[REVIEW] Roborock S8: The flagship among robot vacuums with 6000 Pa suction, a 3D camera and a vibrating mop

In our editorial team, we thoroughly tested the new robot vacuum Roborock S8. It’s the brand’s flagship model with exceptionally strong suction power up to 6000 Pa, a pair of rotating brushes, a vibrating mop, and 3D mapping of the space.

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Since this is one of the models in the flagship series, we had high expectations. Let’s take a look together and see whether these specs and features are reflected in the vacuuming and mopping quality.

Where to buy the Roborock S8?

For testing, the Roborock S8 vacuum was provided by our close partner, Geekbuying e-shop, which has official cooperation directly with the Roborock manufacturer.

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The vacuum cleaner is available in both white and black right in the Polish warehouse, which means express delivery in up to 7 days. Shipping is completely free. Another advantage of buying Roborock products from Geekbuying is the full 2-year warranty with service across Europe.

Technical specifications

Package contents and quality

The Roborock S8 robot vacuum was delivered from the Polish warehouse by DPD courier in a box measuring 44.5 x 39.5 x 13.5 cm. As is typical, Roborock packs its products double—so in this case the product box is wrapped in an additional protective box as well. You’ll also appreciate the plastic handle for easier carrying.

The inside of the box is arranged in the same spirit, with the robot vacuum packed neatly together with all the accessories. Besides the vacuum itself, you’ll also find a small charging dock, the power cable, and a silicone mat under the vacuum.

The vacuum itself is protected very well too. You’ll find a transparent film on it, a sticker on the front camera, and it’s all wrapped again in another layer of silicone. The packaging quality is truly at a high level, just as you’d expect from a flagship model.

The package contents are more or less standard, except for a mat for the vacuum cleaner—something you don’t usually find in robotic vacuum cleaner boxes. Our only reservations are about the power cable, which is very short. It measures just 95 cm.

Build quality and design

The design of most robotic vacuum cleaners is almost identical, and this one is no exception. The Roborock S8 has the classic round shape with a protrusion on the top side, where the LiDAR system for scanning the space is hidden.

Along with that, you’ll also find three buttons on the top (power off / power on, cleaning, return home) and the Roborock logo with a slightly wavy plastic surface. We had the vacuum in white, but it’s also available in black.

The top cover also has a removable hatch under which there is a dirt container with a 400 ml capacity. The water tank is at the back edge, from where it slides out easily. Its capacity is 300 ml and, at a glance, it’s quite small.

On the front edge of the vacuum, you’ll also find an IR camera used for 3D scanning of the space. The bottom is traditionally where the rotating brush lives, but in this case you’ll find two right there.

Of course, there are also sensors to prevent falls down stairs, large wheels with a distinct tread, and a place to attach a mop. Here you can notice a small metal part that handles mop vibrations. We’ll talk about that a bit later.

App and adding the vacuum cleaner

The Roborock S8 works with its own Roborock app, which you can find on the Google Play store or in the App Store if you have an iPhone. The app requires registration and then logging in.

Adding the vacuum cleaner is very easy and quick. During pairing, we scanned the QR code located under the top hatch next to the dirt container, entered the password for our WiFi network, connected to the vacuum’s WiFi network, and the rest ran automatically.

At the end of this process, the app also guided us through the initial settings, asking whether we would clean multiple floors, whether we have carpets or pets. Naturally, you can change these settings later through the app.

First space scan

Unlike some other vacuums that, during the first scan, also clean the rooms and move in detail alongside the apartment walls, the Roborock S8 simply passes through all rooms quickly. During these short visits, it maps the space, identifies the individual rooms, and draws them into a map.

For scanning rooms, it uses an LDS LiDAR system placed on the top of the vacuum and rotating to scan 360° around it. The IR camera in the front also helps this system—allowing the vacuum to create a 3D model of the rooms and avoid obstacles.

The room map is further improved during the first cleaning, but room-by-room division isn’t completely accurate. The vacuum considers several narrow areas as a passage into the next room, so you’ll need to adjust the map for more precise separation.

High performance and dual brush

The Roborock S8 delivers suction power up to 6000 Pa. The manufacturer calls this system HyperForce. Suction performance is supported by two rotating brushes positioned very close to each other that spin in opposite directions. The side three-armed brush is only one in this case.

Also impressive is the Carpet Boost+ function, which automatically detects carpets on which the robotic vacuum increases suction power to the maximum. Another option is extra carpet vacuuming after it finishes cleaning—when the Roborock S8 returns only to the carpets.

If the vacuum has a mop installed, it can lift it slightly, or it can skip carpets completely, and it can even damp-mop them. You’ll find these options in the settings under Carpet Settings.

Vacuuming and mopping options

On the main screen in the app, you’ll find all the important vacuuming and mopping settings that you change most often. The first option is choosing between cleaning the whole space, selected rooms, or zones.

Other options include choosing the mode:

• vacuuming and mopping
• mopping
• vacuuming
• custom

When vacuuming and mopping at the same time, you can choose suction power, mopping levels, and the cleaner’s path type. For suction power, there are the following modes: Silent, Balanced, Turbo, and Max. There are three mopping levels, split according to how much water the vacuum uses.

There are two path types: Quick and Standard. However, with the Quick path you have to tolerate some imperfections in cleaning, because it’s essentially a sped-up cleaning where the vacuum skips the room perimeter walls and doesn’t clean them as thoroughly. Cleaning our apartment with the Quick mode takes 19 minutes, while Standard cleaning takes about 35 minutes.

Separate mopping offers, besides three water quantity levels, four path types. In addition to the Quick and Standard modes mentioned above, there are also Deep and Deep+. In Deep mode, the floor is cleaned along Z-shaped paths, so every spot is covered twice. Deep+ mode also reduces the vacuum’s speed to 20 cm/s.

