I tried this 2-in-1 vacuum to see if it could replace my mop – here's what impressed me, and what didn't

Mopping is far from many people's favourite chore – mine included – so if there's anything out there that can help to simplify the laborious task, best believe I'll be the first person at the scene. Enter, the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua, which promises to vacuum and mop, all in one handy device.

Now, while the concept of vacuum-mops is a slightly newer thing, there have definitely already been some notable releases to creep their way up into the standings of best vacuum cleaners on the market; namely, the sought-after Dyson Submarine. However, with a near £800 price point, it's a big investment that can be hard to justify for the average person.

Therefore, when I stumbled across the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua, it piqued my curiosity and I was instantly keen to see if it had what it takes to rival the dual-functionality of the Dyson Submarine. Plus, at a significantly lower price point, it was worth a shot for me to see if it would quickly earn a top spot among the best cordless vacuums I've tested, offering unbridled versatility and value for money.

After all, if it meant I could potentially retire my mop and bucket for good, I was all ears.

Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua cordless vacuum and mop review

Specifications

• Max. run time: 40 minutes
• Bin volume: 0.3 litres
• Weight: 2.9kg
• Dimensions: H131 x W25.2 x D134.5cm
• Modes: Eco, Turbo, Auto
• In the box: vacuum floorhead, aqua mop floorhead, flexible wand, charging cable, exchangeable battery pack, docking station, 2-in-1 furniture brush, small crevice nozzle, long flexible crevice nozzle, four texture pads for mop floorhead

Unboxing, assembly, and first impressions

The Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua came in a fairly large and heavy box that was admittedly a little battered as a result of transit and had seen better days (hence the lack of photo), but fortunately, the contents were unscathed.

In the box, you receive the respective vacuum and mop floorheads (with the textured pads for the mop), the flexible wand, battery pack, and hand tools which include a small crevice tool, flexible crevice tool, as well as a little furniture brush. You also get a docking station, which you can attach to a wall to hold up your vacuum and store the additional tools, keeping everything neat and tidy.

There's a manual inside the box, which offers step-by-step diagrams to help you in setting up the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua. It only took me a little once-over to get my bearings on general set up, and before I knew it I was clicking things into place easily and was ready to go.

Some things I noticed straight away was how slim the vacuum floorhead is. I'm typically so used to seeing wider floorheads, but this one looks like it'd be perfect for vacuuming in small, skinny areas without having to revert to the handheld mode. It's also pretty lightweight all things considered, despite having a stick design which in my opinion, can often feel quite top-heavy.

What's it like to use?

Vacuuming

The vacuum function on the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua is exactly as you'd expect, offering three different modes: Eco, Turbo, and Auto. These modes are interchangeable using the toggle at the top of the unit, which you can slide freely to your preferred mode. This also doubles as the power switch, as the unit turns on as soon as you select one of the three modes.

I did the majority of my vacuuming using the Auto mode, gliding it over my hardwood flooring, area rugs, carpet, and bathroom tiles to see how responsive it was and how it fared when transitioning between these different areas. Overall, I found myself really impressed with its performance, as the vacuum detected these and changed the amount of suction respectively, leaving my floors visibly cleaner. I could feel the vacuum kick into Turbo mode to help lift deep-rooted dirt and debris on my carpet and rugs, as well as feel it slow down and use less power when gliding over the cleaner parts of my hard flooring.

Manoeuvring the vacuum was simple, and it felt very intuitive. It was easy to bend the floorhead as I pushed it around angles and corners, cleaning pretty close to the edge every time.

One of the other notable features about the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua is the flexible wand, which allows you to unlatch and bend the wand at will to help you clean under furniture without having to bend down completely. This is a feature I also got to try when I was testing the new Shark PowerDetect, however, I admittedly found it to be quite frustrating and awkward to use as it just emphasised how top-heavy the appliance was. But, this was fortunately not the case for the Unlimited 7 Aqua.

