Xiaomi Lydsto W2: Top-of-the-line features for a reasonable price

The Lydsto W2 robot vacuum cleaner is the company's flagship product as of late 2022. Priced between $650 and $800, it boasts lidar navigation, two rotating cleaning pads behind the central brush, and, most importantly, a combined cleaning station for the dust bin and cleaning pads. In short, it offers a range of advanced features that improve cleaning performance and minimize maintenance. Below, I'll thoroughly test the Xiaomi Lydsto W2 and then share my opinion on whether it's worth buying. So, let's get started!

Equipment

The Lydsto W2 arrived in this big branded box:

In addition to the robot and station, the delivery kit includes:

1. Power adapter.
2. Spare bag for the station.
3. Brush for cleaning the station.
4. Operating instructions in English.
5. Two spare microfiber cloths.
6. Spare HEPA filter.
7. Two spare side brushes.

The set is complete. That's a plus!

Appearance

Now let's take a look at the Lydsto W2's design. Let's start with the robot vacuum itself. It comes in white. The body is oval, not round, and slightly elongated. The soft-touch mechanical bumper has two wall sensors on either side and an obstacle detection sensor in the center. The body is 98 mm from the floor.

The control panel has three mechanical control buttons on top. The lidar is equipped with a spring-loaded cover to prevent the robot from getting stuck under furniture.

The dust collector is located under the top cover. It holds 350 ml of dry waste. Inside, you'll find a curtain through which waste is sucked into a bag in the station. The filtration system is HEPA-only. At the rear of the body is a channel for emptying the waste. The robot has no water tank. The cleaning cloths are only moistened at the station.

There are four fall protection sensors on the bottom of the body. Next to the swivel roller is a carpet detection sensor. This is a plus. There are two side brushes. This is a minor, but still an advantage over similar products.

The central brush unit is floating. The turbo brush itself is made of bristles and petals. Both sides can be disassembled to remove tangled hair and pet hair.

The napkin holders attach easily to the robot using magnets. The napkins are attached to the holders using Velcro.

Again, like its counterparts, the Lydsto W2's wipers don't extend to the edges of the body, so I predict the robot won't be able to clean dirt right up to baseboards and furniture. This will be confirmed during testing.

Let's take a look at the station. It features an informative display and touch-sensitive control buttons, specifically: Start/Pause, forced return to station, wipe rinse function, and self-cleaning function. It's very convenient.

Under the top cover are the tanks and a bag for emptying dry waste, conveniently located next to the cleaning tool. The bag holds up to 3 liters of dry waste. The clean and dirty water tanks hold up to 4 liters of water, offering slightly increased capacity. Conveniently, the clean water tank has a hole with a sealed valve for filling without removing the tank.

The robot's drive-in platform is removable, which is a great feature. It makes cleaning it much easier when needed.

It's also worth highlighting several features of this station. First, it features a hot-air drying system, and it's truly effective. After a few hours of drying, the wipes are dry. Second, the station has a waste sterilization system installed. I can't verify the disinfection effectiveness. The next feature is water disinfection with silver ions. I couldn't find any information on how exactly this is implemented or what kind of water is disinfected. But they've implemented something, and that's a plus compared to competitors. And finally, the station's fourth feature is that wipes can be rinsed with either room-temperature water or hot water, which the station heats to 50°C. In theory, this could slightly improve the rinsing quality of the wipes and the effectiveness of stain removal, which will be verified in tests.

Overall, the robot itself is quite standard in design compared to similar products. However, the manufacturer has worked hard on the station, and it's very well-designed. That's a plus.

Technical specifications

The main characteristics of Lydsto W2, as declared by the manufacturer:

Robot vacuum cleaner:

• Li-Ion battery 5200 mAh.
• Suction power up to 5000 Pa.
• Operating time up to 180 min.
• Cleaning area >100 sq.m.
• Dust collector capacity is 350 ml.
• Obstacle clearance up to 20 mm.
• Dimensions: 354*98 mm.

Station:

• Power consumption 1000 W (in self-cleaning mode).
• Clean water tank: 4 l.
• Dirty water tank: 4 l.
• Bag in the station: 3 l.
• Dimensions: 430*430*455 mm.

