At CES, the robotic revolution just took a significant step forward with this compact home help

Odds are that your first domestic robot will be – or already is - a vacuum cleaner. According to the Chinese manufacturer Roborock, we’ve been sharing our homes with robotic cleaning devices for nearly three decades – the first robot vacuum was Electrolux’s Trilobite, originally announced in December 1997.

At around the same time as the Swedish company’s puck-shaped, radar-controlled machine, the American start-up iRobot was gearing up to launch the Roomba, which eventually came to market in 2002 and enjoyed a certain cachet with the first wave of loft-living dot-commers.

Roborock believe they’ve taken another step forwards with the introduction of the new Saros Z70. The innovation here is the addition of ‘OmniGrip’, a five-axis robotic arm integrated into the top of the cleaner. The arm is capable of picking up things left scattered in the robot’s path, with an initial maximum lift of 300g and the promise of more power to come with future updates.

The Roborock Saros Z70 tops the company’s existing range of robotic cleaning machines, alongside other new releases like the Saros 10 and 10R, also shown at CES. The company also makes conventional vacuum cleaners, with the powerful F25 Series 2 debuting at the show as well.

The new robot’s features include mopping capabilities, an AI-driven obstacle avoidance system that uses a combination of cameras and 3D sensors. The system is also programmed to recognise over 100 ‘common’ obstacles like socks and toys, with the foldable OmniGrip swooping in to decide whether something is small enough to be picked up and stashed out of the way in a pre-programmed spot, or just navigated around if it’s too heavy. When not in use the arm folds away into the top of the slim puck – less than 8cm tall.

The little device will do a first pass on your floors, noting the location of discarded objects, before returning to scoop them up and then coming back a third time to clean the areas it missed. There’s an accompanying app that’ll let you define specific objects to be collected or ignored. The low design lets it scoot beneath most furniture and the ride height is automatically adjusted to cope with deeper carpets.

The Saros Z70 can be paired with the separate Roborock Multifunctional Dock 4.0, which automatically changes the battery and cleans and detaches the mop function when it’s not needed. The app also lets you check in to the robot’s camera system for peace of mind when you’re out and about, and there’s the ability to photograph your pets or even roam the house and seek them out. Voice activated operation via Alexa, Siri and Google Home is also available, along with an Apple Watch app.

More information at Global.Roborock.com