SwitchBot K20+ Pro Patrol Kit review: A fun but flawed robot guard

Price When Reviewed

$748.98 (examined with the required SwitchBot Hub 3, which prices a further $119.99)

Best Prices Today: SwitchBot Okay20+ Pro Patrol Kit

SwitchBot is thought for manufacturing quirky good house merchandise, and its SwitchBot Okay20+ Pro Patrol Kit is actually no exception. One half mini robotic vacuum cleaner and mop, one half automated safety guard, it guarantees to scrub your flooring whereas patrolling your own home with an indoor safety digital camera mounted atop a piggybacked cell base–like a triple-decker bus.

Yes, it’s a bizarre combo, but it surely works—though it gained’t in each house (I’ll get to that in a bit). The bundle reviewed right here consists of the tiny SwitchBot Okay20+ Pro robotic vac/mop, its self-emptying base station, a cell dock that may host numerous equipment, and a SwitchBot Pan/Tilt Cam Plus 3K security camera. You’ll additionally have to have the $120 SwitchBot Hub 3 Matter-certified good house hub for all the things to work.

Features and design

The diminutive SwitchBot Okay20+ Pro robotic vac/mop is the core of the system. It docks to a rolling platform that may assist different SwitchBot modules for numerous duties, starting from the digital camera included on this bundle to your selection of a battery-powered cooling fan, certainly one of two battery-powered air air purifier fashions (each with table-top surfaces), or a telescopic smartphone/pill stand.

The rolling platform can host the digital camera with any a type of different equipment, they usually all have safe mounts. There can be, after all, a self-emptying base for the vacuum itself. SwitchBot sells a cordless stick vac, too, but it surely mounts to the cell vac’s base station–making the most of its auto-empty function–however the stick vac isn’t autonomous.

Each product boasts a clear design with no sharp edges in sight for individuals who love rounded corners. Everything felt sturdy and polished with glorious construct high quality.

The safety digital camera is equally nicely designed. It twist-locks onto a purpose-built peg that plunges into the highest of the cell base, and it comes with a brief USB-C cable for drawing energy from the vacuum’s battery (an AC adapter and an extended cable are offered when you’d want to arrange the digital camera someplace apart from on the cell base). The digital camera can pan 360 levels and it tilts 115 levels, which is good for monitoring a shifting topic.

The digital camera can host as much as a 256GB microSD card (not included) for storing video recordings, or you possibly can join SwitchBot’s cloud-storage service, which additionally grants you entry to some AI options, corresponding to pet detection. SwitchBot’s least costly plan prices $3.99/month or $34.99 per yr for a single machine. A household plan that helps as much as 10 units prices $20.99/month or $209.99/yr.

Setup and efficiency

Setting up this factor is an expertise–and never essentially a pleasing one given the variety of elements concerned. What’s extra, you should additionally have–or purchase and arrange earlier than you arrange the Okay20+–the SwitchBot Hub 3 (a Matter-certified, multi-function good house hub). The SwitchBot Okay20+ Pro Patrol Kit can not work with out it. Fortunately, the Hub 3 itself is pretty simple to arrange; simply plug it in and join it to the SwitchBot app. That’s the best step within the course of.

Next, it is advisable to resolve the place to position the robotic vacuum’s charging station, which have to be close to {an electrical} outlet. The cell base docks into the charging station and the robotic vacuum goes beneath, docking into the station. It’s an entire matryoshka state of affairs, and it is advisable to make certain the pins are aligned appropriately so all the things costs.

At this level within the course of, you possibly can solely join the docking station to the SwitchBot app, as a result of it is going to be the one part with energy. To save your self from pointless frustration, step away and concentrate on different duties for a few hours. The units gained’t perform correctly—nor can they be added to the app—till they’re almost totally charged.

Gabriela Vatu

I do know we’re right here to evaluate this product’s house safety aspect, however I need to inform you that the Okay20+ Pro vacuum does a good sufficient job. It’s tremendous tiny and suits into locations most different bigger fashions wouldn’t, but it surely’s positively not a product you’d use as your most important cleansing machine. There’s additionally a “mopping” plate you possibly can set up, however the mops in query are simply glorified moist wipes that get dragged throughout your ground.

Now, onto the vital bit. The digital camera (together with every other Okay20+ equipment you add) will seem within the cell base menu. So you should to go SwitchBot – Mobile Base – digital camera icon within the high proper nook. This takes you to a full-screen view of the digital camera’s stay feed, full with an overlay of your own home’s map and fast entry to two-way discuss or Privacy mode. There’s additionally the choice of going by means of the Cameras menu that exhibits up on the app’s most important web page, however that one takes you to all the SwitchBot cameras you’ve gotten earlier than loading your required feed.

