Will Your Smart Vacuum Still Work After It Stops Being Supported?

My Neato D5 Connected was once a willing workhorse, but, today, things aren’t looking so good. I recently caught an email from the company alerting me that it shut down my vacuum’s cloud servers. Now, my once capable Neato is just a LiDAR-equipped vacuum with a soul that’s been deprecated. Without cloud servers, the “smart” is gone.

This could be the lobotomized future awaiting Roomba users. Earlier this month, the company behind the pioneering smart vacuum, iRobot, filed for bankruptcy. The remainder of the business will go to its primary manufacturing partner—the one it owes all that money to—Shenzhen Picea Robotics. It’s a stark reminder that the longevity of a connected smart device depends entirely on the financial health of the company that made it.

I’m not giving up, however. I’m now attempting to get the Neato D5 back into business. Whether you have a Neato, a Roomba, or another robot vacuum approaching the end of its connected, you can mirror my steps to keep your device cleaning.

Switch your robot vacuum to manual

Following the above email, I tried earnestly to get the Neato back online and back into a routine. I ended up reviving my original account by some miracle, though I have absolutely no access to the vacuum via the app as it currently is.

Luckily, there is already a community of folks working to restore the cloud service that once enabled Neato’s robot vacuums to schedule themselves. Neato-connected lets you use Home Assistant to manage the brand’s devices without the cloud. This is the best choice for experts if the goal is to revive the robot vacuum to its full capacities.

Neato has already said that the robots will continue to work manually. The D5 has LiDAR, so it can still physically “see” its way around a floor plan. And although you can’t schedule the device or remotely control it, you can still get up and push a button to start a cleaning session. If you want to be super extra, Switchbot makes an affordable button-pushing gadget you can install near the vacuum dock to trigger it from your phone, essentially “hacking” a remote start.

The other headache of trying to keep old hardware from going extinct is figuring out if its parts and mechanics still work. My Neato D5, for example, still hasn’t successfully managed a manual cleaning session. After some troubleshooting, which involved several factory resets, disconnecting and reconnecting the battery, and cleaning debris from all the sensors, it turns out that one of the LiDAR turrets—the hat on top—needs a fix. The vacuum won’t start until that’s addressed, since it literally can’t navigate without that system spinning at a precise speed.

The Neato D5 is going to require some surgery. I am either going to fix it by stabilizing a band, or buy a replacement part from eBay and have someone more tech-savvy help with the install. There’s always the option to donate it to a better cause, too. Rather than hold on to an eight pound paperweight rotting away in the utility closet, it can get a second life with a local robotics group, since Neato vacuums have a reputation for being highly scrappable due to their laser sensors.

Until I get the Neato D5 serviced, it will not manually clean.
Credit: Florence Ion/Lifehacker

Even cheaper robot vacuums, like an Ecovacs, can find a second life this way. While they aren’t as easily “hackable” as Neato (or a Roomba), there are plenty of high school robotics teams that can disassemble the devices to retrieve motors and wheels.

Never throw a robot vacuum into the trash. If the device is truly dead and unusable for parts, look into responsibly recycling the Lithium-ion battery as well as the plastic and metal shell with an e-waste recycler.  

Preparing for the end of Roomba

If you own a Roomba, you aren’t offline yet. iRobot is currently undergoing a restructuring, and the company has stated that app functionality and firmware updates will continue as usual. But inevitable change is coming if Neato’s trajectory is any indication. We don’t know exactly how Roomba’s business will go now that it has changed ownership. Existing Roombas rely on the cloud for much of their flagship functionality, like Smart Maps, which help with specific room targeting. Losing the ability would be a major blow to the hardware’s legacy.

You should prepare for what’s to come, even if it involves a little over-preparing. Stockpile replacement parts now, while they’re still available. Although Roomba’s manufacturer has taken over the business, older models will fall by the wayside as a new generation of robot vacuums is introduced. If you want to get a few more lives out of your Roomba, buy at least a two-year supply of authentic, first-party brushes, rollers, and HEPA filters. Skip the third-party stuff.

You’ll also want to invest in Roomba’s dual-mode virtual wall barriers. Buy them used on eBay. These will come in handy if Roomba’s servers ever go offline, since they act as infrared lighthouses to help direct the Roomba’s path. You’ll be able to use these with Roomba’s “Clean” button, its manual mode that doesn’t require the internet to start. You’ll also want to look into downloading your Smart Maps, in case you can integrate them later.

If that isn’t enough for you, there is a vibrant community of tinkerers who have long been dedicated to liberating Roombas from the clutches of the cloud. Projects like rest980 and dorita980 let tech-savvy users host their own local control servers, though this often involves a third-party device such as a Home Assistant hub.

Ending the e-waste cycle

History tends to repeat itself in the gadget world. You can at least future-proof your buying decision by recognizing that obsolescence is a possibility down the line. This applies to any connected gadget, from big-name brands to small ones.

Matter, the smart home specification that’s been quietly rolling out over the past few years, will be more helpful for aging smart gadgets like this, especially since its latest release. It now enables local smart-home control for robot vacuums, so you don’t need a cloud service to connect. The vacuum talks directly to your phone or smart hub instead. There are also brands like Roborock that advertise that their robot vacuums have local-only modes. You can even install another community-managed project, Valetudo, on those brands and go completely corporate-free.

Or, you could go offline. Most connected home gadgets have variants that use a physical remote control instead. Eufy still makes versions of its robot vacuums without wifi, with no cloud features to worry about going extinct.

I’m waiting before I buy eBay parts for the Neato D5 Connected. I need to see if I can fix what’s broken with some finagling. It’s a bummer I didn’t think of preparing for the end of the device’s life earlier—like when Neato’s parent company announced its eventual shutdown two years ago—to give it a second life and save it from abject hardware failure. If all else fails, I can find it a good home with a robotics team or educational program that can put its parts to good use. I will have considered that a well-lived life for a connected gadget.