In today’s video I’ll tell you more about the Narwal Freo Z10 Ultra robot vacuum. It’s a premium-class device packed with features. Is it worth buying? How does it perform in real life? That’s exactly what I cover in the video.
Today’s piece was created in cooperation with the Zigbuy.pl store, which provided me with the Narwal Freo Z10 Ultra for testing. Zigbuy specializes in carefully selected electronics from top manufacturers – proven brands, sensible prices, and discount coupons. If you decide the Z10 Ultra is for you, check out Zigbuy – the link and current discounts are at the end of the text. Let’s support brands that support creators – it genuinely helps grow this channel.
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First impressions
Narwal Freo Z10 Ultra is an advanced premium robot vacuum. It combines vacuuming and mopping, plus it comes with a base station capable of automatically emptying the dustbin and washing and drying the mop pads. The device is a successor to the well-regarded Narwal Freo Z Ultra, offering most of its best solutions, but at a slightly more accessible price.
The robot is packed with modern technologies meant to make cleaning and day-to-day handling easier. Suction power reaches up to 15,000 Pa, which is higher than in most household robots. You can also choose different vacuum modes – quiet, normal, strong, and super strong. You can also set the robot to vacuum each room up to three times in a single cleaning cycle. Importantly, even in Strong mode the unit runs very quietly (about 55 dB), and only at maximum mode does the noise become clearly more noticeable and you can feel airflow around the robot.
The lithium-ion battery has a capacity of 5200 mAh, which allows up to 210 minutes of operation on a single charge. Real cleaning time, as always, depends on your settings – using maximum suction and heavy mopping shortens it. Still, I could clean my entire apartment on one charge without issues. When the battery drops to around 5%, the robot automatically returns to the base and recharges enough to finish the interrupted job.
The Freo Z10 Ultra looks modern and solid. The body is round, in white with a slight sheen, and on top there’s a typical LIDAR turret for mapping. Underneath, the robot has a single main roller brush with an anti-tangle system for hair, and unusually, at the front instead of one side brush it has two side brushes (one spinning brush on each side). Interestingly, the side brushes differ in bristle density and can spin at different speeds depending on the need. In theory this helps sweep debris more effectively toward the main brush. It’s a rare solution that, on paper, increases sweeping reach on both sides of the robot.`
This robot definitely stands out thanks to its unusually shaped mop pads. Instead of perfectly round pads, it uses slightly triangular mops, so their edges can reach room corners better. The manufacturer also uses PreciseEdge and EdgeSwing technology, referring to cleaning right along walls and baseboards – the mop pads can extend slightly beyond the robot’s outline, and the two side brushes help pull dirt from edges.
The robot doesn’t carry a separate onboard water tank – when needed, it returns to the station to rinse the mops and re-wet them, then continues washing the floor. The mop system can automatically lift by 12 mm on carpets, protecting rugs from getting wet (this works on thin rugs, though for thicker carpets it’s still best to set no-mop zones). The robot can run in several modes – vacuum only, vacuum and mop at the same time, mop only, or mop after vacuuming. The app offers quite a lot of options.
Docking station
“Ultra” base station: This is a true command center for the robot – it automatically empties dust, washes mops in water (even hot water), dries them with warm air, and disinfects the interior (warm airflow helps prevent mold and bacteria). What’s more, the Narwal station also has a water ionization feature – before mopping, it can electrolyze water with added detergent, which is meant to improve washing effectiveness and kill microorganisms. You can also hear a voice announcement about the process. You can even see a mist and lighting inside the tank.
The docking station definitely stands out due to its size and shape. It’s quite large, rounded, and resembles a low barrel that the robot almost fully disappears into during charging and mop cleaning. The base really does have a deep cavity that “swallows” the robot. Once docked, the device is nearly invisible, which keeps the room looking tidy. However, this design means you need enough space to place the station, as it’s fairly wide and heavy. The full set (robot plus base) weighs around 16 kg, with the station alone over 11 kg. Even taking it out of the box can be challenging, because the manufacturer packs the robot inside the station. You have to lift the entire weight while unpacking. Fortunately, setup and getting it ready to run are very simple. You insert the cleaning tray into the base, fill the water tanks, install the side brushes, and remove any transport locks. The process is intuitive, parts are clearly labeled, and the clean and dirty water tanks use different colors to prevent mix-ups.
