Shark AV911S EZ Robot Vacuum with Self-Empty Base, Bagless, Row-by-Row Cleaning, Perfect for Pet Hair, Compatible with Alexa, Wi-Fi, Gray

I’m not sure if this was a great buy for me or not. It took me months to get this little vacuum and myself too coexist together. Every day when I come home, I have to check to make sure it’s on the port and if not, I have to search my house for it. I bought this because somebody had wrote that it did really well with picking up birdseed it does not and then also it clogs all the time. If you don’t have pets it would work great.

Good concept and I got the Shark rather than the iRobot or other brands due to reviews. Not what I hoped. For pet owners, its good at cleaning up fur. I have 3 cats and I was vacuuming every day and emptying half a canister of fur. Got this Shark so I could take a break. What it does not excel at is litter. I use natural flushable corn litter and I have thin litter mats that vacuum up nicely with my Bissell. But this robot thing goes over the mat and just leaves a lot behind. On hardwood floor it is much better but doesnt seem to get it all. The thing likes to repeat clean so it eventually gets up most dirt and fur. It turned itself on in the middle of the night on the first day and I almost boxed it up. Had to do a factory reset to clear the memory since there is no clock setting in the app. The app is basic but user friendly and the schedule function is probably helpful but after that first night I just shut it off before bed. It does get lost if in low light conditions. Sunlight is good enough but you will need to turn on all the lights if cleaning at night. Overall it is just okay for the price and I love not seeing as much pet hair. Thought about returning it but my other half got rid of the box which also had the plastic docking thing for carpets. Ill keep it and enjoy not vacuuming as much. UPDATE: 05/27/2022 Bumping up to 4 stars because it makes me happy! Never looking back! This has become very convenient and my favorite cleaning tool. I may have to run it a couple times a day to get up all the litter but I dont mind at all, and the robot doesnt complain. Saves me soooo much time (and back pain) than traditional vacuuming. Added comments after using it for a while... Just like my regular vacuum, I know itll function better if its maintained regularly so Im still emptying the dust bin about twice a week. The robot itself isnt terribly loud. However, it is when emptying so I cant run it while working at my home office. The sensors on the underside need to be cleaned but not too often and Ive only had to manually open the brush door underneath it twice.

So this is really two reviews. One of the vacuum itself, the second of the management software. Vacuum/Robot: The vacuum seems to run great. It picks up well, doesnt get lost, its navigation seems to work well and the ability to clean a given room is nice when it has the map (more on this in software). It fairly consistently returns to empty at the base (I set it to empty every half hour when vacuuming, it mostly does that). They mechanics of the empty works pretty well, sometimes it gets stuck on larger debris (IE dried pasta the kids dropped, bottle caps, etc.) and errors out but thats only happened twice I think. I dont have any stairs in the area of the floor that it runs on, so I assume the stair sensor would work. Overall the vacuum/robot work as well as the software lets it from my experience. Software: Heres the Achilles heel of the system. So far the software from Shark sucks, and not like you want a vacuum to suck. I have a fairly heavily integrated automated home, lots of smart lights, a Roomba on a different floor, lots of google nest mini speakers. Im a cloud engineer by trade so I know my software and network integrations well, so this isnt really a user issue with the software. So far the software seems to log you out of the app about every 3-5 days. When it does this you have about a 25-30% chance that your map, settings, schedule and the rest is there, you just have to log in and youre good to go again. Theres also about a 25% chance that your map, or schedule or both has been lost. This means your room assignments could be gone, your vacuum may not know its schedule to run, and youd have to reset up these items. Then theres about a 45-50% chance that your robot had been completely lost, and you have to re-add it and set it up from scratch again. Shark consistently says an update will be pushed, and to wait 48 hours to see if the issues are resolved, but since it happens every few days its almost like the updates are causing this, or they arent really performing any updates and are just trying to get you off the phone. So long and short, top marks on the robot itself, and the self empty base. Theyre great. Good marks for functionality and setup in the software, you can name rooms, keep out zones, set schedules, alerting, maps, etc. ZERO MARKS for stability. I hate that about once to twice a week I am resetting my robot in some way, either completely re-adding it to the application and wireless, reconfiguring the schedule, redrawing the map, or noticing its missed its schedule and having to find out why THIS time. Ive owned it for just under a month (Dec 3 purchase Dec 30th review 2021) so far and Im not really happy, I hope Shark fixes the stability issues, because then it would be a great system, as it is its meh at best. So much potential taken down by buggy inconsistent software.

