Dyson 360 Vis Nav

The $1,199.99 Dyson 360 Vis Nav is exceedingly expensive for a robot vacuum that can’t also mop. On the other hand, it is a truly powerful vacuum that outperformed even pricier models at deep cleaning small particles in our extensive testing, and picked up pet hair without tangles. Then again, it lacks a self-emptying dust bin, a standard feature for this price range, and its navigational abilities fall short of high-end competitors. Most folks should opt for the Editors’ Choice-winning Roomba j9+ ($899.99), a thorough cleaner with more perks at a lower price, but the 360 Vis Nav is a fine pick for Dyson super fans who want a robot floor cleaner that matches their cordless vacuum.

Design and Features: Simple and Spiffy

The 360 Vis Nav is the first robot vacuum Dyson has released in the US in almost a decade following the tall and round 360 Eye of 2016. The 360 Heurist from 2020 was only released in Canada, China, and Europe.

In keeping with Dyson's aesthetic, the 360 Vis Nav has a vibrant color scheme called Blue/Nickel, though we'd argue that the polycarbonate shell covering most of the top and sides has more of a purple tone, rather than blue. It has a D shape with one flat edge, similar to the outstanding Ecovacs Deebot X2 Omni hybrid ($1,499.99) and robot vacuums from the now-defunct Neato brand.

Weighing 9.9 lbs and measuring 3.9 by 12.6 by 13 inches (HWD), the 360 Vis Nav is similar in size to the Roomba j9+, which has a larger 13.7 inch diameter but is only 3.4 inches tall.

The robot's namesake 360 camera resides on top along with an LCD touch screen, an access for the filter compartment, and a red dustbin release button. Integrated distance sensors, optical flow sensors, and LEDs work with the panoramic 360-degree camera to create a map as the vacuum moves through your home.

(Credit: Andrew Gebhart)

On the front edge, you can see through the clear plastic enclosure to the carbon fiber brush roll. The brush roll expands the full width of the vacuum's flat edge and consists of black carbon fibers for dust, stiff nylon bristles for digging into carpet, and soft nylon fibers for sweeping large particles from hard surfaces. A red latch on the bottom pops the brush roll free from the enclosure for cleaning.

An innovative side duct helps the 360 Vis Nav clean edges by suctioning dirt instead of just sweeping it in front of the vacuum like the typical corner brush(es) found on most floor-cleaning robots.

Using a Hyperdymium motor working at 110,000 rpm, the 360 Vis Nav promises to deliver 65 air watts of suction. Dyson claims the machine is twice as powerful as any competitor, but since most other brands list suction power of their robot vacuums in Pascals (with high-end models like the Roborock S8 MaxV Ultra now pushing up to 10,000Pa), it's hard to directly compare these specs, highlighting the importance of our rigorous independent testing detailed below.

(Credit: Andrew Gebhart)

You can select Auto, Boost, Quiet, or Quick and start a run with the touch screen, the app, or voice commands through devices compatible with Amazon’s Alexa or Google Assistant.

The machine boasts whole-machine HEPA filtration, ensuring particles as small as 0.1 microns are trapped inside and not expelled into the air during operation. Dirt is sucked into a 19.2-ounce (0.15-gallon) dustbin you have to manually remove and empty every couple of cleaning runs. Most other robots in this price range including the Roomba j9+, and even many more affordable models like the Roomba i3+ EVO ($549.99) support automatic dustbin emptying, a big plus for allergy sufferers.

I'd certainly prefer a self-emptying dustbin, but Dyson has, mercifully, made the process easy and ergonomically friendly on the 360 Vis Nav. Press the red dustbin release button on the top of the robot, then grab the bin by its handle, hold it over your trash can, and slide the red latch on the handle. A hatch on the bottom of the bin will then swing open, and the contents will fall into the trash can. It's a thoughtful design that limits dust exposure and dispersion, but some particulates may still fly into the air depending on how far into the trash can you hold the bin before releasing the hatch.

The 360 Vis Nav's base sits mostly flush against the wall and has the same purplish coloring as the robot itself. Because it only charges the robot and offers no other self-maintenance features, the 360 Vis Nav’s base is comparatively tiny at 6.9 by 10.4 by 2.8 inches (HWD) versus the Roomba j9+'s docking station (13.3 by 12.2 by 15.8 inches).

The 12-cell lithium ion battery powering the 360 Vis Nav promises up to 65 minutes of runtime in Quiet or Quick modes, and recharges in just over 90 minutes. In our testing, the battery lasted 58 minutes in Auto mode, which pales in comparison to the 113-minute run time of the Roomba j9+ in its corresponding mode. The 360 Vis Nav didn’t always complete a full run of my 1,500 square-foot, two-bedroom apartment on a single charge while the Roomba j9+ covered my full floor plan 1.5 times on its battery stress test. If you have a larger home, we generally recommend a robot vacuum with at least 90 minutes of runtime on a charge.

Setup and the App: Intuitive Controls

While the 360 Vis Nav lacks some physical features that are standard for its price range, its companion MyDyson app (available for Android or iOS) mostly keeps up with the competition well. You’ll need to download the app and create an account to set up the vacuum.