Under the station lid there are two large water containers – clean water (white) with a capacity of 4.5 liters and dirty water (blue) with a capacity of 4 liters. Tanks this large allow many mopping cycles without frequent refills and emptying. In practice, with intensive mopping you’ll still need to service them from time to time, but it’s easy (the containers have handles and wide openings). Importantly, Narwal made it hard to mix them up. Besides the colors, the housing also shows icons for each tank. The station also includes a replaceable 2.5-liter dust bag (the manufacturer claims it can last up to 120 days of collected debris), plus a slot for a detergent bottle. The kit includes a dedicated cleaning agent – the robot automatically doses detergent into the water during mopping when it decides it’s necessary, which helps avoid wasting chemicals. The station housing itself has a minimalist, elegant design – the white color with silver accents fits modern interiors and I really like it. On the top cover there are a few touch buttons that let you start or pause cleaning without reaching for your phone.
Real-world performance – how it vacuums and how it mops
Considering the declared massive 15 kPa suction power, you might expect the Narwal Freo Z10 Ultra to be a true vacuuming beast. Meanwhile, during testing, results turned out to be mixed. In Quiet and Normal modes, the robot picks up only the smallest debris, leaving visible crumbs or hairs on the floor. Switching to the higher Strong level delivers satisfying results on hard floors, and for carpets it’s best to use maximum power (Super Strong).
When I did a classic test by scattering different crumbs on the floor, the robot handled it quite well. Sensors detected heavier mess and the device turned off the side brushes so it wouldn’t accidentally fling particles across the room. Importantly, the automatic Freo Mode – which should theoretically adjust cleaning intensity by itself – doesn’t always boost power optimally where needed. The robot rarely increases suction on its own even on a dirtier patch of floor. After a month of testing, I found it works best to set two passes along a dense path, because that delivers the best cleaning results.
A big positive is how quiet the robot is and how gently it treats floors. Thanks to the rubber brush and well-tuned motor, the Freo Z10 Ultra is nearly inaudible in lower modes, which matters for daily cleaning when you want to vacuum at night or while someone is working from home (55 dB is a background level that doesn’t disrupt conversation). The main brush anti-tangle system also works well – after a few weeks of use, I didn’t need to clean hair off the roller, which is a big plus for pet owners. The dustbin inside the robot is small (about 250 ml in real volume, though dirt is compacted), but the idea is that it gets emptied automatically into the station, so size shouldn’t be a problem. Unfortunately, in practice there were some reservations about the Auto-Empty behavior – by default, the robot is set to “Smart Dust Collection”, where it empties only after cleaning about 200 m² of area. If you have lots of pets in a small apartment, a clogged chamber can reduce suction power. Manually switching the setting to “Dock Dust Collection” (emptying every time it docks) fixes the issue.
Mopping
It’s the mopping where the Narwal Freo Z10 Ultra stands out against competing robots. From the start, the manufacturer positioned the Freo line as “mopping masters”. Despite having no onboard water tank, the robot cleans floors very effectively. Its unusual triangular mop pads really do reach into corners a bit better than the standard round pads used by many other brands. Of course, it’s not magic – the robot still won’t physically enter a perfect 90-degree corner, so it won’t scrub every millimeter, but it typically leaves less un-wiped area than usual. In open areas, the Z10 Ultra performs excellently: two rotating pads with sensible downforce can remove both fresh spills and dried grime. On panels and tiles, in intensive washing mode (Wet Mopping), it removed dried splashes and light streaks in one pass, and a double pass handled a stain from spilled sauce. Importantly, the robot offers several mopping intensity levels (water dosing): Low for delicate wooden floors, Normal for everyday refresh, High for deeper cleaning, and Very High/Wet for tough stains. This lets you match the mode to the floor type and avoid soaking wood panels – the lowest setting leaves only light moisture with no wet stripes.