Since the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua is more lightweight than the Shark PowerDetect, I actually found that it was way easier to get the flexible wand to work in a way that felt natural. Unlatching the mechanism felt a lot smoother, and the wand and floorhead didn't add any additional weight that made it difficult to manoeuvre. This genius function, paired with the handy LED headlights, make it a lot easier to clean under TV units and coffee tables without having to exert so much effort to do so.

Mopping

Now, for the part I was particularly excited for: the mopping function. Getting everything set up and changing the heads out was super simple. If you still have the vacuum floorhead on, all you've got to do is use your foot to put weight on the nozzle, and then pull the wand and unit away from it. I found that this was a far easier way to change the floorheads than the usual 'unlatch and pull' method that's common among many vacuum cleaners.

Before you put the aqua mop floorhead on, make sure to do all the preparations ahead of time. This includes attaching the textured pads to the bottom of the mop head, which are easily attached using Velcro. Then, press the button above the water tank to eject it and fill this up accordingly, filling it with your desired cleaning solution according to manufacturer's instructions. I made sure to wipe the outside of the water tank before reinserting it, to ensure no water could be subject to leaking.

Once your prep is done, you can simply slide the aqua mop floorhead in situ on the wand and get to cleaning.

Operating the mop function is just like as you would with the vacuuming function. Select your mode of choice (for the purpose of my testing, I opted to stick with the Auto mode as I found it the most effective) and then simply use it as though you were vacuuming.

The mop function operates by spinning the textured pads on the bottom of the mop head, evenly dispersing the perfect amount of water from the tank as you move around. I found that I had to give it a couple of seconds at the beginning for the water to start dispersing and soaking through the pads before I could really start to see the effects on my hard flooring. But, once the pads had enough time to thoroughly soak in the water, I was pretty much on my way to continuously cleaning.

Something I noticed instantly when using the mop mode was how smooth everything felt. It felt as though the mop head was just gliding and propelling me forward, and it felt even smoother than using the vacuuming function. It was incredibly easy to manoeuvre and the floorhead responded well to my twisting and turning as I took it around bends, angles, and underneath cabinets. The mop head is quite tall, and it didn't actually fit to reach underneath my TV unit, which is definitely something to consider if you have a lot of low furniture in your home.

As for the cleaning? To preface, it's not like I had particularly grubby floors to begin with. I only live with my partner and we don't have any pets or children, so keeping a cleaner home is usually pretty easy for us. While I could definitely see the textured pads doing their thing and dispersing the water and cleaning solution from the tank evenly onto the floors, I just really wasn't convinced that it was giving me the deep clean I was desiring.

It definitely lifted some leftover and gave the floors a good polish and spruce up – which was evident as you could see this on the textured pads afterwards, but it wasn't nearly as drastic a difference as I was hoping for. Perhaps this is due to the lack of a dirty water tank, which is what I suppose the Dyson Submarine has over the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua. Since this appliance only has one water tank, it effectively means that any dirt that it picks up will just keep recirculating onto the pads. This wasn't much of an issue in my home, but I can see this becoming undesirable for busier homes with pets and children, and you might honestly just be better off using one of the best mops instead.

I don't think the mopping is bad per se, but I also don't think it's fit to replace a traditional bucket and mop, in my household's case anyway. I can definitely see myself bringing this out for a quick clean before guests arrive or as a mid-week refresh, as I will praise it for being easy to use and even being easy to clean compared to a bucket and mop, but more on that later. In my case, I think I definitely see myself using this in tandem with my other mop; rather than subbing it out completely.

Small tools

Funnily enough, I think I might've actually been the most impressed by the small tools included with the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua. Since it's a stick model, it was no surprise that it can be used in handheld mode. The vacuum comes with a furniture brush tool, a small crevice tool, and a long flexible crevice tool – something to suit all of your smaller jobs.

The wands and attachments are really easy to change out and weighing 2.9kg, I found the vacuum to be fairly lightweight and it didn't feel overly heavy in my hands.

