Shark AV2501AE AI Ultra Robot Vacuum – Powerful HEPA Cleaning with Smart Mapping & 60-Day Bagless Base
- 💨 Incredible Suction: Shark’s signature high-performance suction tackles dirt, dust, and stubborn debris on both carpets and hard floors.
- 🧠 Matrix Clean Navigation: Uses precision grid pattern cleaning, making multiple passes to ensure a complete whole-home clean with no spots missed.
- 🗑️ HEPA Self-Empty Base: Holds up to 60 days of dirt and debris with a HEPA filtration system that captures 99.97% of dust and allergens (down to 0.3 microns).
- 📍 Smart Precision Mapping: Equipped with 360° LiDAR navigation to map your home in real-time and navigate efficiently while avoiding obstacles—even in low light.
- 🐾 Pet-Friendly Design: Combines ultra-powerful suction, a self-cleaning brushroll, and HEPA filtration to capture pet hair, dander, and allergens effortlessly.
- 🗣️ Hands-Free Control: Compatible with Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant, allowing voice-activated or app-based cleaning control on demand.
- 🔋 Extended Runtime + Recharge & Resume: Runs up to 120 minutes and automatically returns to recharge, then resumes cleaning where it left off.
- 🔧 Built for Quality: Engineered and tested to ensure long-lasting, dependable robotic performance.
- 📦 What’s Included: Shark AV2501AE Robot Vacuum, XL HEPA Self-Empty Base, and 2 Side Brushes.
Brand: Shark
Model: AV2501AE
Color: Black / Bronze
Special Features: Smart Mapping, LiDAR Navigation, Bagless, HEPA Filtration, Pet Hair Removal
Dimensions: 13.08″L x 8.43″W x 13.9″H
I run him every day on eco mode to get the cat hair. And every other day on the carpet in matrix mode. The cat hair is not a problem anymore. It makes my place look so much better/ cleaner.
I have a 2 bedroom apt and after the initial few runs I only empty out his bucket once a week. Once a month you need to rinse off his filters and such and there are directions for that in the box. But once a month rinsing off robot parts is much less work than every other day vacuuming if you have pets.
He is quite, sounds like a white noise machine. So no issues there. The only time he sounds like a proper vacuum is when he empties out at the end of a run and then there is a out 5-10 seconds of vacuum noise as he empties into his station.
The only real downside is if you move around big furniture like a couch he has to re map the entire place. It cannot just do one room at a time
I recommend 100%.
One note of caution, if you buy. Make sure you pay attention to obstacles and deep shag carpets. The spinner arms can get snagged easily. After several cleaning runs, the mapping software does a pretty good job of knowing what to avoid. First few times, pay attention!
First review: I have a 5 year old Shark Ion robot, Dusty, that I loved. After all these years I’m noticing issues. I’ve replaced the battery and that helped solve a big issue with charging. But I do notice Dusty gets stuck quite a bit more than it used to, stops working randomly, or doesn’t charge when on the charger, so I have to readjust so he will charge.
I decided to try this new Shark robot, PigPen, because I loved Dusty so much. This one is so much better! I love the lidar that keeps PigPen going around objects. It cleans quite well. I’ve had it for a couple weeks now and just emptied the bin because it looked full of fur. I have two cats and a small dog, so I run it about 4 days a week to keep the fur under control. The picture is after the week and a half ish I’ve been running it. Pigpen has picked up lots of fur and covers way more area than the roaming Dusty does. So Dusty has been moved downstairs to the kitchen and PigPen is now upstairs in the living area. When Dusty does eventually die, which I think is coming sooner than I’d like, I’ll invest in a second PigPen.
Let me address some of the negatives I read in reviews. Noise- not too noisy, when emptying it’s a little loud for about 6 seconds, no big deal. Battery life- no problem for me. I can spot clean any time I want. I have it scheduled to do a full clean at 12:00am every night. As a result it doesn’t matter if it stops to charge in between cleanings. App limitations- not a problem for me, I prefer the simplicity. You can on demand have it clean one room or multiple rooms with the touch of a button. You can have it spot clean an area by touching the area on the map. Scheduled cleaning- only lets you schedule all rooms, you can’t schedule just 1 room. Not a problem. I select rooms as needed throughout the day, for example if kids were messy at lunch I select kitchen. But I like that it cleans my entire first floor every night. Also while it’s cleaning you can alternate the power which is nice. Bin storage- some people say it won’t last 45 days, I’m not gross enough to let it sit for 45 days. But there is more than enough space to not worry about it overfilling if I’m on vacation for a while. Otherwise we tend to empty it every couple days because we love seeing how much dirt it collected lol.
In review, this is the best product at the best value. Anything more expensive isn’t needed because this gets the job done (amazing cleaning without getting stuck on things). Anything cheaper I wouldn’t have confidence in cleaning power/navigating. I rarely leave Amazon reviews but based on all the research I did I felt I should pass this info along to all of you.
