Roborock Q5 Pro+ vacuum-mop review

Choosing a robot vacuum these days can be dizzying. There are dozens of different models from a dozen different brands. One of the newest is the Roborock Q5 Pro +, and in this hands-on review, I’ll take a look at the key features of this bot, what you can expect it to do and what it can’t, and I’ll put it through my regular battery of cleaning tests to see how well it actually performs. I’ll wrap things up by listing the pros and the cons and letting you know if I think I can recommend this robot vacuum and mop to you.

What do you get with Roborock Q5 Pro+?

In a nutshell you are getting an all-in-one robot vacuum and mopping device that also comes with an auto-emptying base station. The robot is capable of either vacuuming or mopping or doing both at the same time. Once it’s cleaned your house it will return to its base station and empty out the onboard dust bin into a sealed dust bag. You can of course schedule it to clean when you want too.

While this is a smart and capable robot, it is more on the budget end of the spectrum ($699USD, often marked down), so you won’t find as many bells and whistles as some of Roborock’s higher-end devices like the Q Revo or the S8 Pro Ultra, both of which I’ve reviewed in my home.

At this point it might be helpful to some of you to point out what this particular floor bot does not have, not to make the Q5 Pro+ down for any of this, but to say if these are features you think you need, you can shop some of Roborock’s more expensive robots with more advanced features:

• no mop cleaning
• no mop scrubbing
• mop lifting; must remove plate to vacuum carpets
• no obstacle avoidance
• waterflow not adjustable
• no adjustable suction

To understand some of the helpful features of this robot that you might like, let’s flip it over.

Key features: Dual roller brushes, powerful suction, large dustbin

On the underside you will find the removable mopping plate; the design of this is rather clever; it holds a removable, washable microfibre mopping pad, and the plate itself also holds a small clean water tank which will supply the water for the mopping.

You’ll also see a set of dual rubber beater brushes. In theory, this should help you pick up more dirt and debris in a single pass. These two brushes combined with a high level of suction power (5,500pa) should mean this budget bot can still pack a punch. We’ll see in the cleaning tests…

There is also a rather large onboard dust bin capable of holding about 770 mL worth of dirt. This is quite a bit and on the large size for your average robot vacuum which should mean it’s able to keep cleaning for longer without needing to go back to its charging station and empty the bin.

Rockdock charging & empty station

This is a good time to touch on the charging and auto-empty station. Dubbed the “rock dock” the Q5 pro plus will recharge its batteries here anytime it’s not cleaning and empty its dustbin into the sealed dust bag.

While the auto emptying is on the loud side, and you cannot adjust the automatic frequency or timing, you can request an empty cycle any time you like in the app.

Set up & mapping

When you get your new robot you’ll need to download the Roborock app to get things set up. For the most part this happens in minutes with just a few clicks. As a short aside, I did recently struggle with getting my Apple iPhone to connect to my Roborock vacuum, so if you’re struggling with this as well, I recommend reaching out to Roborock’s customer service team. I ended up using another android phone to connect and things worked perfectly.

Once you have the robot connected to your homes Wi-Fi network you’ll want to send it out on a mapping run. The robot will use LIDAR to draw a very accurate floorplan of your house. Once you have that map you can go in and label rooms and adjust boundaries so that you can use targeted room cleaning or even schedule certain rooms to be cleaned on certain days. The mapping run takes just a few minutes and was extremely accurate for me after the first trip around the house.

Cleaning with Roborock Q5 Pro+

Whenever I test out a robot vacuum I run each one through the same series of tests; I get it to clean day-to-day dirt for a few days, then I lay some more targeted and difficult spills for it. I sprinkle finer things like flour or sugar, middle sized bits like rice or oatmeal and larger cracker pieces on both carpet and hard floors to see how well the robot will perform.

When it comes to the mopping I will spill some small amounts of liquid and see how the mopping pad fares. It may be worth pointing out there is no suction in the mop; so you are a limited to what the pad can absorb, meaning you should absolutely wipe up larger spills before the robot gets to them.

