The Roborock robot vacuum with a mechanical arm can be the future of cleaning, but it's still limited in what it can do

The Roborock Saros Z70 robot vacuum and mop expands the cleaning prowess of the best robot vacuums with the addition of a robotic arm alongside its arsenal of sensors and brushes. The idea is that it'll pick up objects in its way and go the extra mile to fully tidy up by actually moving items around. Once you see it in action, the articulating arm is instantly intriguing. It's a potential huge leap forward for robot assistants.

I've put the Saros Z70 through dedicated tests and scheduled daily cleanings over the past several months. Its functionality has increased over time, but it's still largely a novelty. The exciting potential remains, but the reality is much duller. The robot has a limited list of items it's allowed to lift and move, including pieces of paper and light slippers. Even within that scope, it didn't always accomplish its tasks. The Roborock Saros Z70 is a top-notch vacuum and mop, but its arm is just an added expense that probably won't be helpful to many people just yet.

A cleaning machine loaded with features

The Saros Z70 is wholly feature-complete. Between the adaptive AI cleaning schedules and the video calls you can use the robot for as it does a patrol of the house, it's hard not to be overwhelmed by it.

Of course, the elephant in the room is its OmniGrip mechanical arm, which even has an embedded camera and is capable of lifting up to 300 grams. That's 0.66 pounds, or the equivalent of an iPad mini (with cellular). The arm will emerge on its own while vacuuming or mopping, but it can also be activated manually while in its remote control mode if you want to play around with it.

The Roborock Z70 retails for $2,599 and is at the tip top of the price spectrum for this category of products. Even without the OmniGrip arm, however, it would still be a high-end product because of all the other tech loaded up inside.

It features up to a tremendous 22,000 Pa of suction, a multi-function dock with hot water mop cleaning, an extending brush and pad, and class-leading mapping and navigation sensors. It packs a lot into its compact, 3.14-inch tall frame. So, in addition to knowing where it should and shouldn't go, it can actually fit under more couches and between more chair legs.

The unit has a rated 180-minute run time on its quiet mode. In my testing, I got more than 115 minutes with the higher power balanced mode. Observing the battery in real-world use, the battery estimate seems highly accurate. Extrapolating my usage out, the Z70 was averaging about 170 minutes in the higher setting. For times of extended demand, the dock will fast-charge the robot in an advertised 2.5 hours.

Mapping and navigation are stellar, helping it avoid bumping into most household items

Despite a functional robot arm tucked away into its top, the unit remains compact and nimble. Part of the Z70's ability to scoot through tight spaces like between furniture is its StarSight Autonomous System 2.0. It has forward-facing detection, along with VertiBeam for lateral object avoidance to the side and above. These sensors and cameras help it perceive 3D depth information and identify more objects, allowing it to move around household items delicately.

On its first mapping, the Z70 instantly created an accurate map of my downstairs rooms. Like other Roborock models, it accurately identified room dividers and even recognized features such as a table and living room seating. Over the last several years, I've been highly impressed with the cleaning paths Roborock robots take and their general ground coverage. The Z70 is no different in this regard. This year's tech appears to be at the top of its game. It's highly thorough while remaining efficient.

The Roborock app has even added Routines to try to allow you more flexibility in how you clean. One recommended option is to clean after a meal. This Routine cleans the kitchen and dining room after the time you set for dinner.

This is an area that isn't static, however. Roborock continues to push updates to what items the robot can recognize, which should only help it improve over time.

Here's what you want to know about a vacuum that has an arm

Far and away, the most interesting thing about the Roborock Saros Z70 is its OmniGrip mechanical arm. It can move certain objects out of the way or move them to designated areas. That's the promise, but the reality is much more limited than it initially appears.

First, you have to explicitly activate the OmniGrip in the app to turn it on. It won't work by default until you take the step to acknowledge its presence. Secondly, at launch, it's only authorized to pick up tissues, sandals/slippers, and socks — but only certain types of each. So what's the point? Roborock is optimistic that this will help tidy up socks that get left close to closets or tissues that don't quite make it to a trash can. I'm more skeptical.

Even if the mechanical arm gains the ability to pick up new objects in the future via software updates, it ultimately has a 300-gram physical weight capacity that it can't exceed. It can't go around lifting anything it wants to, including heavy footwear like boots. Additionally, there will likely always be some objects, such as scissors, that remain off-limits for safety reasons. Additionally, regarding safety, the vacuum features an emergency shutoff button to stop the arm, and the grip has a pinch sensor.

In terms of the OmniGrip's actual performance, it hasn't been great in my testing. Maybe unsurprisingly, I've needed to manufacture a lot of the testing scenarios because the items it will handle are so limited. I wouldn't have seen it work much, if at all, if I didn't artificially start dropping balls of tissues on the floor.