A plus is that the robot rinses the mops frequently during cleaning – thanks to returning to the base after covering a set area, it keeps cleaning with fresh pads. Mopping effectiveness was also obvious from the dirty water color in the station: even when the floor looked clean, after a run the tank water was dark brown, suggesting it removed built-up grime. The quality of mop washing in the base also deserves praise – after 4 weeks of use, the pads still looked almost new, with no stains or discoloration. That’s thanks to the combo of hot water and detergent during rinsing and hot-air drying, which removes moisture (and prevents mold or odors).
In daily use, mopping with Narwal is a huge convenience – the robot can, for example, wash the kitchen and hallway every other day, keeping floors spotless with minimal effort. But it’s worth remembering that mopping highlights a weakness in vacuuming: if the robot doesn’t pick up all hair and dust fuzz first, wet pads can smear it or leave damp clumps in the middle of the room. Unfortunately, the Z10 Ultra sometimes leaves small fuzz behind, especially in homes with pets, so after mopping you may find a few damp hair balls here and there. That’s fairly typical, but it’s worth noting: in pet households, it’s best to run vacuum-only first (to grab fur), and only then mop. Alternatively, you should expect some minor manual pickup of leftovers after mopping.
On wooden floors (such as parquet), Narwal is gentle – low-moisture mode and moderate pressure don’t cause any damage, and the floor is only slightly damp after a pass. On tiles or porcelain, the robot can press harder and use more water, leaving the floor glossy after cleaning. Before the first run, the robot maps the home and automatically detects floor types, carpets, and obstacles.
Navigation and obstacle avoidance
Narwal Freo Z10 Ultra uses a combination of LIDAR and AI sensors to move around the home. First start and mapping are very smooth – pairing with the app is fast and hassle-free (the robot connects to Wi-Fi immediately and setup takes literally a minute), then it’s ready to scan. Apartment mapping happens extremely quickly: in my case, it scanned about 62 m² in under 7 minutes, recognizing larger furniture, room layout, floor type, and carpets. After mapping, the app shows a floor plan you can edit: split or merge rooms, name them, set no-go zones, and so on. It’s worth noting that automatic room recognition can be imperfect. In my case, a separate walk-in closet wasn’t detected at all, and on a second attempt the kitchen was merged into one room with the living room. Thankfully, map editing is fairly intuitive: you can draw split lines manually, adjust room shapes, and assign names. A downside is limited precision of the map itself – the Narwal app shows a simplified, schematic plan that can be hard to match perfectly to reality.
As for navigation during cleaning, the Z10 Ultra moves methodically in lanes, gradually covering the entire accessible area. In normal conditions it drives very precisely and consistently, keeping straight lines and not skipping spots, and it goes around room edges nicely. Problems can appear if you change the environment after mapping. During testing, I noticed Narwal can get “confused” if, for example, you move a chair or place a new object on the floor where the map previously showed open space. Leaving a large box in a room corner caused the robot to work out how to reach an area it remembered as passable – it didn’t crash into obstacles, but it spun around a few times trying different approaches. Likewise, small furniture shifts (moving a chair by a dozen centimeters) can throw it off and disrupt its ideally parallel paths. Sometimes it will spin in place as if deciding what to do next. It also occasionally insists on ignoring floor sections it should clean, because it “thinks” otherwise. So you could say its navigation is effective, but not very flexible – it prefers a stable layout and treats changes with some uncertainty.
And what about obstacle avoidance? Surprisingly good. The device can even take a photo of an obstacle and mark its location in the app. I deliberately moved the dock close to a table leg to leave a very narrow passage. The robot slowed down, retracted the side brushes, and passed through with no problem. Thanks to these abilities, cleaning is safe – the robot won’t eat your charging cables or smear a “surprise” left by a dog on the carpet. Of course, like any robot, it’s not flawless: very thin items (like shoelaces) or transparent obstacles can still be tricky (Narwal isn’t unique here, almost all robots like to grab abandoned socks). So before cleaning, it’s still worth doing a quick floor check, though with Narwal there are fewer such hazards than with most competitors.
