The iRobot Roomba Combo 10 Max + AutoWash Dock fixes the one thing missing from the company’s last high-end cleaning robot. Instead of manually rinsing the mopping pad, this new dock can do it automatically. Unfortunately, the AutoWash feature can’t compensate for other disappointments.
iRobot Roomba Combo 10 Max + AutoWash Dock
$1322 $1399 Save
$77
Engineered to powerfully vacuum and mop before self-emptying its bin then washing and drying its own mop pad. It even knows which areas get dirty fastest and can automatically give them the deep cleaning they deserve.
- Mop pad arm works well
- Mostly solid mobile app interface
- Disappointing navigation issues
- Generally poor cleaning results
- No real-time tracking in app
Price and Availability
The Roomba Combo 10 Max + AutoWash Dock is available now and retails for $1,399.99. However, it has been on sale on the company’s website for as low as $999.99.
The AutoWash Dock Is New, But It’s Late
The new Combo 10 Max bests last year’s Roomba Combo j9+ Auto-Fill by adding an automatic mop-washing element to the dock. There are a few small tweaks between the previous high-end model and this new one, but most people probably won’t be able to spot them—unless you liked the faux wood grain look.
One change I do miss is the extra storage inside the dock’s door. It was a handy place to keep extra dust bags and mop pads. That’s gone now.
The shape of the clean and dirty water containers is slightly altered, too. They’re more square boxes now which didn’t make too much of a difference compared to previous Roomba offerings. But compared to other companies, these Combo 10 Max ones don’t have a handle and can be awkward to carry from one room to another. There’s a wider opening, so cleaning the dirty one is easier.
To be clear, it’s important that this Roomba unit adds a mop pad washing element to its dock. I know I didn’t rinse and clean the Combo j9+ one as much as I should have because it was more manual work. Other people probably don’t clean them often, either. However, it’s still not a revelation in the robot vacuum and mop space.
It seems like iRobot is playing catch-up with the AutoWash dock. It’s better to be late than never, but it’s much harder to get excited about the feature that has been a staple of Roborock, Dreame, and even Yeedi for a while.
A Disappointing Performance in Several Ways
Right from the start, on the vacuum’s first mapping adventure, I noticed a clumsiness to its navigation that carried on throughout my testing. Near daily, the Roomba Combo 10 Max would give up on its scheduled cleaning tasks in some way. Sometimes it was having trouble maneuvering a high-pile shag rug. Other times, I would find it the next morning under the couch with no obvious obstruction in its way.
Once, I even found the robot in the morning with a dripping wet mop pad that had been sitting on a hardwood floor overnight. In hindsight, I saw only one notification on my phone stating that it couldn’t complete its job. The app never indicated that anything else was wrong with the robot.
Since the robot primarily relies on vision from its camera rather than LiDAR sensors like other premium robot vacuums, I have gotten the impression that the Roomba robot is having a harder time navigating my rooms. The Roomba Combo 10 Max bumps into furniture much harder and more often than other devices like the Eufy Omni S1 Pro.
If the Roomba’s navigation skills were sub-par, but it could clean the floors better than the competitors, I would have an easier time accepting its methods. But in my copious amounts of time staring at it weave around my rooms, I didn’t notice any improvement over even $800+ units.
Even in my less subjective tests of taping off a rectangle in my kitchen and monitoring the cleanliness of that small area, the Roomba only performed on par with other brands. It picked up most, but not all, of the crushed Cheerios and white rice sprinkled in the test area.
The point of a robot vacuum and mop is for it to do all, or most, of the work. After a week with the Roomba Combo 10 Max, I had to pick it up and move it back to its dock six out of the seven days. I had to continually narrow its scope of cleaning during the night when I wasn’t around to closely correct its course. On a long time frame, it didn’t fare much better.
The unpredictability in its cleaning and navigation was frustrating and distracted me from iRobot’s new AutoWash dock. That aspect of the product worked well, without a lot of fanfare. Instead of needing to rip off the mopping pad and hand-rinse it, the dock handles that part of the process.
To that point, the Roomba Combo 10 Max’s AutoWash dock even improved one area of annoyance I’ve had with other docks. The automatic mop cleaning process in these kinds of docks includes a constant hum of hot air after the fact to dry the pads. The Roomba’s dock was much quieter and didn’t register any high-pitched frequencies that I’ve heard from others.
The new AutoWash feature may work well and be worthwhile, but it’s only a small part of the whole product. It wasn’t enough to negate my hard feelings toward the lackluster cleaning and navigation.
Similarly, the cool articulating mop arm that keeps the robot from dragging a damp pad around behind it worked well but was overshadowed by the other inconsistencies.
The Software Really Wants to Sell You More Things
I’ve glowed about iRobot’s mobile app, available on iPhone and Android, in the past. Compared to other robot vacuums, it’s a breath of fresh air. The interface is well-designed and easy to navigate quickly. That’s mostly still true now.
Unfortunately, there’s now a “Special Offers for you” announcement banner on each of the four tabs in the app. On the bottom of My Products and My Home, and at the top of Messages and Store.
On its own, in the most forgiving light, this is an unfortunate glitch. But coupled with the robot’s sub-par performance it looks like another indicator of a declining ecosystem. Seeing the message repeatedly was a constant thorn in my side when opening the app because there was another fault I needed to address.
My only other complaint about the mobile app is that there’s still no way to track the vacuum on the map in real time. I’m pretty sure this goes back to the lack of LiDAR and its less precise understanding of where it is in a room at any given point.
Should You Buy the iRobot Roomba Combo 10 Max?
Along with more than a dozen other robot vacuums—including multiple Roomba units—that I’ve tested over the last couple of years. None of those felt quite as unstable and inconsistent as the iRobot Roomba Combo 10 Max + AutoWash Dock does.
It’s hard to pinpoint a specific flaw or egregious area of oversight, but the product simply did not perform well and live up to my expectations for it. If having a docking station that washes the mopping pad is an important feature, there are tons of other devices from other companies that will do a solid job of that.
If you’re set on a new Roomba because you prefer the mobile app or have some other reason, then I would probably recommend checking out the Combo j7+ unit instead.
iRobot Roomba Combo 10 Max + AutoWash Dock
$1322 $1399 Save
$77
Engineered to powerfully vacuum and mop before self-emptying its bin then washing and drying its own mop pad. It even knows which areas get dirty fastest and can automatically give them the deep cleaning they deserve.