I can say the Q5 Pro + was actually intermittent when it came to the vacuuming. Sometimes it got about 80% or debris, other times it was more like 60 percent .
It seemed to struggle most with finer spills on carpets, and on cleaning around edges like the side of a rug.

The suction doesn’t seem to be very strong here and I think that shows in what you can still see on the rugs after it was finished. I could schedule a double pass of the space, but as is, it’s kind of disappointing.

Mopping

While the mop will absorb small liquid spills, the damp cloth is simply being dragged over the floor, so in my opinion what you’re getting here is more of a light dusting wipe and less of a hearty floor mopping. It was able to mop up smaller wet spills easily.

When it came to dried on spills it only got about 50-60-percent of tougher stuff, so while it’s helps, it’s not going to power away those coffee drips or dishwasher dribbles.

If you are mopping a particularly muddy or dirty area it will pay to remove the cloth and give it a good rinse after so the cloth doesn’t get nasty.

The other important consideration for some of you is that there is no mop lifting on this particular robot, meaning if the robot is cleaning in carpeted areas it’s bringing the mopping plate along for the ride, potentially moistening carpets and rugs. The simple fix is to remove the mopping plate when you want to vacuum, but this is an imperfect solution when it comes to the mopping, since there also does not appear to be any way to create no-go zones when the mopping plate is attached.

I let the robot roll over my rugs with its mopping plate on and I can say that on both flatter rugs and even plusher carpets, it was certainly not soaking them; at worst it was a light bit of dampness that dried quickly. So unless you have extremely delicate or special carpet and rugs, the mopping plate remaining attached shouldn’t be too much of an issue.

One last caveat; the small water tank only holds a few ounces, covering about 500 sq ft or 50m2, so if you’re hoping for a dusting wipe on larger spaces you will definitely have to refill partway through. Or you could simply use the app’s scheduling feature to handle certain rooms on certain days to ensure the Q5 Pro+ cleans with a full tank of water.

You can also add cleaning solution to the mopping tank if you want a boosted clean; Roborock naturally prefers you use their own cleaner for this but anything gentle should be okay.

Battery life and Runtime

With a 4-hour maximum runtime (240 minute max runtime) from its 5200mAh battery, this robot should have more than plenty of juice to clean even larger spaces. I can confirm it was easily able to clean all 1000 ft.² of my main floor on a single charge.

Overall review: Roborock Q5 Pro+

Overall this is not my favourite of the Roborock devices. Let’s go over the pros and cons to see why.

On the pro side the vacuum has a very long runtime. The large dustbin means it will clean for longer without heading back to its space station also. The auto emptying dock is a must have and means less hands-on maintenance for you. I found the set up process to be quite easy and the mapping is quick and extremely accurate. I also love that I can schedule the robot on a daily or weekly basis, and even dial in different rooms to be cleaned on different days.

When it comes to the cons, there are a few things I will point out because I think they might turn off some shoppers, but to be clear these are not traditional downsides; I’m not marking this robot down a whole lot because of them; since if any of these features are must haves for you you can absolutely find them in another more robust Roborock model.

To recap, the mop doesn’t lift off of carpeted surfaces, the water flow is not adjustable, and obstacle avoidance is not as pronounced as some more professional models but it can get itself out of trouble. The mop also doesn’t scrub; it’s designed for a light wipe of your floors after vacuuming. The small water tank also means that any mopping that does get done is limited to about 500 ft.² at a time. The biggest downsides for me were the lacklustre suction and half-hearted vacuum performance.

The trade-off for the features you’re not getting comes in the price. This is a far more affordable but then the flagship models sold by Roborock or even other manufacturers.but even so it’s not cheap; Roborock Q5 Pro+ sells for about $699USD/$999CAD, and for that price I was expecting better cleaning performance.

If you do want to see what you get from a more expensive or fancier model, check out my reviews of the Roborock Q Revo or the Roborock S8 Pro Ultra.

Shop the Roborock Q5 Pro+ on Amazon.

Also Read:

1. Review: iRobot Combo j5+ robot vacuum with mop

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