I tried the long crevice tool (which yes, has the small crevice tool attached to the end because that's how I had it stored originally, but the function remains the same) and I found it to be a brilliant tool for reaching all the awkward nooks and crannies in my doorframes, windowsills, and even the top corners of a room.

I'm awfully short, so I had unfortunately been letting spiderwebs form in these corners as I couldn't reach them otherwise, but the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua in its handheld mode has since been my saviour.

Then, I gave the furniture brush a go on my living room sofa. I love my sofa because it's soft and super cosy, especially for autumn. However, it can get a little grubby and filled with hair and debris overtime, and I found that this small Bosch attachment was the best fit for the job – even compared to other tools included in other handheld vacs I've tried, such as the Gtech Multi Platinum. This was lightweight, easy, and effective, providing a great amount of suction for the spots that needed it most.

Overall, I was very pleased with the handheld mode and small tools that came with the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua.

Battery

According to Bosch, the Unlimited 7 Aqua has a runtime of up to 40 minutes, which is definitely on the lower end of runtimes for cordless vacuum cleaners. It also takes around five hours to fully charge, which I find to be quite a lot, considering the Gtech AirRAM Platinum takes three hours to fully charge but delivers a 60 minute runtime.

Generally speaking, I found that I could vacuum my whole home on Auto and still have charge to spare, even managing to use the small tools quickly for select rooms in my house that needed the extra TLC without having to worry about the charge. However, I quickly found the battery life unsuitable when I wanted to use the mop feature after having used the appliance already for vacuuming.

When switching to mop mode, the battery life drains surprisingly fast and I found that just using the mop for 10-15 minutes on Auto took my battery from two-thirds full to one-third. Luckily, only the downstairs of my house and my bathroom have hard floor and tile respectively, so it worked out and I was able to utilise every last bit of charge remaining before it gave out on me.

Seeing as I don't even have a big home by any means, it's possible that those with larger houses and families than me (or if you live in a home with primarily hard flooring) will find that the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua doesn't quite have what it takes to be an all-in-one cleaning solution. That is, if you want to vacuum and mop consecutively.

I find this quite underwhelming as other cordless vacuums I've used have had more than enough battery life in one standing, such as the Gtech AirRAM Platinum with up to 60 minutes of runtime and the Shark PowerDetect with up to 70 minutes of runtime. But, I suppose you can give the Bosch the benefit of the doubt, as it's vacuuming and mopping, whereas the Gtech and Shark only serve as vacuum cleaners.

Portability and storage

Something I really like about the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua is that it has this little notch near the top, at the back of the unit. At first, I didn't quite understand what it was for, but after rustling through the manual I soon found out that you can hook it onto furniture, such as the tops of chairs to hold it in place and keep it upright, without the fear that it'll slip and fall.

I thought this was a really nice feature, and it came in handy while I was in the middle of vacuuming and quickly needed a break or had to rearrange furniture. Although I was utilising it as a mid-clean storage solution, I can imagine that you can hook it anywhere you like and use it as a permanent storage option, instead of using the wall-mounted dock if that's easier or more practical for you.

Although it does come with a wall-mounted docking station, I'm currently renting so I opted against it until I figured out a renter-friendly solution for it that could hold its weight. In the meantime, I'm just keeping the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua balanced in a corner.

However, I do have the small tools attached to the dock anyway even if I'm not actively docking my vacuum in it, so I have everything in one place and don't have to deal with loose attachments everywhere. This just sits in my cleaning cupboard, ready to go at any time.

Cleaning and maintenance

The Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua has a very small dustbin capacity of just 0.3 litres. After a whole vacuum around the house, it was clear that the dustbin was full of debris and you could even see all the hair wrapped around the filter. I don't have the biggest home nor do I have pets (in this house at least), so the little 0.3 litre capacity was sufficient for my cleaning needs.

However, if you've got a bigger household, there's a chance that the 0.3 litres won't be enough, and you'll have to empty it mid vacuum to make more space. Luckily, the dustbin is easy to empty, albeit, not the most allergy-friendly.