Even when ideal-sized and shaped balls of paper towels were left on the floor in central locations, the results were mixed. Sometimes the robot would pick up one of the tissues and put it in its designated bin, while ignoring the others.

I used paper towels, brown packing paper, and bathroom tissue to see if it would identify each of them. Usually, it would take care of one but not the others, with seemingly no logic to which one it handled. The paper towels I left lying flat didn't get any acknowledgment.

I also resorted to placing Crocs in the middle of the room, while the Z70 ran its nightly schedule. Doing that usually resulted in one of the clogs being moved to the designated shoe spot while the other one remained untouched. Sometimes the robot would move the sandals out of its way to finish cleaning the assigned area, but then leave them in a different, inconvenient spot.

It's hard not to be disappointed by the results of the OmniGrip mechanical arm. When it works like you assume it will, it's magical.

I've kept the unit active on and off in my home throughout 2025 to see how the arm worked over time. Ultimately, it's been mostly the same over six-plus months. That is to say, it removed shoes sometimes, but not every time. Mostly, though, I'm not one to leave items it can lift, like tissues and paper towels just left on the floor overnight.

I still have hope for its increased potential. After all, it has a significant lead over competitors who are at least a year behind in robotic arms, but it's not yet there. It's easy to see how this functionality will be improved and could spread to be prominent in two to three years. For now, it's too limited with tidying to be anything but a fun distraction.

The Saros Z70 cleaning performance however, is top-notch

If you're willing to pay the OmniGrip arm tax, you'll still get a good vacuum and mop. Its side brush and extending mop pad help it pick up crumbs and dirt around chair legs and scrub right up against baseboards.

I tested the Z70 on hardwood floors using coffee grounds, flour, and crushed up cereal to see how it vacuumed and mopped up the messes. Using the vacuum and mop on its highest suction level with two passes, it got around 90% of the flour, 90% of the coffee grounds, and 98% of the cereal in a spot, zone cleaning. These results are in line with other high-end robot cleaners.

Using the vacuum on carpet with the same simulated spilled food items, the Z70 got an estimated 87% of the flour, 89% of the coffee grounds, and 100% of the crushed up cereal. Again, its results in this area are in line with other premium robots.

To see how well the Z70 could get into tough-to-reach areas, I taped off a corner of my room with hardwood floors and sprinkled some flour in the square. The vacuum picked up nearly all of the visible mess. Its corner results were quite remarkable, especially compared to other robots.

All of these tests confirmed my general observations of the daily scheduled cleanings I had it doing. It's really good, though not perfect. There were still the occasional crumbs left under the cabinet toe-kicks in the kitchen, but all around the kitchen table, around chair legs, and up against baseboards were free from debris after it finished.

The anti-tangle system, a combination of the side and roller brushes, worked well enough that I only saw a few strands of hair from time to time. There was never a collection of hair wrapped up that needed to be cut off. Nearly all of the hair found its way into the dustbin.

I don't have a high threshold in my home that I need robot vacuums to cross. However, I do have a mid-to-high pile rug that a lot of vacuums have had a hard time traversing. Thanks to the AdaptiveLift chassis, the Z70 can roll over a threshold as tall as 1.57 inches, which, in my case, made it much easier for the bot to climb onto the carpeted rug and vacuum it without getting stuck.

Although the unit can raise itself high off the ground, the Z70 can also detach its mopping pads and leave them behind in the charging dock when doing vacuum-only jobs. This means it won't drag wet pads across the carpet. This isn't a unique feature to Roborock, but one of my favorites that I've come to look for from any premium cleaner.

The Z70 isn't the only new vacuum and mop that Roborock released in 2025. It also released the Saros 10R and 10. Putting the 10R through its paces revealed it has a similar performance. It also employs a sleek exterior with a low profile for nimble navigation, along with a FlexiArm side brush and an extending mop pad. Its suction is powerful, and its scrubbing is thorough. The 10 and 10R, varying in minor ways, aren't as flashy as the Z70, but nearly as capable.

The bottom line

The Roborock Saros Z70 is a great vacuum and mop, but not because it has a robotic arm. It performs well at cleaning floors despite its headline feature. Even over term testing, the unit remains a skilled cleaning assistant. It's been a go-to robot for dust and crumb removal. However, the functionality of its arm is just too limited to make that aspect a useful part of the cleaning experience. If the cost doesn't deter you, it's a fine choice with a wow factor that will intrigue anyone who comes across it. But most people in search of a high-powered, premium robot vacuum and mop will find a better value in it's sister model, the Roborock Saros 10R, one of my top picks for a premium model that delivers an almost flawless hands-off cleaning experience. Read my Saros 10R review.

The post The Roborock robot vacuum with a mechanical arm can be the future of cleaning, but it's still limited in what it can do appeared first on Business Insider