Vax Air Cordless Review
A distinctly average cordless upright vacuum, the Vax Air Cordless is better than its cheaper rivals but not by much
Unlike Dyson’s handheld cordless vacuums, Vax has taken a more familiar upright approach to its latest battery-powered model. The Air Cordless looks a lot like any other upright bagless vacuum, with a detachable bin in the centre and a handle for pushing it around the house. The only major difference is the chunky battery pack plugged into the base.
Vax has cleverly designed the box so the Air Cordless arrives almost fully assembled, with the base of the box folding out to reveal the charger and extra battery pack. The primary battery arrives with 20% charge, so you can start cleaning straight away while you connect the second to the mains. The charger only holds one battery at a time, and isn’t a docking station for the vacuum, so you’ll have to find room for both; other cordless vacuums tend to double up their chargers as storage for when you aren’t using the cleaner.
Ease of use
At 4.6kg, the Air Cordless is light enough to push around with just one hand, but it’s too big and bulky to lift comfortably. Thankfully, you won’t need to do that often, as the vacuum tube can be detached from the fixed brush head and an extension tube removed from the upright handle for cleaning above floors. It’s nowhere near as convenient as Dyson’s modular approach, as you have to stoop down to floor level to unclip the vacuum hose.
It has about 2m of reach and, with a crevice tool and soft dusting brush attachments, it can be used for furniture or for getting into corners. That’s handy, as the main brush head is rather wide, meaning there’s a sizeable gap to the left and right that you won’t be able to cover when sweeping parallel to walls or furniture. There’s, annoyingly, only room for one attachment on the vacuum itself, with nowhere to store the other when you aren’t using it.
The Air Cordless turns easily enough on carpets and hard floors alike, with an articulated, left/right up/down joint connecting brush to vacuum. The direct drive brush bar can be engaged when sweeping carpets, and disabled for hard floors using the button on the top of the cleaner opposite the power switch.
The bin lifts out of the machine with a quick-release switch, and a second switch unclips the lid and empties the bin into a rubbish bag. The bin has a 1.05l capacity, which is more than twice that of Dyson’s V6 cordless models. It should mean you’ll spend half as much time emptying the Air Cordless, but things aren’t quite that simple. The cylinder takes up a large portion of the bin, at least near the channel that connects to the brush, and it got clogged on several occasions when tackling large spills or a particularly dusty carpet.
Performance
With only one power level, I measured suction at 7.5kPa with an empty bin. This is almost half the suction of one of Dyson’s cordless models, and a third of what they are capable of when used in MAX mode. Disappointingly, this power quickly drops off to 6kPa when the bin gets filled; while this was still sufficient for dust and light spills like paper shreddings or Rice Krispies, it then struggled with heavier bits like cat litter.
Hard floors are a real weak point for the Air Cordless, particularly when fine dust and dirt is involved. A baking powder spill on tiles left lots of dusty streaks after a single pass and needed six slow swipes to collect everything. Even then, there was a fine amount of dust that was left behind. You can see the before and after results of a single pass below.
Spills comprised of larger particles were even worse, with cat litter remaining on the floor even after ten passes. The small wheels made it hard to push the vacuum over a big spill, and the lack of suction meant dirt was frequently left in crevices between floorboards.
The Air Cordless fared better on carpets, where the direct drive brush bars could be used to better capture larger particles. Around 80-90% of a cat litter spill was picked up on the first pass, but it left a lot of fine grains behind. It took several more sweeps before the carpet looked clean, but this was with an empty bin; it struggles when the bin is full.
Battery life is something of a mixed bag. You get two in the box, meaning you can leave one on charge and swap out the other when it runs out of juice; they clip into the front of the vacuum, with a release lever popping them back out again when they are drained. Charging takes around three hours per battery, and each one should last for around 25 minutes of use. The 50-minute total runtime should mean you can clean an entire house without needing to wait for it to recharge, although that figure will drop if you engage the brush bars because they are driven by the vacuum rather than by your sweeping motions. You’ll also have to go over areas multiple times in order to leave them completely clean, which isn’t the case with Dyson’s cordless models. You do at least get a three-stage power indicator LED, letting you know when it’s time to swap out the batteries. Should you completely run out of power, the vacuum will simply shut down; there’s no loss of suction as the battery drains.
Conclusion
The Air Cordless has merely average suction for a cordless vacuum, and while the design might appeal to those more familiar with an upright cleaner than a handheld one, it’s not as efficient as a mains-powered machine; you’ll often have to cover the same area multiple times to ensure it’s clean.
It’s hardly cheap at £280, so while it undercuts Dyson’s models, it’s just as expensive as many mains-powered vacuums. If an upright vacuum is a must, a wired model makes more sense; it will do a better job with less effort, and you don’t have to worry about recharging batteries. If wireless convenience is more important, you really should save up and pick up a Dyson V6 Absolute instead.
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