Of the specifications, the only important thing to note is the stated increased suction power, which will be verified in tests. The rest of the specifications are quite standard. For those interested, the station's height with the lid raised is 70 cm.

Functional capabilities

Speaking of functionality, the Lydsto W2 is controlled via the Lydsto app. The interface is in Russian, and the app runs smoothly, which is a plus.

The main functions of the robot are displayed on the screen:

1. Self-cleaning.
2. Rinsing napkins at the station.
3. Drying napkins with hot air (60 °C).
4. Rinse wipes with hot water (50°C).
5. Disinfection of water and waste.
6. Saving multiple cleaning maps in memory.
7. Automatic zoning of premises into rooms.
8. Selecting areas and rooms for cleaning.
9. Virtual walls and no-go zones (and for wet cleaning mode).
10. Suction power adjustment.
11. Setting the frequency of rinsing wipes (6/9/12 min).
12. User mode.
13. Cleaning log.
14. Setting up cleaning according to a schedule.
15. Voice notifications in Russian.
16. Automatic power increase on carpet.
17. Carpet cleaning in wet cleaning mode.

I'd just like to point out that the Lydsto W2 has its own approach to setting the wiper rinse interval. You can select intervals of 6, 9, and 12 minutes. This isn't always convenient. For example, other brands offer the option to rinse wipers after each cleaned area or after a selected cleaning area.

Otherwise, the functionality is quite varied and allows for flexible cleaning settings. Again, the station has more interesting features than the robot.

Testing

A detailed video review of the Xiaomi Lydsto W2 has already been prepared and published on the channel. I recommend watching the video:

Navigation

And finally, let's move on to the tests. First, we'll test the Lydsto W2's navigation in a room with obstacles. The robot vacuum first moves around the perimeter of the room, then cleans the entire accessible area in a serpentine pattern. It carefully navigated around the legs of the dryer. It also swept around the box and chair legs separately, before returning to the station. The test was successful.

Speaking of navigation within the house, the robot vacuum cleans room by room, following the perimeter, then in a serpentine pattern. Every 12 minutes, as I've determined, it returns to the station and rinses its cleaning cloths, then resumes cleaning from where it left off. There are no uncleaned areas left; this model has excellent navigation!

Suction power

The suction power, however, was quite average. The robot vacuum cleaner was only able to vacuum up debris from a 2 mm gap. It even seemed to partially vacuum up debris from a 4 mm gap, but unfortunately, it was just a speck of dust matching the stand's color that had gotten into the gap. The robot is quite loud at maximum power, giving the impression of being very powerful. However, the performance fell short of expectations. Nevertheless, it's sufficient for keeping your home clean, especially on hard floors.

Dry cleaning

Dry cleaning performance on hard surfaces is excellent. The robot vacuum completely picked up debris from the floor. It even swept corners better than many other robots. It's worth noting that the side brush itself fits snugly into corners, and when the robot rotates, it blows debris out through the main suction motor's vents. So, it's blown air. Well, that's better than nothing, really. 😊 Some hair got caught on the side and center brushes. However, most of the debris ended up in the dust bin. Test passed!

Carpet cleaning

The same debris was scattered on the carpet. And I can say that the Lydsto W2 thoroughly cleaned the carpet. Test passed!

Wet cleaning and carpets

Speaking about wet cleaning in the presence of carpets, Lydsto W2 is not able to automatically lift the cloths when entering the carpet, as, for example, does Dreame Bot L10s Ultra Or the Mijia OMNI, so you can either run it over the entire area, so the robot will move onto the carpets with wet wipes. Or you can enable the automatic carpet avoidance mode, and the robot will detect the carpet and avoid it without wetting it with wipes. This is a plus.

Wiping off dirt

This robot vacuum cleaner removes dirt efficiently, taking into account several intermediate trips to the cleaning station to rinse the cloths. This is the main advantage of such robots. Dirt is not ground into the floor during the entire cleaning process. Consequently, in just a few passes, the robot can actually clean the floor, not just mop it. As expected, a narrow section of the floor along the baseboard remained unwashed because the cloths don't extend to the edges. This is a problem with all the robot vacuum cleaners tested.

