Best Window Cleaning Robot UK 2026: We Tested 9 on the Same 14 Windows. Only 3 Left Almost No Streaks in the Evening Sun.

We expected Ecovacs or Kärcher to win. The Vekto did not win on anything that looks good on a box. It won on three plain things: it gets to the windows you cannot reach, it stays safely on its rope, and it comes with enough pads.

First, the windows you cannot reach. The landing window, the tall glass by the front door, the outside of the upstairs windows. You open the window next to the pane, clip the rope to the handle or the banister, set the robot on the glass and press the button. It grips, finds the edges and works down the pane row by row. The rope is braided, thick and rated to 50 kg. If the power cuts out, it holds on for 20 minutes and beeps, so you can take it down calmly.

Then the pads. It sounds dull, but it is the reason for the streaks. A pad picks up dirt and drags it round until someone washes it. Trusted Reviews saw the same with a rival: "I was prompted to remove the wiping pad after cleaning each window pane, because the windows were so dirty." The Vekto has 20 pads in the box. We put a clean pair on every large pane, and the small panes shared a pair. 20 pads is ten pairs. That was enough for every pane on one side of the glass in one go. The pads went in the washing machine overnight, and we did the other side the next day.

What the others do better. Ecovacs has corner brushes, and you can see it at the frame. The Vekto left a strip of about 1 cm. There is a microfibre edge cloth in the box, and with it the edges took about a minute a window. The Hobot's sliding mops came close in the sun. The Vekto has no drying or polishing pass.

And what it cannot do. No conservatory roof, no sloped glass, no small Georgian-bar panes, no app. It needs a plug socket, which is why a 5 m extension lead is in the box. In return you get a 5-year guarantee, pads included, with no registration.

The house is a 1930s three-bed semi in Stockport with white uPVC double glazing. We used 14 panes. Most were cleaned on both sides, the upstairs ones on the outside. Two large patio door panes. The front bay window, one big pane and two narrow sides. The kitchen window over the sink. A tall fixed landing window 3.6 m above the stairs. The outside of the three upstairs windows. Four upright side panels of a small conservatory. And a Labrador who presses her nose to the patio doors every morning.

Each robot cleaned every pane it could manage 12 times over six weeks, with the maker's own fluid or tap water and a drop of washing-up liquid. We changed pads as often as the cloths in the box allowed. After each round we photographed every pane at 7pm with the sun behind it and counted the streaks. We measured the strip left at the frame with a steel rule. Gary Whitworth looked at every result with us.

• "Few streaks" means no lines and no circles in the 7pm photo, at most a few faint marks
• "Upstairs and outside" means it cleaned the landing window and the outside of the upstairs panes, safely on its rope
• When a robot's cloths ran out, we carried on with the used ones, as most people would at home. All pads were washed at night
• Prices were checked between 21 and 23 September 2026 at the shops in the sources
• Press reviews are quoted as sources. They are not part of our score

If you own a Kärcher window vac, keep it. For condensation on a winter morning, and for windows at head height, it is quicker than any robot here. Which? says the same: if your windows are easy to reach, "a window vacuum cleaner is cheaper and faster". That is the cheapest advice on this page.

A robot is for the panes you never do because you cannot reach them. The landing window. The outside of the upstairs windows. The patio doors the dog noses every day. Which? again: "for hard-to-reach spots on first or second-floor windows, a robot cleaner is the better option." That is exactly what we tested.

One thing from our reading stayed with us. The same story comes up again and again on Gransnet and MoneySavingExpert: a window that has not been cleaned in years. Not from laziness. You cannot reach it, and nobody feels safe on a ladder on the stairs or leaning out of an upstairs window. "I'm with the leave it and stay safe gang," wrote one. Another: "I don't think the NHS would thank me for breaking a leg after falling off a ladder cleaning windows!"

The worry is not overdone. RoSPA counts falls as the biggest single cause of accidental death in the UK: 11,110 deaths in 2023, almost half of all fatal accidents. A robot that cleans the high window while you stand on the landing is not a luxury. It is the reason that window gets cleaned at all.

Start with the exceptions. If you want to clean the conservatory roof, none of the top three is right for you. Call a window cleaner. If money is no object and the strip at the frame bothers you, buy the Ecovacs W2S Omni, and read Tom's view above. If your windows are all at head height, keep your window vac.

Most homes are like our semi. A few big panes, patio doors, a landing window nobody can reach, and the outside of the upstairs windows. If that is your house, the result is clear. One robot under £300 cleaned all of those panes, safely on its rope, with no tangles, a clean pair of pads for every large pane, and only faint marks in the evening sun. It has a 5-year guarantee and costs £249.

The landing window in Stockport is clean on the inside now. For the first time since the owners moved in.