Отзывы о Робот-пылесос Neato Botvac D5 Connected

Dissapointing product. The cleaning seems to be adequate but the charging base design is so poor that the vaccumm is seldom able to place itself on the base. Which makes the vaccuum lose it’s charge throughout the night because it keeps wants to reposition on the base but isn’t Able to get adequate positionning and then you spend your day playing with it in hopes it has enough battery to clean your house. You then realize you should of vaccuumed your house yourself. I reached out to customer service via they’re website and no answer after 48h. For a 700$ product you would think they would care more. Returning.

 3 Year Update: Robot dead. Replaced battery, hard reset, just plain dead. No help from the internet except tons of people with the same problem: blue and green lights flashing, unresponsive dead robot and it cannot connect to the internet. Seems too early to die so downrated to 2-stars. No more tech support "due to the global impact of covid-19." Game over.

-----

2 Year Update: While the app has evolved a lot in the positive, the algoritmic updates to the robot have seriously worsened. The latest update is really bad, the robot consistenly gets stuck on nothing but backing itself up to a long flat wall. There are also more reduntant patterns that hit many areas many times, and other areas not at all. It seems the company has made serious hiring mistakes, manifesting in serious programing incompetence. The robot used to work PERFECTLY, now it gets stuck in several places 100% of the time and can't complete a floorplan. I'm pretty angry about the software "upgrade" incompentence.

-----

1.5 Year Update: Best purchase ever.

-----

4 Month Update: I love this robot!! No issues. My routine has evolved a little... before I run the vac, I wipe down all my kitchen and table surfaces right onto the floor. Neato sweeps it all clean. Just great!
------

I am so impressed by this robot! After my first, highly rated vacuum robot (Eufy 11) ended in frustration and dissappointment, I wondered if any of them really worked. Well thank goodness, they do.

The important thing to realize when buying a vac bot, and it is not admitted by the manufacturers, is that there are two basic types of vac bots:

1. Random path, unknown position
2. Calculated path, known position

Type 1 means the bot has no way to know where it is, it uses a random pattern until the battery is about 15% capacity, then it turns off suction to save power and adopts a more linear pattern to attempt to accidentally find its base before dying. Surprisingly, this can work pretty well in a small space, where the machine is bound to colide with its base after a few minutes of blind wandering. But, if your floor plan is larger than around 700 to 1000 sq feet, chances of docking successfully fall off sharply. At around 2000 sq ft, you'll have to get very lucky to dock before the bot dies. The blind luck method can be improved by buying multiple docks, if sold separately (not for Eufy). These bots have no cleaning area knowledge, so they will only clean all floor areas through many uses in a game of chance.

Type 2 bots are for homes where blind luck is unlikely to work reliably, if at all. These bots have some method of determining position and are able to truly "navigate" back to their charging base when low on battery. Additionally, they may plan and adopt a vacuuming pattern for thoroughness and efficiency.

Just as my Eufy 11 experience showed me the frustrations of Type 1 bots (= under $350 or so), my Neato showed my the joys of a perfectly executed Type 2 bot.

I'm amazed at the meticilous detail and methodical patterns this Neato vac traces as it attacks every few square inches of my VERY complex floorspace.

Plus, Neato easily rides over surface transitions and through obstacle courses that beached Eufy 11 everytime.

For one thing, Neato can back up. Backing up seems to be off limits to a random bot, because it has no idea where it is and could fall down stairs, etc. Neato also raises its wheels to climb onto thick rugs or to free itself from dragging loose objects and cords. It's fun to watch and extremely effective!

Neato will still get stuck on a thin sock, or shoes with lose laces etc. If you wouldnt roll over it with a full size vacuum roller brush, then Neato will probably suck it into the roller too. On a great note, the roller pops right out for easy cleaning and the design keeps all hair, thread, and other entanglements within the removable brushes, the base machine is not susceptible to tangling. Great design!

In a nut shell, this bot is about 2x more money, but it works beautifully. The Type 1s bots are not cheaper alternatives for multiroom use because blind luck is not a viable docking/charging strategy. So you can't really consider Type 1 bots to be price competion for Neato, because they will never recharge reliably in multiroom settings, nor clean your entire floorplan. Ever. Neato will work everywhere Type 1s work, but Type 1s will not work everywhere Neato will work.

Another great thing about Neato is the full length frontal brush. That means every bit of the carpet gets both brushed and vacuumed. And one thing I didn't expect was how beautiful my hardwood floors would be polished by Neato. Cheaper bots have a few inch brush, so not only is their path random, but also less than 50% effective because the brush is less than half the width of the unit.

If the high cost of a quality working vac bot is worth it to you depends on your situation, but at least the Neato provides a terrific solution for larger or complex homes.

The only downside of this model is the dust bin is not very large, but it is larger than most vac bots. All models need emptying after every 90 mins or so.

