What testers say about the Shark Matrix Self-Empty
The Shark Matrix Self-Empty is Shark's mid-range vacuum-only robot: a 360-degree lidar maps the home, Matrix Clean sends it over the floor in a grid with several passes over dirt, and its self-cleaning brushroll is built not to tangle with hair. After each clean it empties itself into a bagless base that holds up to 45 days of debris, so no bags are needed. Shark rates the battery at 90 minutes.
RTINGS tested it and found it good on hard floors, where it cleared medium and large debris easily, and very quiet. The lidar map lets you send it to a pinned spot and draw no-go zones in the app, which sets it apart from the cheaper Shark EZ, which has no lidar.
The rest of RTINGS' verdict is critical: in a home with mixed floors it rates the Matrix inadequate. On carpet it left much of the fine debris behind, especially along edges and in corners, and pet hair tangled in its brushroll, got pressed into the carpet or was dragged around, despite the anti-hair-wrap claim. Its obstacle avoidance only detects large objects, so it runs over socks, cables and pet waste, it sometimes gets stuck trying to climb obstacles, and it cannot get under low furniture. The base's small bin needs emptying often and is messy to empty, and there is no mop. For a tidy home with mostly hard floors and no pets, the lidar map and the self-emptying are what it offers.