But you’re not getting this complete ensemble only for static digital camera pictures, proper? If that’s all you wished, you could possibly simply plug within the SwitchBot digital camera anyplace in your house. No, you’re shopping for this method to have a digital camera patrol your home. And patrol it’ll.

From the cell base interface, you possibly can arrange three Waypoints. Once the robotic vacuum has mapped out your own home, you possibly can add these spots wherever you see match, corresponding to subsequent to doorways and home windows in your house. Then you possibly can simply ship the entire ensemble on patrol. It will go round your own home, trying out all environment and sending push notifications when people are detected.

Gabriela Vatu

The digital camera’s settings are fairly in depth, permitting you to allow movement detection, regulate sensitivity, arrange what forms of notifications you wish to get, and extra. If you wish to use the patrolling function whilst you’re asleep, for example, or while you’re at work, you possibly can arrange schedules. You can arrange numerous different automations, too.

The digital camera itself does a good-enough job, delivering nice video decision and clear video. Pair it up with the cell base and you’ve got a extremely cool technique to keep watch over your own home while you’re on trip, or to maintain watch in your pets whilst you’re at work. Since it comes with two-way audio, you possibly can chat along with your pets or warn an intruder that they’ve been noticed. When you’re house and need privateness, you possibly can instruct the digital camera to roll its lens again into its enclosure for fast privateness.

The inevitable caveats

So far, so good. Now let’s focus on the caveats, and the primary one is a biggie: SwitchBot’s app is considerably of a nightmare. It’s onerous to determine the best way to entry options and fiddle with settings at instances, and whilst you can arrange Scenes and activate them with a single faucet, the app’s consumer interface is hopelessly cluttered.

Gabriela Vatu/Foundry

And then there’s the truth that the cell base can not handle to cross a threshold; i.e., any kind of elevated transition between two ground surfaces. I needed to transfer the vacuum’s base unit to a distinct location and remap the entire home due to this. The Robovac itself crosses thresholds simply effective, however the cell base merely can not.

And don’t think about I’ve this large step that have to be crossed—it’s a easy baguette-type plastic factor in between the hardwood flooring in my front room to the tile flooring in my hallways and kitchen space. The transition is even rounded so it doesn’t pose a tripping hazard, however the cell base simply can not handle to roll over it. And you possibly can overlook about anticipating the cell base to traverse plush carpeting or thick rugs–something greater than 3mm (0.12 inches) excessive will probably be insurmountable.

That stated, one of many different use circumstances SwitchBot posits for this package is to place certainly one of its tabletop-equipped air purifiers on the cell base, so you possibly can ferry issues like ingesting glasses from one room to a different. So, you wouldn’t need the desk to jiggle a lot in that situation, particularly with long-stemmed wine glasses on it.

During my first take a look at runs, I attempted having it cross the edge for a number of minutes earlier than muttering “I’m done” and sending it again to its station. If your own home has any kind of transitions between flooring, this complete SwitchBot Okay20+ ensemble isn’t for you.  

Should you purchase the SwitchBot Okay20+ Pro Patrol Kit?

Well, the reply actually hinges on whether or not or not you’ve gotten transitions between the flooring in any of the rooms in your house. If you do, don’t rely on the robotic patrolling your complete house–you’ll be left with blind spots wherever there’s a transition–to not point out stairs. The SwitchBot Okay20+ Pro Patrol Kit isn’t a cheap safety system, both. The full rig prices $750, though you’ll discover it on sale comparatively typically.

And don’t overlook to consider the price of the required SwitchBot Hub 3, which is able to price you one other is one other $120 (when you don’t have already got one). That’s fairly a bit of cash for a tiny robotic vacuum and a cell base that can carry a safety digital camera round your own home with out with the ability to cross thresholds.

To be frank, I’m a bit peeved as a result of I actually wished to love this factor. It’s such a cool thought: One gadget that may each clear your flooring and patrol your home with a safety digital camera to point out you what’s taking place inside it–and warn you if it detects somebody who shouldn’t be there. Genius! But its lack of ability to cross the bottom transitions between flooring defeats its complete goal.

Perhaps a extra highly effective motor within the vacuum aspect or bigger wheels on the cell base would do the trick. But that might be an entirely completely different product that what’s on supply right now.