties itself into the base, leaving you free to twiddle your thumbs while it does – literally – all the work.
Exceptional at tackling pet hair, too, the combination of rubber and bristles scoops up any floor-lurking crud, no matter how deeply stomped into the carpet it is and, taking the convenience to the nth degree, the eufy even features a Pro-Detangle Comb that automatically removes hair for the ultimate in hands-off laziness.
Finally, making this the perfect addition to any smart home, the eufy X10 Pro Omni is Alexa and Google Assistant enabled, meaning you can just tell it what to do when you can’t be bothered to find your phone.
Slick-looking and super-smart, the eufy is the pinnacle of the current robovac crop, something which makes the incredibly affordable (for this level of tech) £700 price tag very surprising indeed.
- Weight: 12kg
- Height: Robot: 11.4cm, Station: 48cm
- Power: 110V
- Run time: 173-minutes
- Charge time: 6-hours
- Collection: 2.7l bacteriostatic dustbag
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: Yes
- Pets: Yes
Buy now £799.00, Amazon
Bosch Unlimited 8 Pet
Best for: Non-nonsense all-home dust-annihilation
Back on remit now, Bosch is one of the most reliable brands in the world when it comes to domestic appliances, and the Unlimited 8 Pet is an excellent example of just that – a solidly built, powerful, robust design that incorporates a sizeable bagless dust tank while weighing in at just 3.1kg.
Good to go on all floor types, the Bosch features a 70 per cent bigger diameter brush to help cover more floor more quickly, cutting down on time taken to vac larger spaces, although the 40-minute battery should provide ample time should you want to give it a second pass.
Naturally, all you need is included amongst the accessories provided, such as a crevice nozzle, docking station, crevice nozzle, pet turbo nozzle, and pet brush duo, meaning the Bosch will be able to access all the awful places you yourself are too afraid to go.
Featuring filtration to keep pesky allergy particles out of your air, the Bosch comes with LED light to guide your way and, as the name might have suggested early on, utterly excels when it comes to dealing with pet hair, whether that’s tangled in the carpet, strewn across the parquet floor or just spread liberally over seat cushions and pillows.
When your chores are complete, simply pop the Bosch back on its wall-mounted docking station where it will automatically recharge ready for next time – bish, bash, Bosch.
- Weight: 3.1kg
- Height: 129.9cm
- Power: 18V
- Run time: 40-minutes
- Charge time: 5-hours
- Collection: 0.4 dust bowl
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: Yes
- Pets: Yes
Buy now £299.00, Amazon
Hoover HFX
Best for: A thoroughly modern classic clean
The most misused name in vacuum cleaner history, to “hoover”, “do the hoovering” and “hoover up” became the accepted terms for pushing the vac around, regardless of what brand of vac you were using, such was Hoover’s success at positioning itself front and centre in consumers minds. Today, of course, it's all a matter of brand protection, but seeing as Hoover will never be able to stop everyone from using the aforementioned expressions, it doesn’t need to, because it simply reinforces its reputation by producing things like this.
This is the Hoover HFX, the manufacturer’s latest cordless wonder, and quite the beast it is too, with two power modes offering 30- or 10-minutes of run time depending on whether you use turbo or not. It also has a 1.29-litre dust tank with no-touch emptying, a new all-in-line design resulting in a 40 per cent shorter dirt path between floor and bin, integrated LEDs to highlight the dust horror before you, and a recharge time of 3.5 hours.
To keep you entertained as you vanquish the dust, dirt and hair to the Hoover’s inescapable filth prison, a handy smart LED display lets you see power and mode at a glance, and the bundled motorised mini power nozzle, flexible crevice nozzle, 2-in-1 dust and furniture attachment, handheld vacuum container, and wall mount provides every piece of the perfect vac puzzle.
Not the lightest vac available, perhaps, but the build is robust, the design stylish, and the performance on any floor surface, second to none.
- Weight: 3.65kg
- Height: 112cm
- Power: 21.6V
- Run time: 30-minutes
- Charge time: 3.5 hours
- Collection: 1.29l dust bowl
- Carpet: Yes
- Hard floor: Yes
- Pets: No
Buy now £369.99, John Lewis
