PCMag editors select and review products independently. If you buy through affiliate links, we may earn commissions, which help support our testing.

Next-Level Clean: Roborock's New Robot Vacuum Has an Arm to Lift and Move Your Junk

The Roborock Saros Z70 robot vacuum channels The Jetsons' Rosey with a fully retractable mechanical arm that can recognize items like socks and toys, pick them up, and put them away.

 & Andrew Gebhart Senior Writer, Smart Home and Wearables

Our team tests, rates, and reviews more than 1,500 products each year to help you make better buying decisions and get more from technology.

Our Expert
LOOK INSIDE PC LABS HOW WE TEST
65 EXPERTS
43 YEARS
41,500+ REVIEWS
(Credit: Roborock)

Debuting at CES 2025, the Roborock Saros Z70 is a premium robot vacuum and mop hybrid that takes tidying up to the next level with a fully retractable mechanical arm capable of recognizing objects, picking them up, and putting them away.

The Saros Z70 promises to be Roborock's most capable model yet with 22,000Pa of vacuum suction power and a new navigation system using time-of-flight (TOF) sensors. You also get a dock that can empty its dustbin, wash its mop pads, and even remove those pads for dry runs.


Go Go Gadget Robot Arm

Robots with object-gripping arms aren’t uncommon at CES. LG, in particular, has shown several concept home-helper robots over the years with similar capabilities. Moreover, numerous startups have teased humanoid robot helpers that were clearly inspired by Rosey herself. That said, the Roborock Saros Z70 has a distinct advantage over its flashy CES predecessors: It’s actually coming to market this year.

Roborock isn’t promising infinite capabilities for the arm at launch. The five-axis OmniGrip has a built-in camera to help it maneuver but is limited to picking up objects weighing less than 10.6 ounces. At first, it will recognize socks, sandals, tissues, and towels, with more object types to be added via over-the-air firmware updates in the future, Roborock says. Via its companion app, you can train it to bring each of those four objects to different spots in your home. The tissues can go to the trash can, while the sandals can go to your closet.

The arm when retracted
(Credit: Roborock)

The Saros Z70 will clean in three passes. On the first, it will vacuum and/or mop and mark any objects that need picking up. On the second pass, it will move the objects to the side and clean the previously obstructed spot. Finally, it will put the objects away. The Z70 will navigate using 3D Time-of-Flight sensors, an RGB camera, and AI. Roborock has trained it to recognize up to 108 objects, even if it can’t pick them all up, and you’ll be able to teach it up to 50 customizable objects by labeling them in the app. In theory, then, when bedtime comes around, the Saros Z70 can help you find your child’s missing Teddy Bear if it saw the bear during the run.


Cleaning, Climbing, and Reaching

Aside from the robotic arm, the Roborock Saros Z70 carries forward all of the features from the company’s excellent 2024 flagship, the Qrevo Curv, including the ability to lift itself up and over objects and small thresholds. Like the Qrevo Curv, the Saros Z70 has a FlexiArm Riser Side Brush and dual spinning mop pads that can extend to the side to clean along walls and in corners. The Saros Z70 can also lift its mop pads 0.87 inches above the floor to help keep them away from carpets.

(Credit: Roborock)

Beyond what the Curv can do, the Saros Z70 gains the ability to automatically drop off its mop pads at its base station to completely avoid cross-contamination with carpets, similar to the Dreame X30 Ultra. The Saros Z70’s 22,000Pa of suction power also sets a new benchmark as Roborock continues to lead in this spec. The Curv held the standard previously with 18,500Pa of suction.

Because it ditches LiDAR in favor of Time-of-Flight sensors, the Saros Z70 is just 3.14 inches tall, whereas the Curv stands 4.1 inches thanks to its tower on top. Its shorter design will allow the Saros Z70 to more easily fit under furniture compared with the Curv. Roborock also promises its advanced navigation will help it avoid bumping into furniture and objects while nimbly cleaning alongside these obstacles.

Otherwise, the Saros Z70 has the features you’d expect from a high-end Roborock hybrid, including built-in voice command support. It can empty its dustbin and wash and dry its mop pads at the dock. It can act as a security camera, and you can send it out to try to locate your pets. The Saros Z70 will work with Alexa and Google Assistant, and an over-the-air update will add Matter support for wider interoperability with third-party smart home devices.


A New Saros Trio

While the Saros Z70 is certainly the headliner, Roborock is teasing a couple of other robot vacuums at CES to round out its new Saros line of vacuums. The Saros 10R is essentially the same as the Z10 but without the mechanical arm. The Saros 10 has a unique radar tower that can retract when it's trying to squeeze under objects.

(Credit: Roborock)

Roborock hasn’t officially announced pricing or a release date for the trio yet, other than noting that all three are due out in 2025.

The Saros Z70 looks like an exciting step forward for robot vacuums, and once it's available, we’ll put that robotic arm to the test to see if it can keep a real-world environment tidy. Recent Roborock models, including the Qrevo Curv, have fallen short of their iRobot counterparts in terms of obstacle avoidance, so we're eager to find out whether the Saros Z70 changes that. Stay tuned for our full review, and in the meantime, check out our roundup of the best robot vacuums you can buy now.

About Our Expert

Andrew Gebhart

Andrew Gebhart

Senior Writer, Smart Home and Wearables

My Experience

I’m PCMag’s senior writer covering smart home and wearable devices. I’ve been reporting on tech professionally for nearly a decade and have been obsessing about it for much longer than that. Prior to joining PCMag, I made educational videos for an electronics store called Abt Electronics in Illinois, and before that, I spent eight years covering the smart home market for CNET. 

I foster many flavors of nerdom in my personal life. I’m an avid board gamer and video gamer. I love fantasy football, which I view as a combination of role-playing games and sports. Plus, I can talk to you about craft beer for hours and am on a personal quest to have a flight of beer at each microbrewery in my home city of Chicago.

The Technology I Use

I tend to like mixing flavors from various companies. My personal computer is an Apple MacBook Pro. My phone is a Google Pixel 7a. On my wrists are an ever-rotating lineup of the latest smartwatches, and I sometimes wear two at once for testing and extra style. The Apple Watch Ultra 2 is a mainstay on my wrist because I use it as a control for evaluating the accuracy of other devices' fitness metrics. 

I spend plenty of time in front of my entertainment center, which features a 55-inch LG OLED TV, a Yamaha soundbar, a Nintendo Switch, and a PS5. (I insisted on getting the PS5 with the disc slot when they were hard to come by and haven’t used the feature in more than a year.) I thought I’d have given in to temptation and snagged an Xbox to play Starfield by now, but Baldur’s Gate 3 saved me money by distracting me long enough for the Starfield hype to blow past.

I have two cats and sneeze plenty, so I have a Shark Air Purifier to help me fight back against their dastardly, shedding ways.

I use my aforementioned Pixel 7a and a Nest Hub for Google Assistant, an iPhone 16e and AirPods to talk to Siri, and an Amazon Echo Show 5 and Echo Show 15 for Alexa, so I’m not in danger of losing touch with any of the big three digital assistants.

Read full bio