Not recommend gets stuck everywhere

Updated Review: here we are more than 2 years later. I now own the Neato Botvac D5 and the a Neato Botvac D7! We replaced the Roomba that had been banished to the basement because we tired of going around trying to find it (it was always getting stuck or couldn’t find/,make it back to its base). We love our Botvacs so much! We even purchased the Botvac D7 for our son as a housewarming gift! He loves his too! His floors are all wood with two large (thick) area rugs and it has no problems navigating the different surfaces and patterns. I can’t say enough wonderful praises about the Neato Botvac! On another note, Roomba recently launched a new commercial that shows the stand sucking up the dirt out of the vacuum. Really? Is it that difficult to lift the lid and dump the debris and simply set it back on the Botvac? SMH🤦🏼‍♀️ I might be considered lazy because I have a robot that vacuums my house, but who would vacuum their house every other day? I wouldn’t, but my robots will! They will even do it while I am snuggly in bed asleep saving me tons of time to do all of life’s other wonderful things! Hands down, Neato is still in the lead when it comes to robotics!!!

Original review: Okay. This might be lengthy but our Neato D5 Connected has earned the praise. Like others, we too have the best Roomba. But it was banished to the basement because it can't handle carpets with any black in the pattern. I have several very expensive carpets from 12' x17' and smaller sizes but they all have black in the pattern so Roomba gets confused and thinks it's a cliff then swirls around helplessly trying to turn around until the battery wears out!
Now let's talk about the Neato Botvac D5 Connected. This vacuum does it all! Black patterns in the carpet are no match for the Neato! Our first floor is quite large so more than one run was necessary. But she goes right back to where she left off when the battery is charged up. We love be he way she glides over the carpets in a methodical way (unlike the Roomba) and gets up everything off the floor. We have three Great Danes and there is no trace of them in the house when my Neato Botvac is finished! She runs in the dark with no problem at all! We have a very large open floor plan and I was concerned the Botvac wouldn't get all areas cleaned. But she did! It's also quite amazing for it to know how to lower herself to go under my sofas! She shrinks down if she is too tall! We have a large round table with six chairs. How she managed to maneuver around the pedestal and chairs amazed us! She can even lift herself to get out of a jamb! (Not the Roomba. Even in the basement we have to go hunt and find the Roomba because it always gets lost and stuck.) I also have to mention when she goes back to her base to charge she literally backs her back side in and wiggles until properly connected! Too funny!

Constantly have to go through device setup in its local hotspot to reconnect it to my wifi network. Devices further away stay connected. Nothing else has an issue.

I'm not convinced this is a product worth 300 let alone twice that.

I'll give it one more shot then I'm returning it.

Also the website isnt as clear as it could be. Not all connected devices have the "coverage map" feature. Only the connected version without a D designation.

I waited several months before writing this. We have had several issues with our D5. The unit becomes "offline" all the time and requires a reboot to see in the app. Extremely frustrating since it does continue to run on a schedule so if it gets stuck in our house we can't even use the find me feature anymore or even see a notification that it is stuck.

The old XV21 series used to have an issue occasionally where just before it would move it would throw an error. It required pushing the unit to get the motor moving. Surprisingly I had the same issue with this D5 yesterday. It would start to clean then stop just before moving, turn the suction motor off then do it again. When I watched it I recognized it was the same sort of problem the XV21 had.

In fairness it does work overall better than our old XV21 but I'm not sure I would buy this again with all of the other options available.

**edit 1-26-2018

We had to get the unit replaced, it took several weeks to get a replacement. The unit would not start cleaning and just throw an error. The new one still is generally just flaky. The app only alerts half the time when the unit is stuck. Several times now if it gets stuck it may throw the "please put me on the floor" message and it cannot be cleared. The unit has to be rebooted and cleaning restarted from scratch. Today it swept half the house, charged, and didn't continue to clean. The app still disconnects from the unit requiring a reboot. At this point we are really disappointed with this purchase and can't recommend it at all.

I have to agree with many others here, the new Neato D5 is a winner! This is the first robot vacuum system we ever owned, so did a lot of research and talking to others that owned competitive brands. We chose Neato since others mentioned their brand was round, so had a problem getting into corners and doing a good job. Neato is a D shape, so has corners that fit to clean. Others mentioned their brand would either go randomly across the rooms, or miss areas 5 inches away, and never come back to get them. Neato has NOT missed one spot yet for us.

We attribute the great cleaning coverage of the Neato D5 to the excellent programming and laser mapping this unit has. Though you can't see the laser, you can see the unit sitting and turning to map out the room and area. Plus, it remembers the areas that it traveled, such that when it comes by them again, it will automatically turn to do an overlap. It maneuvers itself graciously around table legs and chairs. It goes under our dining room set of many chairs and legs and manages to get around all of them, and it knows that they are there. If the laser doesn't pick it up, the very sensitive edges on the unit will very lightly touch the object, then remember it's there, and go around it.

As an example, we forgot about a tall thin ceramic vase we had sitting on the floor. A slight bump would knock it over. We saw the Neato coming toward it, and thought that's it, it's going to fall over. But NO, the Neato slowed down coming up to it, gave it a very gentle touch, and went in a circle around it. We were now very impressed and didn't worry after that. We also have a solid heavy square edged stainless steel table bottom, between 1/2" to 3/4" thick. It stopped when it came to that and couldn't go forward to get over it. Did that stop it? NO! It tried a couple times, realized it couldn't go forward, backed up, turned to an angle, then lifted it's one wheel taller, and went right up on it and continued to clean.