I have some experience with robot vacuums, from an old roomba shop vacuum cleaner, to a recent Samsung robot vacuum. I lost my Samsung to the Marshall fire, so purchased this Shark robot vacuum to replace it. My wife & I had a Shark stick vacuum that we loved, so we thought to give the Shark 911S EZ a try. It cost only $299 at the time I bought it ~25 days ago. First, the good: The ability of the robot to return to the base and recharge, AND empty its (tiny) dustbin into the base stations dust bin is fantastic. I used the app to program the Shark robot to clean every day at 13h00, so the tiny dustbin doesnt over fill. (If you only vacuum once per week, the robots dustbin might choke before returning to evacuate contents to the base?) The app will actually develop a floor map of where the robot has cleaned. Tech support is available and the agents speak understandable English....but see below. Second, the bad: The software that drives this unit AV911S EZ appears to be glitchy. Ive made 5 phone calls for tech support in 25 days, spending well over 4 hours trying to get the robot to operate as designed. It was quite time consuming to get the robot, my wifi, and the app to communicate. I paid $299 for my model, which has the docking station and attempts to clean in a logical pattern as it builds up a map of your floor plan. This model does not have the AI (Artificial Intelligence) that some very similar Shark models have. This is VERY IMPORTANT, because when you set up the software, the app will ask to choose between AI model and non-AI model. They both have the same docking station, so do not go by the picture on the screen, just remember that AV911S EZ is not AI, so choose No. [Initially the robot would not return to its base. The tech support agent instructed me to delete everything and start from scratch. As the agent guided me through the set up, the question about AI came up and this 2nd time I choose no instead of yes. The end result was that the robot was able to return to its docking base.] There was still difficulty in pairing the app, the wifi, and the robot. By the statements made by the agent, I gathered that this is a glitchy process that must be repeated until it works. I wont recount the few hours of frustration when the robot would simply run out its battery and stall, as these may have been due to an incorrect set up. If you buy this unit, do yourself a favor and have the agent talk you through the initial set up of the software....there are several places where even a tech-savvy consumer is forced to guess what to do. Once the robot was paired over wifi with the app, I was able to set a daily cleaning schedule. The robot has rather weak suction compared to my previous Samsung robot, but as the Shark cleans every day, I think it gets a fair amount of dirt. Dont expect miracles: If you run an AC-powered floor vacuum over the rug after a pass by Shark robot, dont be surprised to see a HUGE amount of dirt in the dust cup of the AC vacuum. Its hard to objectively compare vacuum efficiency, but I can say that Shark robot picks up only half as much dirt as the Samsung robot (my previous model is no longer for sale, or I would have bought it again.) But... the large dust cup on the Samsung had to be emptied after every cleaning, whereas the Shark returns to its dock and transfers dust/dirt to the base station. Another bad point: The Shark needs a lot of attention. Several times during the past few days it has given an stopped cleaning with an app error message that its cliff sensors are blocked. I followed the cleaning instructions and see no dirt on the cliff sensors of this nearly-new unit. Another error message is that Robots bumper got stuck while trying to clean. Instructions are to clean the bumper and make sure it moves freely in and out. I see no evidence of obstruction in the bumper. I believe that these are software glitches. Ive spoken to the agents about software issues, asking whether these glitches will be fixed, and when. They seem to understand that the software that drives the AV911S EZ requires a lot of attention. They do not criticize their own product, but they thinly disguise the need to call in for tech help frequently. They urge me not to return the product to Amazon, but to file warranty claims. Im not willing to rely on the warranty. Why dont I trust the warranty? Because if the software is buggy and Shark doesnt intend to fix it, I would spend lots of time working with Shark tech support, until the time I spend far exceeds the time I wouldve spent vacuuming manually! Yes, the agents are patient and helpful. But at least three times theyve told me to uninstall everything and reinstall. This is quite time-consuming. My Shark model was significantly less expensive ($299) than the same model now (25 days later)... Now it is $420. Is this the same model, or is it updated? Who can say? I ask these questions but cannot get answers. Speaking to the point of excessive time: This Shark Robot saves time by emptying its dust bin into the base every time robot returns to the base. The robot requires you to keep your house neater than you might have in the past, as stray objects will interfere with the robots path--a blessing in disguise. But....I realize that in the month Ive owned the robot, Ive spent more time futzing with it than I would have spent simply vacuuming the floor and rugs!!! I love gadgets, and robot vacuums are cool, but I really want it the robot to SAVE me time. I am probably going to return this within the 30-day grace period because I dont want to be stuck with a product that may not ever be able to work properly. I would keep it if I had assurance that software bugs were being fixed, but it is not possible to determine this. Today, a decent product is not enough; everything seems to be software driven. If the software is problematic, the whole product becomes problematic.

