Independent buying guides
For households comparing cordless sticks, canisters and robots before the grit of a Canadian winter arrives. One buying question per guide, sourced figures with check dates, and running-cost calculators that print their own formula.
The decisions that actually change what you end up with.
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Photo: 池田正樹 - Masaki Ikeda · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
Like-for-like comparisons on the specifications that matter.
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Photo: ajay_suresh · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
What the total comes to once everything is counted.
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Photo: TiHa · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Getting it working properly the first time.
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Photo: Jirka Matousek from Brussels Taipei Hong Kong Singapore Prague Shenzhen · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
What the numbers mean in day-to-day use.
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Photo: Chico1996 · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
The expensive errors that are easy to avoid.
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Photo: Unknown authorUnknown author · CC BY-SA 4.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Each guide answers one buying question and shows the figures behind the answer.
How to choose
Floor type and floor plan decide the vacuum, not suction numbers. Work out the minutes your home needs, then check that against the run time on the box.
Photo: Ryan McBride · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Budget and prices
Five lines turn a $650 sticker into a yearly figure: the tax the till adds, the machine over five years, filters, a brush roll, a battery and electricity.
Photo: ajay_suresh · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Setting up
Where the dock goes, what has to leave the floor, a maintenance calendar that costs about 4 hours a year, and the battery rules Health Canada publishes.
Photo: Dennis van Zuijlekom from Ermelo, The Netherlands · CC BY-SA 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons
Every figure in a guide is taken from a named source, with the date it was checked. Where a number is an assumption or an example, it says so in the same sentence.
We do not run paid product tests, we do not publish reader reviews, and we do not claim to have handled every product mentioned. Where a claim needs a lab or a long-term test we do not have, the guide says that plainly.
Photographs are free-licence images from Wikimedia Commons or Openverse, credited to the photographer with the licence named. Charts are drawn from the figures printed in the same guide.
This site earns money from advertising and, where disclosed, from affiliate links. That does not change the order of a comparison or the conclusion of a guide.
Some links on this site can earn us a commission. That does not change which product a guide recommends, and it adds nothing to your price. Advertising is not enabled on this site yet. When it is, ads will be labelled and kept visually separate from the guides.
Each calculator shows its formula, units and assumptions. Nothing is estimated for you in secret.
What a cross-border order really costs once shipping, duty and tax are added.
landed cost = (item price + shipping) + duty + tax, where duty = item price x duty rate, and tax = (item price + shipping + duty) x tax rate
Spreads purchase price, consumables and repairs over the years you expect to keep it.
cost per year = (purchase price - expected resale value + consumables per year x years + expected repairs) / years
Annual electricity cost from rated power, hours of use and your own tariff.
annual cost = power (W) / 1000 x hours per day x days per year x price per kWh, plus standby power (W) / 1000 x standby hours x days x price per kWh