Speaking of wheels, there are two main drive ones on the Neato. On bare floor, the unit sits low to the floor, but when it comes to bumps, rugs, edging, etc, it moves one wheel or the other, or both, to a different height, then keeps on going. We thought for sure the unit was going to get itself stuck a few times from the situations that it got into, but, no again. The unit figures out how to get out of a jam. We watched it get into tight spaces like a maze, and sure enough, it's smart enough to figure how to get itself back out. Though there's a Find Me icon in the App on the smart phone, we haven't had to use it. It just kind of takes care of itself. We don't worry about it.

The App that you can load on your smart phone lets you set schedules, start and stop it, provides you with cleaning statistics, tech data, battery power, etc. We found the unit battery will at least go two hours, and if it hasn't finished cleaning (depending on size of the area), it will shut of it's vacuum, and find it's way back to it's base to charge. Never bumps into anything on the way either, it knows where it needs to go. As mentioned by another reviewer, it will go up to the base going forward, slow down, turn itself around, then slowly wiggle backwards to ensure it makes a good contact. It will then charge, and when done, leave again and go right back to the exact spot it left off to finish cleaning. The App provides status of everything going on if you want to know.

Since we have pets, if the vacuum filled up and needed emptied, that's not a problem either. You can tell it to remind you to clean bin at an interval you choose, or, if you forget, and the unit bin gets too full, or even if the brush gets tangled or needs cleaned, it will stop and signal you, and even send you a message from the App to let you know. If you want to clean just one room, all you do is sit it in the room, press Start, and close the door. When it's done, it returns itself to the exact spot you placed it and shuts itself off. If you have an area with no door, or a section where you don't want it to "cross that line", Neato provides a magnetic strip you can lay across that section, and the unit will not cross it.

Sorry for the ramble, but you can tell we're impressed with the Neato D5, and are very glad we chose this brand over any other manufacturer. We haven't found anyone else that has a unit that can do the same. Instead, they tell us what theirs can't do. So are we pleased, definitely Yes!

I also have the D80 botvac and I wanted to get another unit with more features. I have always been pleased with the software on the D80 and I love the features of the D5. I think you get what you pay for in this category and the quality of the laser mapping and cleaning patterns work much better than cheaper units I have tried. Plus I love the map feature so I get to see where the vac cleaned. I highly recommend this unit.

UPDATE: I am on the second one and still no luck. The first one I had failed after just 4 cleaning cycles. I think it was a laser issue but you don't get troubleshooting codes any more. I returned the 1st one and received the second unit. I was excited and after I pressed start the vac pulled away from the charger and then wouldn't run and required a reboot. I did the reboot and it finally did run but failed to finish a cleaning cycle and will never find the base. It also does not clean the full room anymore, it does a partial room and then just stops and I have it set to clean the whole house not the spot cleaning mode.

Its been 3 days and no customer service return notice so I think this one is just going back again. I am going to try a third vac but after that I am done with this model. For the high price tag you would think they would have a better quality unit.

Update 2: A week and no customer service so I am just returning the unit and based upon other 1 star reviews will not spend the money on this vacuum again.

This review for the Neato Botvac connected. I spent hours reading reviews all over the net, and decided to go with this one.
I have this bot for about 6 months, and love it, however, all reviews did not spend enough time to rate the reliability. Of this 6 months,
I’ve gone thru 3 combo brushes at $40 a pop 

This is an updated/revised review after 2 years. I'll address some of the comments that have appeared since my original review.

We've had our original D5 Connected for 2 years now. We schedule it to run every weekday to sweep up the main living floor of our house (about 1500 sq. feet), which is about 1/2 medium carpet and 1/2 hardwood floors. We have 3 indoor cats and a couple litter boxes in one room, where litter tends to get tracked onto the floor. We were so happy with our robot that we bought an identical one about a year later, to clean the other floor of our home.

We are quite happy with the way the Botvac cleans methodically, working one room before proceeding to the next, and the how well it cleans. It is surprisingly quiet (for a vacuum cleaner). It does take some trial and error and new habits to leave your house each morning in such a state that the Botvac won't get stuck on a pile of cables or dirty laundry or a floppy bathmat. We are still not experts in this, because 1 out of 5 cleans still sees the Botvac getting stuck somewhere and crying for help. Because it is wifi-enabled, it sends a notification to our phones--but of course we can't actually do anything about it until we get home.

The D5 can't clean that entire 1500-square-foot floor without recharging once. It gets about 3/4 done, but then has to go back to its docking station for an hour or so before getting back to work. It does a great job of cleaning, overall. It's so-so about cleaning around the cat litter boxes, but that's somewhat of an obstacle course in there, so I'm not disappointed on that account. It's great to come home to a clean floor--which is something of an obsession with my wife. She's named the Botvac "Onet" after a cat she had as a child. Cute.