Setup itself only takes a few minutes. Plug the included cord into the back of the base station, run it out the side, and then attach the base’s backplate. Find a spot for the base near an outlet, against a wall, and with at least 20 inches of space in front and on either side so the robot can see and maneuver around it.

(Credit: Andrew Gebhart)

Roll the robot up to the base and against the charging contacts, and it’ll automatically turn on. You’ll select your language on the touch screen, and then you’ll need to add the device in the app. After logging in, select the menu in the upper left corner of the screen, hit Add Machine, and give the app permission to find nearby devices. You’ll need to hold your phone near the vacuum, press in the touch screen until it clicks to confirm the pairing, and then enter your Wi-Fi network credentials in the app to connect the robot.

After that, you can name the robot, and the app will show you a few tutorial videos if you want further instructions. Then you’ll be prompted to send your bot on a mapping run so it can get to know your place.

The 360 Vis Nav took 29 minutes to find its way around my apartment on its initial mapping run. I followed the instructions in the tutorial video and made sure rooms were bright and the floor was clear of clutter. Higher-end hybrids like the Ecovacs Deebot X2 Omni and the Dreame X30 Ultra completed the task more quickly in 10 and 12 minutes respectively, but the 360 Vis Nav was faster than the Roomba j9+, which took 52 minutes.

During the mapping run, the Vis Nav ran over my cats’ food bowl, and seemingly got lost towards the end of the process. It wandered in a loop in my bedroom like a skipping record, but it fixed itself as soon as I opened the app to try to get a read on what was happening.

The map itself looked good, with all of the rooms in my place resembling their true shape and furniture represented by gaps. The app walks you through adding rooms (which it calls zones) by arranging border lines between them. You must have at least one line of separation and two resulting zones to progress to the next step and save your map, which might not be ideal if you live in a studio apartment.

With the borders in place, you can tap room icons to name your zones, then name and save your overall map. The MyDyson app does not automatically label any areas, whereas the Roomba j9+'s companion iRobot Home app figured out a few of my rooms without my input. While editing the map, you can also add restrictions to tell the robot to avoid certain areas. The Roomba j9+ supports both Keep Out Zones to avoid and Clean Zones to indicate areas needing extra attention.

You can edit your map at any time via the gear icon in the upper right corner of the device page. The menu in the upper left corner lets you add new devices or manage your account. The bell icon next to that shows you notifications if one vacuum part is in need of maintenance.

(Credit: Andrew Gebhart)

On the main device page, you'll see a picture of your robot along with its battery life and status. Tap the bottom left button for run history with heat maps of gathered dirt detected by the piezo sensor during each previous run. Tap the bottom right button to set up a cleaning schedule. The center button between those two opens the menu to start a run. Here, you can select individual zones by tapping their icon and toggle different cleaning modes for each, or switch to a whole-home (All area) clean in the mode of your choice. Then, simply hit the play button to begin.

The touch display on the robot itself also offers a full suite of controls. Tap to wake it up if it's asleep, then touch any of the four cleaning modes on the wheel to select it and the display will show an estimate of the robot’s run time in that mode. Press the panel until it clicks to start a run in the selected mode. You can also swipe up to access detailed settings, where you can turn off, reset, or update the robot.

Performance: Extreme Highs and Lows

For the majority of my testing, I ran the 360 Vis Nav in Auto mode. It took a long time to complete its initial cleaning run of my place, since it ran out of battery after 50 minutes and wasn’t finished yet. As with the mapping run, it got lost when trying to return to the dock, but once again found its bearings when I went to check on it in the app. It then charged for 40 minutes, and finished up in roughly 20 minutes after that. Altogether, the first run clocked in at 109 minutes, putting it way beyond the tight 73-minute cleaning time of the Roomba j9+ in the same space. It also appeared to miss large sections of my bedroom, and the heat map from the room looked misaligned in the run history page.

(Credit: Andrew Gebhart)

On its second run, it had a better idea of my place and pushed its battery life harder, completing a whole-home run in 58 minutes without needing to charge midway, and it appeared to more thoroughly cover my bedroom floor. After some initial stumbles, it was finding its stride.

It also picked up so much dirt that I was slightly embarrassed about the prior state of my home, especially since I test and review robot vacuums for a living. I was shocked at how much pet fur filled its dustbin. I didn’t know my two small cats could shed quite that much. The 360 Vis Nav also captured all of that hair without getting any tangled in its brushrolls or leaving behind any dust bunnies or clumps in its wake.

Given how full it looked, I felt compelled to empty the dustbin after the robot's first run, but after that I generally only needed to empty it every few runs.

While cleaning, the 360 Vis Nav doesn’t navigate in a typical zamboni fashion like other models with advanced navigation technology. Instead, it travels to the middle of a given zone, and spirals outward before finally circling the perimeter. It’s an interesting approach designed to give extra attention to the middle area of a floor.

