Neato Botvac D5 Connected - Review 2022

A couple of years ago, the Neato Botvac D5 Continued would have been a steal at $599 thanks to its laser navigation system, Wi-Fi connectivity, and app control. It'south still a solid value today, specially because its stiff suction ability and long bombardment life. However, many of these features can now exist found in robot vacuums that price less, like the iRobot Roomba 690. And if you lot're willing to pay top dollar, the Roomba 960 offers detailed cleaning maps and vocalization command, making it our Editors' Choice.

Blueprint and Accessories

The Neato Botvac D5 Connected looks a lot like its predecessor, the original Botvac Connected. It shares the same black color, D shape, and overall components, it'southward just slightly more minimal in design. It does away with the original'due south LCD panel in favor of two LED indicators and consolidates controls into a unmarried button.

Located at the bottom left are the Battery and Info LEDs. The Battery LED lights green when full and flashes when charging. The Info LED lights blue to signal Car style, white for Spot Cleaning, and red if in that location'southward an error. To the left of the indicators is the Start button. Printing it once to clean regularly, or twice to activate Spot Cleaning way.

Below the controls you'll find the straight-edged bumper, which helps the vacuum make clean tight corners, something that completely round models have trouble with. To a higher place the controls is a top-loading dustbin. And well-nigh the rounded edge of the robot is the laser navigation arrangement. If you flip the D5 over, you'll see drib sensors and a roller brush along the apartment edge, along with a tiny spin brush and ii master wheels. At the rounded border are ii charging contacts.

The D5 measures 3.9 by 12.half dozen by 13.2 inches (HWD). Some of the pinnacle is due to the navigation light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation, which juts out at the meridian; the residue of the robot is nearly a quarter-inch shorter. The Samsung Powerbot R7070, another D-shaped model, is a bit larger effectually at 3.8 by xiii.4 by 14.7 inches. The D5 should be able to clear most low-contour furniture, but considering of the laser bump, it might struggle to fit all the manner nether certain java tables or couches.

In addition to a charging dock and power cord, the D5 comes with a philharmonic castor, filter, side brush, cleaning tool, and a roll of magnetic tape you tin employ to mark off boundaries. There'southward no remote, equally you can control (just not steer) the robot from your smartphone.

App and Setup

Setting up the D5 is a cakewalk. The only thing you lot actually have to do is place information technology on the dock in a relatively clear surface area and wait for it to finish its initial charge. You might need to button the D5 into the dock's charging contacts and double check that the battery indicator is flashing.

Neato Botvac D5 Connected Once the bombardment is total, you tin download the Neato app from the Apple App Store or Google Play. It volition walk you through a serial of prompts and tutorial videos to get the D5 connected over Wi-Fi.

The app is uncomplicated to use and modern in design. There'south a card with a moving-picture show of your robot, its name (which yous can edit), status, battery, and three circular icons underneath. The icons allow you view settings, robot information, and schedule and cleaning history.

If y'all tap the robot'due south menu, you tin access its chief screen. In the eye, there's a large Kickoff circle you can tap to begin a cleaning session. Beneath that is another battery icon indicating how much charge is left. To the left and right are small Terminate and Dock commands. If you swipe up, you lot'll bring up a secondary gray carte du jour that lets you toggle additional features and cleaning modes. The D5 doesn't take many, so you won't demand to use it that much.

The Cleaning History tab isn't the most detailed. You lot tin come across how long the robot cleaned per session, as well as how much space was covered. Unlike the Roomba 960 or Dyson 360 Eye, even so, you lot don't go to see the shape of the rooms cleaned. It'south more of a basic bar graph that tells you lot the total foursquare feet vacuumed.

As for scheduling, the D5 allows yous to customize both start times and days of the calendar week. So if you lot desire a hyper-specific schedule that fits your routine—for case, cleaning every Monday, Midweek, and Friday at a sure time in the afternoon—that'due south not an issue.

As mentioned above, you tin't steer the bot. The D5'due south navigation abilities are good enough that you probably won't demand to rescue it that often, but when you lot do, you'll have to get up off the couch. It will, yet, transport button notifications to your phone for troubleshooting.

Ane of the benefits of connected bots is that you can commencement or stop cleaning when y'all're not at home. That's true of the D5, simply only if it'southward online. If for some reason your bot is disconnected or tin't connect to Wi-Fi, you lot won't be able to see cleaning history or edit any scheduled cleans. This is truthful of whatsoever Wi-Fi robot, but I experienced more instances of finicky remote connectivity with the D5 than usual. On ane occasion, I tried to admission vacuum through the app simply to find a notification saying the D5 needed to close downwards. When I got home, I saw that it hadn't moved and its battery was full, then it's unclear why the betoken dropped.

Performance

The Botvac D5 Continued is a skillful navigator. Information technology was able to reliably glide over different surfaces like carpeting, tile, and hardwood, as well as maneuver around objects in testing. I ran it multiple times at home, and was pleased to find it handled the raised flooring between my kitchen and hallway with no difficulty. It also successfully navigated over my living room rug, which has tripped upward a fair number of robot vacuums due to its black border and dark geometric pattern.

When it comes to suction ability, the D5 was able to pick upwardly all but the well-nigh stubborn bits of lint in its path. The just upshot is that is dustbin doesn't hold equally much equally others nosotros've tested, and isn't the easiest to remove. It requires some jostling to go in and out.

Ironically, this is somewhat exacerbated by the D5's excellent battery life. Because the bot tin run for quite a while, you may demand to empty information technology in the center of a session if y'all desire the all-time possible clean. In testing, the D5 lasted for seventy to ninety minutes of cleaning and still had some juice left over. The only reason it returned to the charging dock before running low was because it had run through each room twice, as programmed, which is more than acceptable for the boilerplate apartment. You lot'll still probably need multiple cycles for larger homes with multiple floors, but yous get a lot out of a charge here.

When it comes to automatic docking, the D5 is very practiced at finding its way back dwelling house; I never had to assistance it along. And while it'south a chip noisy, it'southward not so bad you'll have to invest in earplugs. It'due south right on par with other robot vacuums, and quieter than most traditional stick models.

Conclusions

At $600, the Neato Botvac D5 Continued is an all-around solid robot vacuum. Its laser navigation is excellent and you get a skilful make clean, app control, and excellent bombardment life. That said, the Roomba 690 costs less, and while its navigation capabilites don't fare as well when it comes to nighttime floors, you can control it via voice using Amazon Alexa and Google Banana. For $100 more, meanwhile, the Roomba 960 does everything the D5 can, but adds vox control and cleaning maps. And if you're already heavily invested in Samsung's ecosystem, the Powerbot R7070 can be hands added into existing routines with other smart home devices via the SmartThings Hub.