Since my original review, the software has been updated several times. You can now interrupt a cleaning cycle from your app, and tell the Botvac to return to its charging base. You can even do this using Alexa. It was a big relief to get this working. Say you have scheduled your Botvac so that it *should* finish cleaning before you get home, but it gets stuck soon after starting its cycle (it can happen even when you've taken precautions). So you get home and hear it bleeping plaintively at you, and you un-stuck it. It goes about its duties for a bit while you fix dinner, and then it goes back to its dock. But it turns out it's only recharging before it can finish cleaning the rest of the house. A couple hours later, when you're lying in bed watching the latest Game of Thrones episode or getting ready to snuggle with your sweetie, your Botvac happily kicks back on and starts to clean again. Total buzz-kill! No you can at least order the thing back to base without getting out of bed.

You still don't the ability to define different rooms and have the robot clean just one of them. There is a "floorplans" option in the software, but it doesn't seem to work in this way. You would imagine that in this day and age the ability to tell your robot to clean only one room would be a no-brainer, and relatively easy to implement in software. (I am a tech specialist by trade, so I feel fairly confident in that statement). Yes, you can spot-clean using the Neato, but that's not the same thing. So, goodbye one star. Still, a great robot!

That said, recently we are dealing with an issue that has made our 2-year-old robot practically un-usable: the dirt bin latch is not "latching" well. The result of this is that the lip of the dirt bin pops up after the robot has bumped around the house for a short while. When this happens, an internal sensor throws an error and the unit stops in its tracks until the dirt bin is pushed back down. The issue is not with the dirt bin itself, but with a plastic tab on the main unit that should pop into a recess on a tab on the dirt bin--but is not doing so. I worked with Neato support on this issue, sent photos, and carefully compared the latch on my broken robot with that on my working one. I could detect no visible difference between the two, but clearly the older mechanism has simply worn out. The problem is that this plastic bit *seems* to be part of the main body molding (it's difficult to tell, being in such a recessed place). So I suspect that no simple part replacement will do. Indeed, Neato support simply told me that my unit was out of warranty and gave me the web addresses of some authorized service centers.

I think if this happened after 4 years, or even 3, I would be ok with it. And worn out batteries after a years is to be expected (I already did replace the battery, once). And of course, all the filters and brushes need replacement every few months. But a broken bin latch after 2 years? That strikes me as poor engineering. So minus another star for that. (It's tempting to subtract 2, but that would be just giving in to my frustration, and we really have appreciated having the thing, and *perhaps* this is just an unlucky fluke for us).

I'm going to have a close look at the unit this weekend. I'll see if I can open it up and devise a solution for this issue. I can be pretty handy that way. If that doesn't work, I suppose I'll end up paying for to have it serviced--and just hope they don't tell me that I might as well buy another vacuum!

Jeeves has been living with us for about two months now, and I will admit he came close to being sent back. However, the latest firmware update completely changed things and this little guy is now our best friend!

Our first robotic vacuum was a Neato XV Signature which worked well enough for us but eventually succumbed to the dreaded Error 3000. After going a couple years with no robots in the house, I once again took the plunge and got the D5 on the basis of my prior experience with Neato and the new features (i.e. connectivity).

Initial setup was pretty painless - download the app, start the bot, sync the wifi and away you go. The wifi setup was rather slow but Jeeves seemed happy enough for the first few days merrily cleaning our home at night. However, about a week into things, we started getting "Not Available" errors in the app. The only cure was to reset the bot and re-sync the wifi. In addition, he began having trouble navigating what seemed to be simple obstacles such as chair legs. About a week of this behavior had me about to send him back. Luckily for Jeeves, Neato pushed a new firmware update that added mapping and seemed to address the wifi and navigation issues. After the new firmware was installed, I have had ZERO issues with wifi and he has never gotten stuck on something that should have been picked up in the first place (dog toys, phone charger cables, etc.) I love the map feature as well, but we don't get to see our lifetime cleaning square footage like the previous version calculated. Only about 3 weeks of data is stored in the app as far as I can tell. The suction is powerful and the debris chamber is much larger than the XV series bots. The lithium batteries give us about 2 hours of cleaning time (about 1100-1200 sqft) so sometimes he'll get the house done on a single charge cycle.

A few of caveats to this gushing praise:

1) Jeeves runs at night, when everyone is asleep. He's much, much quieter than the XV Signature predecessor, but is not exactly whisper quiet. Since we sleep with doors closed to keep him corralled, it generally is not an issue. You will here some crashing and bashing if he's working on hard surfaces. On carpet he's actually quieter than our convention Oreck upright (albeit less powerful.)

2) Pick up anything that isn't tall enough to trigger the bumper or securely held in place. Shoes generally aren't a big problem but shoe laces are delicious. Phone charger cables are also a robot delicacy (although props to 

SO... I'm a previous owner of a D80 and have only positive reviews for that product from NEATO. When I did have an issue with the D80 I called the Neato support and they were fabulous. WELL, all that has changed. I recently got the D5 Connected and right out of the box it would run 8 minutes and then just stop. I called Neato support and while they were very nice and courteous it took them a week before I got a new battery to see if that was the problem. It wasn't. So I had to call again and then they stated that it wasn't the battery and that they would send this on to the next level to be approved while asking for the SAME information that I had given before with the battery. That was almost a week ago and they still haven't approved it. Called again today and found out that while I sent my email in on Friday today is a "bank holiday" and so it might not get taken care today. Needless to say, I will probably be waiting over 3 weeks AFTER I originally got my email to even get a replacement if that one works. I understand this problem may be unique to this one product and will change my review or update it when I do get the "new" one. However, I have to say I'm not as happy with my experience with their support as I was when I originally had my previous Neato product. That alone may make me choose another brand if we choose to go with something else.