During test runs, the 360 Vis Nav navigated nimbly around my furniture, and did a decent job of avoiding obstacles. After letting it run a couple of times without clutter, I slowly added cat toys of a variety of shapes and sizes to my floor to see how the robot would react. It bumped a large, colorful ball of foil, but only slightly and avoided it after that. It also bumped a smaller felt bird hard enough to trigger its chirping sound effect, but it fully avoided a bright red plastic spring.

It ran over a small white plastic mouse toy that blends into the carpet, but didn't get stuck on it, or any of the other intentionally-placed obstacles. Only the Roomba j9+ series avoided the white plastic mouse toy out of all the vacuums I’ve tested. Overall, in terms of obstacle avoidance, the 360 Vis Nav keeps up well with the rest of the field, though I wouldn’t trust it to avoid smearing pet accidents, a guarantee you get with the Roomba j9+ and the older Roomba 7+ series.

I then evaluated cleaning power using our standard methodology, which involves measuring pickup performance of both large and fine debris (using dry rice and sand, respectively) on two different flooring types (hardwood and wall-to-wall carpeting). In each of these four separate tests, we run the robot vacuum using its Auto mode in a roughly 100 square-foot closed room with a specific amount of the test debris intentionally placed on the pre-cleaned floor, and weigh the dustbin before and after. If you’re curious, check out all of the details of our vacuum testing procedure.

On the carpet tests, the 360 Vis Nav showed its power in action. It picked up 97.60% of the rice, beating the Roomba j9+ series (95.80%) and generally keeping pace with high-end hybrid models in this test. It has plenty of suction power, but its spiral navigation would occasionally cause it to push grains inward where it already covered.

With sand on carpet, our ultimate suction power stress test, the 360 Vis Nav gathered 53.58% of the debris, crushing the Roomba j9+ series (38.50%) and beating our previous record-holder, the Ecovacs Deebot X2 Omni (45.55%). This test shows that Dyson's robot vacuum has the power to outdo the competition, and that its sensors are smart enough to recognize dirty floors and increase suction accordingly.

While I sang its praises after the first batch of measured testing, the next round, on hardwood, made me want to punt the 360 Vis Nav into the sun. I use my bedroom for the hardwood testing, and the 360 Vis Nav kept getting lost under the bed. After a brief period of cleaning in this environment, it would keep searching and searching for a new zone for 45 minutes or more. Sometimes it would start a run by wandering around the room and would never actually turn on its suction.

While troubleshooting the problem, I created a new map for just the bedroom, and tried running the test again, but it still got lost. I then factory reset the device and started over yet again, having it map and treat my bedroom as my entire home. This time, it would finish runs by making it back to the base station, but miss whole sections of the room, including the strip covered in rice.

I talked with a Dyson engineer to try to figure out a cause and solution for the problem, and he said that the machine's visual navigation might have lost its bearings when traversing under my bed. Moving the base from room to room for testing, an atypical user behavior, may have also played a part in the robot's navigational challenges.

I ended up moving the robot and its base station back to its starting spot in my kitchen, resetting it again, and remapping my home. I then used the app to send it to my bedroom for the hardwood testing instead of manually placing it there as I'd done before. In order for it to complete our hardwood testing with consistent results, I had to block off the section of floor under my bed. The results still weren’t great. The robot had likely mismapped the bedroom badly enough that it still couldn’t quite figure out how to properly circulate along the walls of the room.

(Credit: Andrew Gebhart)

The 360 Vis Nav picked up a record low 59.90% of rice on hardwood, well below the Roomba j9+ series (88.40%), because it missed so much floor space so consistently. It barely flung any debris, which can be a problem for other robot vacuums on hardwood due to their spinning side brushes. Dyson's robot vacuum would occasionally push grains back toward the center of its cleaning pattern, but otherwise had no problem picking up debris when actually navigating through the dirty area.

It picked up 74.73% of sand on hardwood, which puts it in the middle of the pack among premium robot vacuums, and above the Roomba j9+ series (54.30%). It still missed sections along the wall, so its respectable result shows how effective it is at picking up fine dirt in the territory that it did actually cover. It essentially handcuffed itself and still kept up with the pack.

Since the bottom of the bed was blocked off, I’m not giving the 360 Vis Nav any credit for the speedy 7:43 average completion time on hardwood. Its second best 8:29 time on carpet (half the time of the Roomba j9+ series) is proof enough that it works efficiently when it knows where it's going and is effectively finding its way around.

The Verdict: Expensive, Powerful, and Sometimes Dumb

The Dyson 360 Vis Nav asks you to make a lot of compromises for an uncompromising price, but it lives up to its billing in cleaning power at least. It’s the best deep-cleaning robot vacuum that we’ve tested, offering impressive suction power in our exhaustive stress tests. On the other hand, it gets lost more easily than any other premium model we’ve tested, and is particularly challenged when it comes to cleaning dark areas like under the bed. Moreover, it requires manual bin emptying, and its 58-minute tested battery life falls well short of the 90-minute runtime we generally recommend for large homes. If you can live with those drawbacks and you're a fan of the Dyson brand, it’s worth considering, but for most people, the more affordable Roomba j9+ is our Editors' Choice for its superior navigation, battery life, and convenient self-emptying functionality.