Removing difficult stains

The Lydsto W2 struggled with removing dried-on coffee and sauce stains. It managed to remove the coffee stains, but only partially removed the sauce.

In defense of the robot, I can say that it's not designed for this type of purpose. The test only shows that the pressure of the wipes on the floor isn't as strong as that of specialized robotic floor cleaners. The results are roughly on par with the closest equivalent. Xiaomi Mijia Self-Cleaning Robot Vacuum-Mop Pro, but it seems like the Lydsto's wipes press even less firmly. Or maybe the sauce was more stubborn this time. Overall, stain removal isn't its strong point. However, the Lydsto W2 can vacuum and mop simultaneously, as well as perform high-quality wet cleaning over large areas. Within the confines of everyday life, I'd still consider this robot vacuum a mopping machine. Especially if you set the wipes' rinse interval to every 6 minutes.

Rinsing the wipes

I'll also demonstrate the cloths' rinsing performance after the dirt-removal test. After the last cleaning cycle, the cloths were in a rather poor condition. The robot vacuum returned to the station and rinsed them. Visually, they really did look much cleaner.

I even tested the wipes under running clean water afterwards. Only a minimal amount of dirt was removed. I can say the station effectively rinses the wipes.

Self-cleaning quality

The dust bin's self-cleaning performance is also near perfect. I ran the robot vacuum in a room with a large amount of debris. It cleaned everything in a double pass, gently blowing debris from side to side. We see that the dust bin is tightly packed. We return the robot vacuum to the docking station and see that the dust bin is completely empty after self-cleaning. Self-cleaning is well implemented.

Obstacle clearance

Although some stores claim it can handle obstacles up to 15 mm, the Lydsto W2 was able to overcome a 20 mm threshold without any problems, even with the floor mats installed. The robot has good maneuverability.

Driving on black surfaces

However, the Lydsto W2 is sensitive to black surfaces, detecting them due to differences in height, like most other robotic vacuums. This is important to keep in mind.

Noise level

Finally, we measured the robot vacuum's noise level in different modes. In Quiet mode, it ranged from 58-60 dB. In Standard mode, it rose to 62 dB. In Power mode, the noise level increased to 71 dB, and at maximum power, the peak was 73 dB. As I mentioned earlier, the Lydsto W2 seems very powerful in terms of noise, but in reality, this power is lost somewhere.

Let's sum it up

The Lydsto W2 robot vacuum cleaner has been thoroughly reviewed and tested. our evaluation system he was able to dial 150 pointsI'll share my personal opinion about the robot I tested.

I liked the following:

1. Availability of a station for self-cleaning and rinsing of wipes.
2. The station's ergonomic and efficient design (including a removable platform, effective wipe drying, hot water rinsing, sterilization, and even a control panel on the body) is impressive. Overall, it's a fantastic station!
3. Good navigation.
4. Simultaneous dry and wet cleaning.
5. High-quality wet cleaning of large areas.
6. Good quality dry cleaning on various surfaces.
7. High-quality self-cleaning and rinsing of wipes.
8. Complete Russification.
9. A large number of functions for flexible adjustment of cleaning parameters.
10. Good cross-country ability.
11. Optimal price, considering the presence of a lidar and a combined station.

Speaking about the disadvantages, I would like to highlight:

1. The napkins do not rise when driving onto carpets.
2. The robot vacuum cleaner is afraid of black surfaces.
3. There is no system for identifying objects on the floor.
4. The claimed suction power was not confirmed in real-world tests.
5. There is no possibility to connect the station to the sewerage and water supply.
6. Doesn't scrub the narrow area along the baseboard.

Overall, for the price, this is definitely one of the best robot vacuums of 2022, even taking into account all the criticisms, some of which are common to most robots, and some of which are forgivable, given the price. The Lydsto W2 is definitely worth considering and is recommended, especially during the sales, when the price drops to a record $430.

On that note, I'd like to end this review. If you have any questions, please ask them in the comments below the video. Happy shopping. Bye!