NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — Spring is in the air! But dirt, dust and debris have probably built up in your home all winter. The right vacuum can make all the difference.
“Your best bet for a thorough deep cleaning is a canister or an upright vacuum," said Consumer Reports' Pang-Chieh Ho. "You really want a vacuum that’s going to suck up any dirt that you cannot see such as embedded dirt in carpets.”
To see which vacuums remove the most embedded dirt, Consumer Reports testers go to work, sprinkling a measured amount of sand onto a test carpet, pack it in, and then vacuum it up. For bare floors, testers sprinkle more sand.
The vacuum gets two passes to suck it up.
“In addition to cleaning performance, we also measure in each vacuum, how strong their suction power is, we run cleaning emissions test on them, we assess how loud they are and we also note how easy each vacuum is to maneuver,” said Ho.
Consumer Reports has pet parents covered, too! You want a vacuum that picks up pet hair in the fewest passes without getting stuck in the brush.
A canister vac is an excellent option if your home has stairs and a mix of hardwood floors and carpeting. This Kenmore model earned top marks in Consumer Reports' bare floor, pet hair, and emissions tests. It also offered solid performance in the embedded carpet test.
Upright vacuums are best for deep cleaning carpets but are not great on stairs. In Consumer Reports' tests, this upright Shark offered impressive performance on carpets and bare floors.
Now a handheld or stick vacuum is a great option for smaller jobs in between deeper cleaning.
Although they don't have the great the suction power and cleaning performance of uprights and canisters, they’re great for surface dirt and smaller messes.
Do you have more information about this story? You can email me at jennifer.kraus@newschannel5.com.
My friend and colleague Carrie Sharp had a lot of fun last week, on an adventure to a country more than three thousand miles away! She’s back now – sharing her Adventures in Iceland through stories, and incredible images of this remarkably beautiful and unique island nation (kudos to Chief Photographer Catherine Steward)! But did you know Nashville has something very important in common with Iceland? Tourism! Here, Carrie explains how a volcanic eruption decades ago helped save the country’s economy from collapse!
-Rhori Johnston