To empty the dustbin, you simply have to remove it from the top of the unit. Then, you'll be met with this red mechanism that you simply have to twist a couple of times and then remove the cap. Once it's off, make sure you're over a rubbish bin and simply tap out the contents from both the filter and the dust cap.

If you've got allergies, be aware because dust can get everywhere if you're not careful. The Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua unfortunately doesn't benefit from a dust-free emptying system, like many Dyson vacuums do where you can simply 'point and shoot' the debris out, or the Gtech AirRAm Platinum that has a sliding mechanism to push the debris out without you having to touch it or tap it out yourself. But, it gets the job done and dust is otherwise contained when the vacuum's in use.

As for cleaning the water tank and textured pads from the mop floorhead, this is also really easy. When you're done vacuuming, simply remove the floorhead from the wand, remove the textured pads, and eject the water chamber from the mop head.

To clean these, I just dumped the water out, rinse it out a couple of times and left this on the side to dry. The same goes for the textured pads; which I just rinsed under the tap with lukewarm water, wrung them out, and left them to air dry. According to the manual, you can also just pop these into the washing machine to clean them, if your floors were particularly grubby beforehand. But, mine weren't too bad so handwashing was the route I opted for.

You also get an additional set of textured pads, so in the off chance that you need to use the mop again while these are drying, you can. You will just have to ensure that the water tank is dry on the outside before filling it up with water and reinserting it into the floorhead.

How does it compare to similar vacuums?

Cordless vacuums with the ability to mop are still a newer concept, with many models either being subpar or just extremely expensive. It goes without saying, but the Dyson V15 Detect Submarine is easily the best in class right now as far as vacuuming and mopping goes, with a design that's really considered every aspect, from a larger capacity, separate dirty water tank, and all the bells and whistles that com with the Dyson name. However, it is double the price of the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua and not overly accessible.

Alternatively, the Samsung Jet 95 Pro has a strikingly similar design to the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua, offering both vacuuming and mopping in a similar with two rotating textured pads on the mop head. However, since there isn't a separate dirty water tank, you're effectively also just picking up grime and recirculating it over the floor, which isn't fantastic if your floors are really dirty. However, the vacuuming function is pretty similar, it has a wide range of accessories, and a freestanding charging station, if that's more your style. The price range is extremely comparable too.

Aside from vacuum-mop models specifically, I also took the liberty to see how the Unlimited 7 Aqua looks next to the other two vacuums I have and use regularly at home, the Gtech AirRAM Platinum and the newly released Shark PowerDetect Clean and Empty cordless vacuum.

The Bosch vacuum is a good middle ground amongst the Gtech and Shark vacs. It shares a similar stick design to the Shark, which can also be used in handheld mode but in my opinion, the Bosch is a lot lighter and easier to use. I also much prefer the small tools provided by Bosch, as opposed to Shark. The Gtech, on the other hand, is an upright design so isn't really comparable in that respect. However, I thought putting them side by side was interesting nonetheless.

Should you buy the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua?

So, should you buy the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua cordless vacuum and mop? In my opinion, I do think it's a fantastic piece of kit if you want to combine both vacuuming and mopping into one handy appliance, but it's not without its drawbacks.

The vacuuming is great, with its Auto mode being the star of the show for powerful and precise pick up and the mopping function gets the job done, but it's nothing groundbreaking enough to replace a traditional bucket and mop (or a dedicated hard floor cleaner) for super grimy floors. It does, however, benefit from being lightweight, with design features that make it feel nice and premium.

I wouldn't say that it's the absolute ultimate 2-in-1 cleaning solution, as it's got a couple of issues such as a subpar battery life and a smaller dustbin, which may make it not as suitable for larger or busier households that often need deep cleaning. However, if you live in a smaller flat or home and need something for a quick mid-week spruce-up, I can see the Bosch Unlimited 7 Aqua being a great choice to streamline your cleaning routine, and I've had a blast testing it out these past couple of weeks.