By Kate Harvey
Content Manager | Pou Whakahaere Ihirangi
Making the switch from a corded vacuum to a stick vacuum can feel so freeing. No longer do you have to deal with the plug popping out of the socket when you venture too far away from it.
If you’ve bought a stick vac with a short battery life though, you might find yourself having to return it to the charger before you’ve finished getting round the house.
The only way to really know if you’re buying one that will last a long time in between charges, is to take a look at our stick vacuum test results. Vacuum manufacturers all use different power modes when reporting their run times. But our lab puts them all on maximum power mode before timing how long it takes them to run out of juice vacuuming carpet.
The average run time of the sticks vacuums we’ve tested is about 13 minutes but some fall well below that. Erin Bennett has written about vacuums for Consumer NZ for the past decade and says this can be because they’re so good at vacuuming that they use battery power faster.
“A long runtime can be a bit of a red flag because low suction means they’ll be able to run for longer. So, you also need to check their overall cleaning ability.”
Erin says she is seeing more and more stick vacs that make it easy to switch out batteries, so you can keep on vacuuming.
“It used to be that it was just the tool brands like Ryobi and Makita that you could clip in a new battery when it dies on you in the middle of cleaning. Now you’ve got brands like Dyson, Miele, and Shark giving you the ability to take out a battery and clip in a new one.”
While some stick vacs come with a spare battery, you usually need to buy a spare separately from the manufacturer, Erin says.
“It’s an extra cost so what I’d do is make sure I’m buying a stick vacuum that our lab has found has a long run time, but also has the ability to swap out the battery should you find it’s not lasting long enough. And of course, it should also be a vacuum that scores well overall, preferably getting the Consumer Recommended tick.”
Stick vacuums with the shortest run times
These five vacuums definitely aren’t terrible – a few are actually top-scoring models and get the Consumer Recommended tick because they do so well in other areas we test on. But if you’ve got a big house, expect to break up your vacuuming into chunks, because these stick vacs will only last 6 to 7 minutes on max power.
Dyson V12 Detect Slim Absolute – 6 minutes.
Samsung Bespoke Jet Plus Elite VS20B95993B/SA – 6 minutes.
Dyson Cyclone V10 – 7 minutes.
LG Kompressor A9K-ULTRA – 7 minutes.
LG A9N-MULTI – 7 minutes.
Stick vacuums with the longest battery life
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How to make your stick vac battery last longer
Your stick vacuum loses battery capacity every time you use it, but there are ways to use it and charge it that will make it last longer.
More reasons to check out our stick vacuum test results
Run time is just one thing to consider when you’re trying to get the best stick vacuum for your money. When you use our stick vacuum test results to compare models, you’ll also be able to see:
which are the noisiest
dustbin size, so you get an idea whether you’ll be emptying it a lot
how good they are at sucking up pet hair
how reliable each brand is
how satisfied people are when they buy a stick vac from that brand
plus lots more easy-to-understand information to help you save time and money when choosing a stick vacuum.
