Stick vacuum cleaners Electrolux Unirapido
Here’s a trendy vac that you won’t feel compelled to banish to the cupboard. The £80 Electrolux Unirapido is a cordless rechargeable ‘stick’ vacuum cleaner that’s handy if you want to do a quick blitz round the kitchen floor to get rid of crumbs. We gave it a quick try, and here are our first impressions.
After bit of an initial false start with the first use procedure – finding it tricky to attach the handle to the vac and then having to wait 24 hours for it to charge – it proved to be a handy little vac once we got going.
You don’t always have to charge it for 24 hours before use. A light illuminates during charging, but unfortunately there’s no indicator to show when it’s fully charged. We got around 15 minutes of vacuuming time from a full charge – you’ll hear when it starts to run down.
Unirapido suction power
There are two suction speed settings – higher suction is better suited to carpets. It’s a fairly quiet machine - the lower setting is quietest, and even on this setting we found the Unirapido was fully capable of lifting fluff and bits that you can see from carpet.
The head has a driven brush, which should also help you to lift hairs and fluff from carpet. You’ll need to remove it to clean it and with this vac that’s easy – push a button to release a catch and you can unclip the brush from the vac for cleaning. It clips back into place with relative ease.
You can also pop the wheels out for cleaning – you’ll need a screwdriver for this. Keeping the wheels clean will keep them rolling freely and avoid damaging hard floor surfaces if any bits and bobs get wedged in them.
Using the Unirapido cordless vac
Practically everything about this vac makes it easy to use. There’s a big push button that pops out the dust container so you can empty it. The two washable filters inside are easy, if a little messy, to remove and clean, and there’s little chance of putting anything back incorrectly.
The Unirapido is manoeuvrable and light to push around - it weighs just 2.1kg. The head pivots and twists smoothly as you turn your wrist, to negotiate corners with ease. If you alter your grip it’s light to pick up and carry, too. One of the few disappointments is that the vac won’t support itself in an upright position unless it’s on the charging base – so if you have to stop vacuuming to move something you’ll either need to prop it against something, put it back on the charger, or lay it down.
The brush head stays in contact with the floor surface even when you tilt the handle down to the floor – handy for vacuuming under low furniture. For a vac, this is an attractive machine. The soft-touch handle adds to the tactile feel, and it’s available in a range of colours so you can tie it in with your decor.
Emptying and maintaining the Unirapido
There’s no maximum fill level marked on the container, but, as with most stick vacs, capacity is small so you’ll need to empty it frequently.
This vac runs on NiMH batteries – if you notice the cleaner can’t vacuum after charging for as long as it originally did, fully discharge the batteries and then charge the vac for 16-24 hours. The charger comes in two parts so it can be wall-mounted or freestanding. The charger base is the same size as the vac’s brush head, so it doesn’t take up much floor space.
Pros: Light and manoeuvrable, two speed settings, easy to remove parts for cleaning and emptying, washable filters
Cons: No full-charge indicator, not freestanding without the charger
Our full vacuum cleaner review has lab test ratings and reviews of more than 100 of the latest vacuum cleaners from brands including Dyson, Hoover, Electrolux and Bosch. You can also find out the best handheld vacs in our handheld vacuum cleaner review.
