# Neato robot vacuum

7 Hacker News commenters recommended Neato robot vacuum and 10 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 2 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** People recommend Neato robot vacuums for lidar mapping and remote use, often over Roomba. The main caveat: functions stop when the company's cloud service goes down.

## Why people recommend it

- Better than Roomba and newer models (3 comments): "It's pretty crazy just how much better the Neatos were than brand new ones." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46269239)) "The best robovac was Neato. Lidar and mapping 13 years ago. No cloud." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46269152)) "The neato was so much better than the Roomba and that was so long ago" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46341533))
- Lidar mapping without cloud (2 comments): "The best robovac was Neato. Lidar and mapping 13 years ago. No cloud." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46269152)) "Neato made a line of (good) vacuum robots with Lidar." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46084955))

## What people warn about

- Features disabled after company troubles (3 comments): "a shitty architectural design makes it so my robot loses half its functionality when the company goes under" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46086297)) "Almost all functionality is being disabled, other than limited manual operation." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46084966)) "The functionality is very much reduced." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46085422))
- Cloud dependence and outages (2 comments): "we're incapable of maintaining a cloud solution that we built for a product we sold to you" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46085716)) "has never had to become unavailable whenever AWS goes down" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46085649))
- Poor developers and security (2 comments): "Neato cuts corners, does outsourcing, good developers leave, only shitty internal developers stay there" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46085960)) "Hopefully Neato's security is as bad as their business side." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46085904))
- Support gaps and missing advertised features (2 comments): "it appears NEATO Robotics vacuums aren't supported ... yet." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46109218)) "Is that what was advertised when the product was sold?" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46085839))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [iRobot Roomba](https://hackerapproved.com/p/roomba.md): 68 recommend
- [Roborock robot vacuum](https://hackerapproved.com/p/roborock-robot-vacuum.md): 48 recommend
- [Eufy robot vacuum](https://hackerapproved.com/p/eufy-robot-vacuum.md): 10 recommend
- [Dreame robot vacuum](https://hackerapproved.com/p/dreame-robot-vacuum.md): 9 recommend
- [Matic robot vacuum](https://hackerapproved.com/p/matic-robot-vacuum.md): 8 recommend

## Where to get it

- [See price on Amazon](https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Neato+Robotics+robot+vacuum&tag=hackerapprove-20) (affiliate link)

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Neato robot vacuum", https://hackerapproved.com/p/neato-vacuum-robots/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).