As of today, it’s been approximately nine months since I’ve had this machine. In fact-it is running right now as we speak. So, if you were expecting this machine to clean everything in your house, well, it won’t. However, if you put it at the setting of an average clean, it will pick up the dust and everything else in between in the common traveled areas. If you place it on matrix clean, you will run the battery down and it will take a couple of sessions in order for it to clean your entire place based on the square footage of your home. One recommendation is to make sure every week you dump out the container or the collecting bin. Also, when you do, make sure you inspect what it has picked up when dumping!!! I had found that it my wife’s missing earring, a few dimes and a missing screw that I was looking for for my key fob to the car. So make sure you are looking to see What the vacuum shot into its collecting bin. Also, in regards to hair, it will pick that up however, make sure you have a fine or small screwdriver available. The hair tends to bind up the bristle wheel that is next to its traction. If there’s any long hair, or dog hair or what not it will end up collecting there and bind up the Pick up Wheel or spindle. You will have to unscrew two small screws and gently take it apart and get that tangled weave of hair out of there. There is a ball of it binding the wheel to make it free flowing. What will happen is over time, it will not spin as well, it will drain the battery because it had to work harder when working, and then you will get errors stating that the wheel is caught up somehow. It is because of that reason you need to make sure that you do a monthly maintenance check on this vacuum. It’s just like any other robot vacuum / it can only do so much as it’s designed for. Constant preventative maintenance insures that your robot vacuum will operate properly like brand new. As in with bumping into things and so forth, it does have some hiccups where it cannot find the collection bin. You may want to make sure that the Wi-Fi is working properly in your house and also make sure that the base unit is plugged in properly. I’ve already had that happen to me a couple times because the vacuum Will sometimes pull out the cord when vacuuming around it- the cord is on the floor and then it has problems finding the charging base even when it’s right next to it….just a suggestion…
The app is very friendly to use, and you can set your zones, so customization is really user-friendly- once again. Also, this machine tends to find its way quite easily through all the areas corners, nooks and crannies. It operates in the dark because of its motion sensor, and Vacuums our entire floor in one charge based on its settings. 1750 Sq feet. It notices stairs, and also one feature I do like is that it does adjust to objects that are either stationary or if you’re standing in the way. Meaning, if you’re standing in the vacuum comes up to you it will work around you. It will then turn around to do the next pass. If it sees that that object is not there, it will come back And vacuum the spot where you were standing. That’s a very cool feature in my opinion. I also noticed that it does not miss or uncover typical open areas. They are very uniform when this robot is vacuuming those spaces, almost like a golf course lawn pattern. Once again: nice job in uniformity. If you are low on charge, the vacuum will stop, find the charging unit, recharge, and come back to the same exact spot and continue vacuuming until the whole (day task) is completed…
Keep in mind, this won’t do everything, but it does keep the dust down. In tight corners, this will not be able to reach due to its circular design. The main key is to perform monthly maintenance on this vacuum if you are running this one to four times a week. If you maintain that which is very simple, approx 5-10 min of time, you’ll be very pleased with this shark vacuum. I just bought another one for our downstairs because I am that impressed. Additionally, I purchased two extra batteries to make sure that this model is discontinued. I have enough prolonged extended time for this machine to keep going. This is a great investment. Good luck!
Pros:
Self cleaning roller - I’ve attached a photo of the roller. It’s been cleaning my master bedroom and bathroom for a week and a half now often twice a day and my hair is thick and long enough to go down past my waist. With normal rollers, I have to clean them often if not after every time I vacuum these rooms. With the self cleaning roller I haven’t had to do any hair removal. There’s just a tiny bit of hair on the roller but that will clean off as it runs. I also have 5 cats and 2 heavy shedding dogs and this roller is very clean. I have 2 other robot vacuums I use downstairs and we have to clean those rollers often.
Bagless - need I say more? No extra costs on buying bags. No hassle of attaching the bags.
Cons:
Noise - This shark vacuum seems a bit louder than my newer Coredy and about as noisy as my very old early generation Roomba.
Programming - as of right now you can only program it to automatically run 1 time per day. With the animals I have and the fact it can empty itself, I’d rather have it run twice per day. However, it’s easy enough to tell it to run a second time in the app or with Alexa.
Also doesn't bump into walls or furniture either! OMG I am in love!! I do empty the dustbin weekly as I do have 4 furry dogs but have no complaints whatsoever!
After about a month of use we have had to stop it a few times because it sucked up something a little too big like a leaf from a house plant or a cat toy. Or it finds a charging cable that was left in the floor. If a forgotten toy is big enough, taller than 4 inches it will be avoided, otherwise it will be pushed aside. It will occasionally shut a bedroom door and shut itself in until the battery dies and a few times it has wedged itself somewhere it and gotten stuck.
As shown in the pictures it has developed some scratches, scuffs, and gouges from trying to navigate in some tight corners. A few of our base boards have some stuff marks as well as the front of our range. We are getting some adhesive felt to go around the outside if the vaccuum to see if this helps.
Overall we have lived the robot, it has cut down on our cleaning and has even cut down on how often we need to dust. This was purchased on a Cyber Monday deal with a pretty significant discount. I don't think we would have paid full price.