Separate vacuuming has, besides the four basic levels, an additional one—the strongest—labeled MAX+. The custom mode lets you configure each room separately using those levels.

Vacuuming and mopping quality

So the vacuum should handle all kinds of dirt without any problem, which we’ll verify in our test. In the kitchen, we scattered various mess like coffee, oats, and lentils onto the floor.

Before vacuuming, you can see how it looked in the photo above. Solid particles like lentils are usually a tougher challenge for robot vacuums, but the Roborock S8 handled them really well. After the first pass in the highest MAX+ mode, only a few pieces remained on the floor—those were picked up by the side brush exactly in the spots where the vacuum had already been. After the second run, even those disappeared.

Overall, the cleaning quality is excellent, and we’re extremely satisfied with the vacuum’s performance.

We tested the mopping in a similar way too. In the kitchen, we spilled milk and water mixed with cocoa. We waited until the mixture dried on the floor overnight, and then ran the vacuum with the highest mopping level, Deep+.

On the photos, you can see what the floor looked like before mopping:

And then after the first and second mopping:

Of course, dried milk is a tough challenge for a robot vacuum, because these smears even gave Roborock Dyad Pro with its rotating brushes quite a hard time. Cocoa stains, however, were removed excellently after the first mopping, and we’re overall very happy with the mopping quality.

As we mentioned earlier, in Deep+ mode the Roborock S8 goes over each spot multiple times, because the imaginary lines of its route are much denser than during vacuuming. The vibrating mopping function also helps achieve better results.

Collision and obstacle avoidance

Since the Roborock S8 has a camera in the front, it can effectively avoid unexpected obstacles too. For example, if we step into the vacuum’s path, it immediately stops and neatly goes around the obstacle.

Overall, the vacuum has a very smooth, clean movement—it bumps into walls or furniture only exceptionally. Unlike some other vacuums, it doesn’t waste time in tight spaces.

When it comes to overcoming obstacles, it can handle thresholds up to 2 cm high, or other obstacles. We only have a higher threshold leading into the bathroom, which is 2.3 cm, and the vacuum didn’t even try to get over it from underneath.

Map in 3D too

By default, the app shows a map of the rooms split into individual areas, and it also offers the option to switch to 3D view. Of course, only walls appear here, but we can improve the 3D map nicely by adding furniture, setting the floor type, or adding carpets.

Among the furniture, we have beds, a sofa, an armchair, a TV cabinet, a dining table with chairs, a classic table, a coffee table, a wardrobe, a shoe cabinet, a bedside table, and more. We’re perhaps missing only the kitchen unit. Adding furniture only serves an aesthetic purpose and has no impact on vacuuming or mopping.

As for the other map settings, you’ll also find the standard options like splitting or merging rooms, naming them, a virtual wall, a no-go zone for vacuuming or mopping. Another option is setting the floor type and the cleaning order. Here you can choose either an intelligent order based on room type or a manual order, where you decide the sequence yourself.

You can rotate the map by 90° in either direction, or switch between the mentioned 3D and 2D views. An interesting feature is intelligent obstacle detection.

The map then shows identified obstacles such as shoes, an extension cord, or cables. For each of these identified obstacles, the confidence level of the recognition is also displayed. However, this feature is available only in 2D map view.

Even though the vacuum identifies cables or an extension cord as obstacles, it can still get tangled in such cables instead of completely avoiding them.

Of course, you can also save up to four maps if the vacuum operates on multiple floors.

More settings

In the Roborock app settings, there are several interesting options. These include the mentioned reactive obstacle avoidance, scheduling vacuuming or mopping based on a selected time with the option of recurring repeats. There is also a carpet cleaning setting, which we’ve already talked about.

It’s also interesting that you can set the vacuuming direction along the individual floor planks to avoid crossing the seams at right angles, especially on wooden or laminate flooring.

There are also settings for volume and the language of voice alerts, although Slovak or Czech are still missing, LED button backlighting can be turned off, and there’s a child lock, Do Not Disturb mode, or charging during off-peak electricity hours.

You can also send the vacuum to a selected spot on the map or control its movement with the directional arrows. You’ll also find history in the form of activity logs and the status of individual components such as the filter, sensors, mop, or side brush.

Runtime on a single charge

The new Roborock S8 has the same battery as its predecessor, the Roborock S7. It’s a 5200 mAh battery, which the manufacturer says should be enough for 300 m² of vacuuming or 180 m² of mopping, or 180 minutes of operation. However, it doesn’t state the important detail of the mode in which these values were measured.

We tried to drain the robot vacuum in the highest MAX+ vacuuming mode, which we managed to do in almost 3 full cleanings of our apartment, during which it covered a total of 92 m² and took 104 minutes. At 19% battery, the vacuum returned to the charging station to recharge. Charging to 100% took about 5 and a half hours.

One cleaning in MAX+ mode used about 25 – 28% of the battery. For comparison, vacuuming in Balanced mode with simultaneous mopping at the medium setting used 15%.

Roborock S8: Final verdict

The Roborock S8 robot vacuum belongs to the flagship model line, and we have to admit, rightly so. It offers a high suction power of up to 6000 Pa, a pair of rotating brushes placed right next to each other, 3D room scanning with an IR camera, and several smart features.

The cleaning performance is excellent, and thanks to the vibrating mop and thorough coverage of each area, it ranks among robot vacuums with higher-quality mopping. Obstacle avoidance is also pleasing, as are intelligent obstacle detection, a 3D map with furniture, and plenty of customization in the clear app.

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The only real downside is perhaps the higher price, but for that you get a truly excellent robot vacuum.