Mixed flooring should always be a major consideration when buying a home vacuum. Always. With modern home design trending towards hard flooring, we’re now seeing a lot of wet-dry vacuum cleaners hit the market.
Like all niche categories of tech, not all are equal, but Tineco has emerged as the clear market-leader here. Between our team, we’ve played around with several of their releases over the past few years, and from carpet to hard floors, it’s become abundantly clear that this brand is set at a premium for good reason.
The Tineco Floor One S9 Artist Pro is the latest in Tineco’s successful series of cordless mop vacuums, but at $1,299, it’ll need to do some heavy lifting to justify not just going for an older model, such as the impressive S7, which you can currently pick up for around $800. Thankfully, it does.
This feels like the ultimate one-step floor solution to beat. Not only have they put a bigger emphasis on design (hence the “Artist” in the product name), but iterative refinements have made this the smoothest and most efficient cleaning experience I’ve tried to date.
Design
Mop vacuums are always going to be a little bulky. The very function necessitates its pear-shaped design, which Tineco has refined. The bulky aesthetic of previous models has been retained, with inspiration from the Aurora Borealis. The Artist version uses gorgeous sky tones with sketches of aurora hues.
I could see lovers of design-forward tech, who want their devices to seamlessly fit into their aesthetic, more than willing to pay a premium for this. Something this powerful and functional already justifies an excess of $1,000 in this category, so shelling out a bit extra for something with this kind of build doesn’t seem like much of an investment.
The shimmery silver neck is crowned by a 3D light display to add beautiful visual feedback to performance. The rest of the device is matte black, working up a beautifully modern design language with clean lines and a streamlined profile.
Most important here is the 180-degree lay-flat design. Thanks to a rework, the new device features Smooth Drive Technology, allowing effortless 360-degree cleaning with smart omnidirectional wheels that were designed after automotive systems.
This helps with precision. I tried to use an older Dyson stick vacuum straight after this just to compare how they move. Like chalk and cheese. The great thing about new design tricks is that once they introduce another layer of convenience, switching over to something else feels like regressing decades.
I don’t enjoy cleaning, but the way this moves so calmly and gently across hard floors gives that satisfying tactility that tech writers live for.
The new wheels allow for an ultra-slim 12.85cm profile when the vacuum is compressed. It can easily slip under furniture, so you’ve got a stick vacuum that has the enhanced movement of a robot vacuum. This is great for edge-to-edge cleaning, although my apartment is rather straightforward with no tricky spots.
The water tank has been repositioned to the base of the unit to improve weight distribution. Long-term, this is meant to reduce arm fatigue, but I’ve only been using this for a week and a half. I have no reason to doubt the claim, however, seeing as it reminds me of when I got my first high-end suitcase and cursed the fact that I ever went without omnidirectional wheels.
Retooling the silhouette also allows for what Tineco call DualBlock Anti-Tangle Design. Hair tangling and clogging is served by dual-layer scrapers. First, a comb scraper captures hair while a straight scraper wipes away the hair plus any dirty water.
The water tank (1L) and a separate dirty water tank (0.75L) are handled by the device’s nifty Flashdry Self-Cleaning System, which uses heated fresh water to dissolve stains from the pipe to the brush roller. Right before using 85-degree hot air to dry every part of the machine.
I’m not worried about maintenance at all after seeing what this thing can do to itself. And it makes it infinitely easier to clean when the time does come to give it a bit of a polish. I did find that the dirty water tank needs some extra special attention when cleaning, but that’s just about it. It’s easy to detach and address any issue.
Performance
22kPa Suction Power puts the S9 Pro ahead of most wet-dry vacuums on the market right now. This thing is seriously super-charged with industry-leading power. You’d hope so, too, since the Tineco can run rings around all types of debris.
Heavy debris triggers increased suction, while lighter dust requires less aggressive settings. This isn’t just marketing speak – the difference is noticeable when transitioning between different types of mess and flooring. And you get a nice bit of visual feedback when somewhere is well and truly clean. Red for still dirty, blue for clean. In a way, this gamifies cleaning with a clever little visual reward system.
For me, that’s mostly wet leaves from housemates (and me) coming in through the back door. I run my regular Dyson over the flooring all the time, when I look back, and see infinitely small speckles of wet dust that have come off from my shoes. Running the S9 Pro over that clump is like using one of those precision eraser tools on Photoshop.
Tineco has already mastered the art of distribution. Water distribution is even at all times when I run this around my apartment, keeping consistency at the core. I don’t think I’ve needed to double back once while using this, which ups the value simply for saving time. Having a vacuum that you know can also do the job quickly and seamlessly also ups my motivation to actually clean and not like debris to pile up as I’m wont to do.
The 75-minute runtime is overpowered but appreciated. I don’t need more than 30 minutes to run through my apartment, and the vacuum’s low profile makes it super easy to click into its charging dock when it’s ready to basically clean itself and set up for the next run.
App Smarts
The device has WiFi, so it can connect to the Tineco App, which I haven’t used as much because it’s more useful for those with bigger homes. The clean interface gives intelligible cleaning stats, and you also have access to tutorials. You can even set some maintenance reminders, bringing the device closer to the smarts of a robot vacuum while still having the seamless control and precision of a powerful stick vacuum.
Verdict & Value
I have never used any type of vacuum cleaner before that feels as seamless as this. I’m guiding it more than pushing it, as it seems to self-propel with how smooth the wheels are. Tineco’s software refinements have made a huge difference, as well as streamlining any pain points from the S7 generation and presenting what I feel is the best possible non-steam vacuum on the market right now.
And so yes, while that $1,299 may seem steep, you are paying for the best here.
Deep pile carpets may still be a problem here, and there is a lack of attachments for tricky surfaces (like stairs), but for the promise this product provides, I really don’t think Tineco could have worked harder on this one.
FIVE STARS (OUT OF FIVE)
Highlights: Beautiful design, satisfying tactile experience, glides around floors, consistent
Lowlights: Lack of attachments
RRP: $1,299