Couple of other details just about the D5 Connected. DON'T like that it doesn't have an LCD and you have to get all information from the app.

LIKE that it is almost exactly like the D80 (minus the LCD), but with better battery life. Again will review more after I have a working product.

I ordered the D5 connected after watching probably 50 online video reviews and reading a lot of website information on the latest robot vacuum tech available. I opted for the Neato line because of the advanced room mapping and methodical cleaning that is promised. I wanted the D5 because it offers the best cleaning power and filtration for pet hair and allergens without going for the top of the line unit. So far, good choice.

I want to give a quick summary of my situation.
I have two large dogs. 1 Great Dane and 1 Pointer mix. The both shed quite a bit and it has been a hassle to say the least to keep up with vacuuming the dog hair. I could literally vacuum in the morning and it would need another go over later in the afternoon. I have a Dyson D17-Animal Upright so getting the hair up is not a problem... it's having to lug out the upright constantly that's an issue. After a recent couple of large gatherings at our house, I told my wife I plan to purchase the robo-vac to help keep up with the dog hair.

So, the unit arrived (3 days earlier than the estimated delivery... Woo-Hoo!!) I un-boxed it and quickly got it setup on our wifi Network (downloading the app on the phone this only takes a few minutes to be up and running). I immediately noticed that the bot had about 76% charge already but I let it top off for about 1/2 hour before I ran it the first time. Now... I have to say, I had vacuumed in the main area of my house... lightly... with my Dyson earlier in the evening as I had some people over to watch a movie.

After it had charged about 30 minutes, I decided to let it go on a test run to see how it worked. Well, as I have said, I watched a lot of video reviews and comparisons of these units so I was basically aware of what to expect... but... you just can't appreciate how intelligent this thing seems to be until you actually watch it in action. I'm a computer programmer and I have done board level development and some robotic programming... even in industrial... so I can appreciate the nuances that go into an AI algorithm. This is very impressive. I have a very odd shaped living area to begin with, but it is really cluttered with a lot of furniture, dog bowls, tv table stand... etc... We didn't really do a lot of setting up our house for the bot before running it the first time. I just wanted to see how it would handle things as they were. Well, it quickly scanned our family room and then began edge cleaning and working in sections cleaning one area at a time until it cleaned: Family Room, Dining Room, Kitchen, Living Room, Main Bathroom and a small hallway. It was really interesting to watch some of the subtleties of how it covered the floor (it would literally skip a small spot which at first a thought was an issue... but it would return to that one spot later and clean it after completing some other task. It knew it missed it... but had to come back to it).

When the cleaning was done and it returned to the docking station to charge, I removed the bin to see what it manged to pick up. I was absolutely shocked... the bin was stuffed completely full of dog hair, dust, dirt and other debris. I couldn't believe my eyes. Where the heck did it find all this as I had just done a light vacuuming earlier (see pics). I started walking the area checking to see if it had missed anything major and was again stunned to see how well it cleaned. I should also mention, we have hard floors throughout (tile in the main living area and laminate in the master bedroom) so I didn't test it on carpet. Other than a couple of spots where it wasn't able to get to the dirt because we hadn't moved the furniture to optimize it's cleaning... it didn't miss anything. I also want to mention, it cleaned 570 square feet in about 56 minutes. When it started the cleaning, it was at about 85% charge. When it finished, it was at 52% charge. The battery life is very impressive.

My son took it into his room the next day and did a 1 room cleaning. He was shocked how much dirt and hair it picked up from his room. I guess we don't realize how dirty our floors get until we see it.

Couple of things to note about the setup and unboxing:
1 - The wifi setup is a little confusing as the app automatically connects to the robot then asks for YOUR wifi. Initially, I was confused and thought it was asking my to find the robot to connect to but couldn't (the online videos show it doing that way). They must have changed this in a firmware update.
2 - All of the online information says you must use the included USBTG (usb tether) included with the unit to upgrade the firmware. This was not the case. Apparently, the latest release of firmware is now OTA (over the air) capable so the robot upgraded right over the app / wifi. Nice.
3 - This unit does not include any spare filters or brushes (side brush). They are on replacement reminders in the app, so you'll likely want to order some replacements before too long.

I currently have this unit scheduled to clean my main living area every day except Sunday at around 2:30 PM. We will have to see how it holds up from a maintenance standpoint and I will likely update my review with more information in a couple of months with any maintenance tips / concerns. I also should mention, I was an early adopter in Robot Vacuum technology. My first unit was one of the early Roomba vacs about 9 years ago. At that time, it was more of a gimmicky... nice to have techie thing that wasn't really practical. With the new technology and efficiency of what's available today... these are viable appliances in your house. Won't replace the manual vacuum. But I won't be needing to pull it out more than once a week and probably less than that.