The pros: it does do a decent job of cleaning and works well on my carpet and much better on my tile. It has only gotten stuck once and sadly was under my desk. The unit has gone throughout my home (areas i want vacuumed). The unit is small enough to get under my couches, bed, and will make its way around my chairs and tables. Overall, there is value in the unit and what it can do. Wearable/Replacement parts seem to be readily available and priced reasonably. The cons: the AI/mapping is rudimentary at best. We have cars that can successfully self-drive but we cant seem to get a vacuum to map a home correctly. Ive now reset my unit 3x and tried to get a good map of my home... and to date without a strong degree of success. I get a map. The map has some areas that look like my home, but.. and esp as you get outside my open floor plan area, it seems to struggle understanding where my bedrooms, baths, office, laundry, etc are in relation to the open area. it seems to use the first 2 runs to do the initial map of your home and doesnt seem to up date the initial map much after that... if at all. After that, it just seems to clean what it mapped on those first 2 runs and doesnt really update the map after that (or so it hasnt seemed to in this case). Help resources stink. Theres not much in the literature and even less online. So, do i wait for some sort of notice that the map is complete or do i accept the initial one and it will update it as it learns more?? The unit runs for 60 minutes then docks. It doesnt matter if the battery is 15% at the end or 80%. it docks after 60 min and there doesnt seem to be any way to change this (ive been completely throughout the settings.. and again.. documentation is terrible esp within the app).Evac and resume will pause for 3 hours regardless if the battery charge is 15% (which it needs some charge) or 80% (it should just resume at this point.. but no, its going to sit for 3 hours). it does this regardless if its cleaning or if its mapping out your house. Firmware updates are pushed and cannot be requested. So, lets assume my firmware is out of date by a release or 2. I cannot download and apply it to my unit. it has to be pushed from some central server somewhere to my unit. Im not sure if my release is current or not (2020 is the date of the last update... which may be WHY the AI/mapping seems quite dated in capability). And, if this is the latest version... that would have me question the commitment by the manufacturer for this product. Overall, the unit is good. It does a fair job at cleaning and does offload the stuff it picks up into the bin which does last a while (have the 45 day bin). The unit does a really good job of avoiding getting stuck and if it vacs up something (like a toddlers sock) it will alert you to the issue. There is so much more potential with this device and it seems much of this is software/firmware related (hardware is pretty solid). Im hoping the company makes some changes to allow some more self-service, improves the mapping and AI capabilities, and releases regular updates. If not, then open this thing up to third party tools which will do this for us.

I bought this after doing a lot research. I thought it was nicely priced and had a lot of features considering the cost. It cleans very well sometimes going over the same area more than once. The self emptying is a particularly nice feature and on a cleaning run, it will often interrupt the cleaning to empty itself then start over where it left off. Its pretty good with hair as long as its not very long. I am not so sure that the bin on the base will go for 30 days as I usually empty mine after a week or at most 2 weeks. It is however not maintenance free... The filter in the robot as well as one in the base does need cleaning every now and then to maintain the great sucking power that it has and I usually take off the brush and remove the hair that is tangled there. As I have a baby in the house and hence lots of food particles on the floor, I activate the robot twice daily and clean the robot every 2 weeks though it is probably un-necessary to do it so often as the filter and brush are usually not very dirty at that time. My only negative comment is that there is no option for a remote to the best of my knowledge bearing in mind that the app to control the device doesnt work in all countries outside of the USA as I painfully found out when I tried to download the app. That unfortunately converts it from being really smart to being somewhat retarded as it learns the position of bits of furniture but if they are removed, it still avoids the area as if they were still there. I took off one star for this reason and would not recommend this particular unit if you live outside of the USA or its territories.

Works fantastic on our hardwood floors and carpeted rooms. I dont think Ive had to bust out my old vacuum since getting one of these for the upstairs and one for the downstairs. We have 3 cats that would track around kitty litter and shed everywhere. This vacuum does a fantastic job of keeping our floors clean and comfortable to walk around barefoot on. (I did buy the no tangle rollers since cat hair/human hair was building up on the roller and getting wrapped around it eventually stopping the roller from turning and needing manual intervention. I havent had the no tangle rollers for long so well see if theyre any better than the stock ones) Only complaint is the mapping doesnt work the best. The robot will ignore the no go zones and you have to wipe the map and start over to try to get them to apply. Mapping software could use some work. Also youll want to run these during the day/in a well lit room. Ive tried running them late at night or early in the morning and due to the lack of light they get lost and cant find the docking station. Verdict: Despite the buggy mapping software for no go zones and low light issues I love the fact I no longer have to vaccum!

Vacuum cleans great. I love that it empties itself when full.

I cannot believe how much I adore this vacuum. I have 4 dogs and live on a farm. Vacuuming is a daily chore and I haven’t had to do anything since this thing arrived. Set up was easy. It runs daily and I empty weekly. Easy and so efficient!!

Pros: I have a shedding lab and the unit works great getting the hair off the hardwood floors. It rarely gets stuck under furniture or tangled in power cords. Gets dirt and hair out from under the smallest crevasses with its front sweeper brushes. Empties itself when complete. Cons: Its a little noisy when cleaning, especially when emptying itself into the main container. The mapping system is inaccurate at times with the machine hunting for the base station for several minutes. Ill send the machine to a single room to clean, but it seams to partially clean other areas as well. Doesnt get up the dog hair thats on the rug. I bust out the large upright vac for that. In all its really worth the price and the pros far outweigh the cons. Works much better than my first robot cleaner I bought in 2017. Its like day and night better! If the mapping worked better Id give it 5 stars.