Finally, it’s worth mentioning the robot’s terrain capabilities. The Freo Z10 Ultra has large wheels and good suspension, so it can overcome obstacles up to 30 mm high. In practice, that means it easily clears typical room thresholds or transition strips. It had no trouble entering my closet over the track of a sliding wardrobe door. That said, it quickly asked for help after getting tangled in a loose rug mat and then didn’t want to go there again.
App and controls
You control the Narwal Freo Z10 Ultra using the Narwal Freo mobile app (Android and iOS). Initial setup and adding the robot to the app go smoothly. The app itself is fairly clear, although, like many manufacturers, the interface can be a bit non-intuitive at times.
The map in the app is rather basic. You can edit room divisions, name rooms, set forbidden zones (where the robot must not enter), and no-mop zones (where it should vacuum but not use the mop pads, for example on carpets). Unfortunately, the map editor isn’t very precise, especially if rooms aren’t perfectly rectangular. Moving walls or drawing irregular zones can feel clunky. There’s no major limitation on the number of maps, though – if you have a multi-story home, the robot can handle multiple floors. The app also lets you view cleaning history, usage statistics, and consumables status (filters, brushes, mop pads).
One downside of the app is Freo Mind (AI) mode. Narwal markets it as smart, automatic cleaning method selection, where the robot should decide where to vacuum, where to mop, how many passes, and so on. In practice, the mode feels undercooked: the robot cleans less efficiently and may drive in odd patterns (for example returning to already-clean areas multiple times while skipping others). As a result, Freo Mind can increase cleaning time and battery usage instead of reducing it. Manual settings work much better, such as selecting vacuuming and mopping separately for specific zones. The app makes this slightly annoying because the mentioned “Customized” mode is enabled by default when you pick a room, so you have to manually toggle whether you want vacuuming, mopping, or both each time. That can be irritating with frequent use, because if one day you want to vacuum the living room only, and the next day you want to wash just that floor, you have to adjust settings each time. When cleaning by room selection you can decide whether you want to vacuum the carpet in it or not. But if you apply a zone over an area the robot should clean, it will always skip the carpet and you can’t change that (even if you want it to vacuum only the carpet).
Beyond that, the app offers a standard set of features: cleaning schedules (you can set different modes at different times for selected rooms), manual control (like a remote, more of a novelty), voice language selection for robot announcements (yes, Narwal talks, including in Polish, though the voice can sound a bit synthetic and sometimes drops letters, which is funny). Integration with voice assistants (Alexa and Google) is also possible, for example voice commands to start cleaning.
Summary
Narwal Freo Z10 Ultra is without a doubt a distinctive robot vacuum that brings a breath of fresh air to the robot vacuum-and-mop market. Its biggest ace is very strong mopping. If you have lots of hard floors and want regular automated wet cleaning with minimal involvement, Narwal is hard to beat in its price class. The cleaning station makes a huge difference: auto-emptying, mop washing, and drying push the robot closer to a real “clean and forget” experience. High overall refinement (quiet operation, gentle behavior around furniture, elegant looks) makes it a household-friendly gadget. The Z10 Ultra also shows how advanced obstacle avoidance has become – loose cables or scattered toys stop being a nightmare, because Narwal can move among them with care and confidence.
That said, it isn’t a flawless product. The on-paper suction power doesn’t translate into a vacuuming revolution. In vacuuming, the Freo Z10 Ultra is good, but not exceptional. If your priority is pulling pet hair and deep dust out of carpets, there are models that do better for similar money. Also, the robot software and app still need polishing. There are small rough edges and non-intuitive choices that can irritate in everyday use of such a modern device. The robot can also have “off days” where, instead of cleaning the selected room, it spins in place as if thinking what to do next, or it deliberately skips some areas while returning to already-cleaned spots. At a price around 4,000-5,000 PLN, you expect something close to perfect, and the Narwal Z10 Ultra is excellent at some tasks and average at others.
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