12/14/17 Update - This robot has been cleaning my main part of the house at least 5 times a week since I got it. Other than a few minor glitches (getting stuck a few times) it has kept our house so much cleaner than it used to be... with the two big dogs. But... the main reason I wanted to post this update. I just received a notification today... the D3 and D5 (which I have) just got a firmware update... they now support the area cleaned map like the Botvac Connected (shows an actual map of the area that was cleaned that the robot detected after the job is done). It doesn't show a live update like the Xiaomi does, but this is an awesome update!! :) very cool. This way, I can see if the robot was seeing anything weird when it cleaned. Image of the first cleaning map is included (see my pics below).
12/23/2018 Update - After less than 1 year, sadly my Botvac D5 started acting oddly and would navigate erratically and report bizarre cleaning maps. It would get lost in the middle of the room and run out of battery without returning to recharge. I contacted support and after about 2 months of back and forth sending the unit in for repair, Neato determined the unit should be replaced and they sent me a new Botvac D6 upgrade. So, in general, I'm still happy with Neato because, although the process was a little frustrating at times, they did support the unit while under warranty (warranty had almost expired). I wasn't thrilled with the repair depot that they instructed me to send the unit to. It's in Texas / US and I looked the location up and it's a 3rd party repair center. They were not very helpful as they didn't package my unit very well when returning it and they never sent me anything regarding what was diagnosed or repaired with the unit. I did inform Neato of this in case they wanted to keep track of how their contracted repair centers are performing. So far, very happy with the D6.

I promised Neato customer service I would leave a review because they couldn’t care to help me with a robot they had replaced five months earlier. They snarkily told me the warranty on replacements was only three months, even though their warranty is one year on new robots. I told them I had gone through seven Neatos in seven years and I would not be buying another one since they’re clearly unreliable and their service staff have a nasty attitude. Switched to the robot that starts with an “R” and bought their top of the line model and I could not be happier. Have had very minor (compared to Neato) issues but their service staff do a great job. Kudos to them and shame on Neato.

Pros: I really like the D5 for its battery life as well as its cleaning pattern and mapping ability. Its capability to resume where it left off if it is unable to do the whole cleaning in one charge.
Cons: The side cleaning brush. It is so small it is USELESS when edge cleaning. The BOT never gets close enough to the wall or baseboards for it to even be effective. A longer bristle would have easily solved this problem.
Although I really like my D5. I also have a D3. The D3 is $200 dollars less, doesnt have a side brush (which doesnt work anyway), and does all the things that my D5 can do. It has a weaker battery than the D5. It just means it will recharge more often than the D5. 1800 sq.ft. vs 4500 sq.ft. of cleaning on a charge, but with the resume mapping its a better choice for smaller places.
Recommendation: Save $200 bucks and buy the D3. Great bot with lots of features for the price.

First, I should disclose that I’ve only had the D5 connect for one day. However, just based on the first vacuum it’s definitely five stars. My place is only 1400 ft.², but I have a golden retriever. That basically means that vacuuming at least four times a week is a must. The last time I had vacuumed , Prior to using the D5 for the first time was just three days ago. Look at the hair and other things that it got up on its first run! The ability to have this thing run once a day will keep my place smelling much cleaner.

UPDATE: Since my first review was after only one day of ownership I wanted to update now that I've been using it going on 5 months. It is still AWESOME and a lifesaver.....and I run it every single day due to my boy Rudy (my Golden Retriever). In fact, I bought a second one for my vacation home in the Rockies. I noticed some negative reviews about network issues and I will say that the first few weeks it would occasionally fall offline. However, since the last software update that has been entirely resolved. These are not cheap but if it lasts just two years I will feel like I got every bit of value out of my investment. Anything beyond that will be icing.

Update Two: First disappointment. The top of dirt bin won't stay down and on further inspection one of the 3 plastic tongues broke off.....just a few months out of warranty. Just had to drop $85 on a new one, which seemed pricey.

We have had this vacuum for 7 months now. I was very happy at first. The robot does a great job of cleaning the whole house and navigating its way around. Unfortunately at about 5 months, the space behind the brush leading up to the collection bin started to get clogged. Despite taking the vacuum apart and cleaning it, the problem would come back every week or so. I reached out to their customer service and that’s when the fun started. It took over a month of calls every other day to get them to acknowledge there was a problem and agree to replace the unit. You get bounced from person to person with no follow up. I think their philosophy is eventually you’ll get tired and give up. Even once we got to the point of agreement on a replacement it took another month and calls every other day to actually get a replacement shipped to me. The worst part is that less than a month with the new one, the same issue is recurring. It’s a design flaw. The hole from the brush to the collection bin is too small and get clogged. You have to take the vacuum apart to clean it. If you don’t have a star wrench, you won’t even be able to do that. Such a pain. We are going back to roomba. This thing is a piece of junk!

I love this vacuum. I've had it for over 9 months now, I didn't want to write a review right away because I wanted to give it a real test and after this amount of time, I can give a real review.

A little background on my house, I have all hardwood on my first floor with 2 area rugs - one of which is a thick pile and one is a medium pile. My second floor is all wall to wall carpeting except for vinyl in the bathrooms and laundry room. I have 2 cats and a dog, they all shed. I also have 2 boys, who just turned 6 and almost 4. There are a lot of crumbs. I run the vacuum upstairs during the day, while we're downstairs and downstairs at night when we're in bed. I pick up the cats' water bowl and I also pick up and shake out bath mats, etc. A tiny bit of prep work so this guy can do his job. Totally worth it. The bin is full every time it runs with dust, dog hair, Legos, coins. It picks it all up. I will include a picture of our thicker pile rug, as well as a Lego man that was picked up.

It does require some maintenance, as with anything. Every Saturday, I take 5-10 minutes and vacuum the inside, the dirt bin, I take the roller brush out, and vacuum all throughout there. I change the filter once a month. You may be able to do it less often if you don't have as many pets, etc. I bought the cheaper ones on Amazon, I think I-clean is the brand. I very occasionally will also take some canned air and spray around the circle on the top where the "eyes" are. I will do that if it seems to be getting confused, getting stuck in weird places or saying it's finished when it's not. Once I spray and clean the eyes, it's back to new. I've only had to do this twice in the 9 months.

I used to have tumbleweeds of animal hair along all edges of my floors, not anymore. I used to have a cleaning service and was able to get rid of them, and I always say it's because of this vacuum! It goes completely under one of my kid's beds, not the other (because it's too low) but that's ok.

You also need to understand how this thing works, it cleans in sections, so it will do the border of a roughly 15x15 foot section and then go back and forth in beautiful lines in that area and then it will move on to the next area. It will keep doing this until the whole floor is cleaned. My OCD is calmed with straight lines. I would not be able to handle a random pattern. It works in the dark. It works on black flooring. It can get itself unstuck most of the time. When it's climbing onto my higher pile carpet, it will attempt to climb on straight and then it will back up and approach it at an angle. Amazing to watch. It doesn't go under my chairs because when it does, it normally gets stuck. But when I want a really thorough clean, I just pick up the chairs and stools.

The app sucks after the latest update, but the vacuum works very well. I can start and stop it with the app and love the cleaning map (that wasn't available on this model when I first got the vacuum, but they updated the app to include it and I love that). But I always put my phone on airplane mode at night, and it used to just tell me in the morning that it was done cleaning, but now (after this latest update) it doesn't tell me unless my phone is connected at the time that it finished. It's really no big deal as it's still cleaning whether my phone is connected to it or not. And that's more important to me!

Overall, I don't think I could live without this vacuum (maybe that's an extreme statement, but maybe not), because my house is finally clean, all the time. The animal hair doesn't get a chance to build up. Very satisfied customer! And yes, I paid full price. I'm not lucky enough to get things for free. If this broke tomorrow, I would with certainty buy it again! But I hope it doesn't!!

Update: 4-6-2019: I've had this almost 2 years now, and still love it. Now that neato has updated the software, I never get errors that it's not connected. I also don't have to pick up the cats' water bowl because I can create the virtual no go lines. I have to give it to neato, when they update, they give the older vacuums all the newer features. How many companies do that? The app works great now, and I love that I can create the floor plan and draw a no go line. Still really happy with this vacuum!

 UPDATE: A new application update has released allowing me to use it. I was given an RMA on 3/13, so I have sent the robot back. They estimate 1-2 weeks after receipt I will get a replacement sent to me.

UPDATE 2: Just got the replacement unit. The shipping was actually fast.

Update 3: The brush gear is stuck on my unit and unable to clean. There isn't a way to clean the gear or belt drive like on older units, as it is sealed. I'm assuming Neato will have me send it back again. I've had a ticket open with Neato for weeks now, they were responding initially, but I've been unable to get a response for over 2 weeks.

Update 4: After over a month of contacting customer service initially I was able to get in touch with them after escalating to their Facebook account. My new replacement robot has arrived today.

Update 5: Fall of 2019 the unit began to have issues traversing the house. Thesholds, rugs and carpets became his nemesis. The wheels will spin as though he is bottomed out or struggling for traction. I'm not sure if the tires have worn down, causing his ride height to lower or if there is some additional drag on the drive motors. I've sent a message to Neato December of 2019, as cleaning the tires didn't help.

Original Review:

I'm a long time Neato customer. First with the XV, then a Botvac D80.

Initially I was a little wary of something that is internet connected and uses wireless. The internet of things is a double edged sword. After reading reviews however it seemed like a great improvement due to the lithium ion battery.

So first off, the android phone application will not launch on my Nexus 6, but it works fine with my wife's Pixel. Neato has said that due to my Android 8.1 beta it is crashing. There is no fix other than for me to downgrade the OS on my phone. That's fine I can still program it using my tablet or my wife's phone.

The first 3 weeks were great, it is quieter than older models and seems to clean better. The way it maps a room is very efficient. Also the map it creates is visible, so you can see where it covered and what it sees.

About 4 weeks after purchase the unit stopped cleaning. It will pull forward from the base, spin up the motor, beep and stop. It repeats this a few times, then requests to be rebooted. After reboot the same happens. This is despite the room it is started in or time of day.

I opened a ticket, but it took a few days for them to respond and only after I sent a 2nd email. They have been eerily silent after I went through the steps they requested of me and the behavior did not change. No response in 5 days and I've sent follow-up emails each 48 hour period.

The robot is great when it works, but this buggy application and slow support process has me questioning the entire purchase.

This little guy replaced my Neato Botvac Connected. Feature or feature, it's very similar, though this one is a bit cheaper and lacks the screen that the Botvac Connected had. But that's not even needed, because you can control this robot vacuum from your phone.

Overall, if you're new to robot vacuums, I prefer Neato over Roomba because it follows a specific course as it maps out your space, versus just aimlessly spinning around and bouncing everywhere like a Neato. (Dyson's also follows a more methodical map, but theirs is way expensive).

With my original Botvac, it would slam into things and rub up against my baseboards, leaving black marks and rubbed depressions into the wood. One of the features I liked about this over my Botvac Connected was the ability for it to have a "delicate" mode, where it detects it's getting close to a barrier and tries to avoid it, versus just slamming into it.

What I Like
- delicate mode
- fast, and easy to manage through my iPhone

What I Don't Like
- sometimes it does get stuck in random places (but this is usually fixed by clearing out its sensors)
- the dust bin needs to be emptied regularly, and it can be a little messy

Overall, across all the other robotic vacuums, Neato is my favorite at the moment. The D3 model is a cheaper version of this, but doesn't feature the side spinning brush (which is actually helpful). The D7 adds some extra features and a slightly different brush, and the ability to have virtual boundaries, but it's more expensive as well. For most people, the D5 is the sweet spot and a good vacuum for your needs.

I bought this to replace an older model on the Neato robotic vac..good thing I kept the old one. Don't be fooled by the "improvements" like phone app and side brush. This vac got "stuck" repeatedly while in the open and kept dying 1ft from the charger. I never experienced this with the older model. The app is easy to use but really only functions as a way to scheduled your vac easier. You can't help him if he is stuck or even virtually wall off areas...great to get notices like "I am stuck" when you are not home and can not do anything about it. My older model goes over short shag carpet but this one will not, replaced that rug but still can't put up with everything else it can't seem to manage. Sending it back.

This is a difficult review to write, since I like the company and the product concept.

Summary: If you don’t care about the functionality of the mobile app integration, then the botvac is good, though a bit expensive if you can’t use the app. If you do care about using the app functionality, I ran into troubles, and others seem to have also — see neato iPhone app reviews as evidence. I decided to return it. I’ll revisit getting one in a year if the issues under “Cons” are cleared up.

Pros:
1) The botvac is pretty intelligent in figuring out best way to clean. Much better than my parent’s rumba was a few years ago.
2) You can pretty much leave it alone and it does the job until you are ready to pick it up, or have it find its way back to base.
3). Suction is good, filter is great, cleaning it is easy.

Cons:
1) The software app for the iPhone seems defective. It worked for 1 week then it stopped connecting to the botvac. I spoke with customer service and they tried to help but couldn’t solve the issue. We tried uninstalling and reinstalling 3 times — it would keep the connection for a short time, but then drop it. It’s an app problem not a wifi problem. Check the neato iPhone app reviews and you will see this is not an isolated issue.
2) The customer support team tried their best to help. However it was clear that they needed better education on the software app. They did not know exactly what should be showing up at each stage of the reinstall and setup. I had to walk them through it. That said, they were extremely concerned about this and wanted to help.
3) The unit is not flat on top. The silver circle where it says “neato” on top is elevated a bit … just enough that it cannot get under my couch, my bed, or my coffee table. It requires me to put a book under 2 legs of each piece of furniture; then it works fine. But that undermines a little the reason for getting a botvac … to minimize the human intervention needed to vacuum.

Net:
1) The botvac itself is good — clearly 4-5 stars if it came without the app and was priced less because of that. It is pretty smart. It has strong suction. It’s filter is very effective. It pretty effectively navigates throughout my condo.
2) Where it falls down is on the software app which is actually an important aspect of this product.
3) If you don’t care about the app functionality, and you are file with lifting up some of your furniture so it’s hump can get under the furniture (or you have furniture with high clearance), then this is a very good vacuum. It’s also a company that stands by its product.
4) I’ll be checking back in a year to see if these issues have been resolved. If so, I’d consider buying it again and boosting the rating.

Purchased about a year and a half ago. After several months the vacuum stopped working. It would start up its motor 3 times, then quit and throw an error on the app asking to be rebooted. Rebooting, of course, does nothing. This issue is very common (go ahead, Google it). I RMA'd the unit as it was under warranty and received a replacement. Now, several months later the replacement vacuum has stopped working with the EXACT SAME ISSUE. Of course the vacuum is now out of warranty. 2 vacuums in a row with the same problem? That is what you call a chronic defect that Neato, apparently, hasn't bothered to address. I cannot recommend this product from Neato. Stay far away.

will not connect to my network. will not even see it. call to costumer service says that a wep network will not work. After much time and effort converting every piece of my equipment to wpa2 / aes just to suit the robot, it will still not see my network. no way to see what errors are happening. had to "jack up" my couches(3) so robot wont get stuck. this is in my completely tiled living room area alone. can not get robot to complete 1 pass of room without getting stuck. Can't use it with the app and can't use it without. Of course my return period ran out 2 days ago. Don't even want to contemplate how I would have to rearrange the other 3/4 of my home to make it "work" with the robot. could do the vacuuming myself in less than 1/8 the time with my floor vac. Anybody want to buy a lightly used botvac d5 connected?