Ifa Berlin Archive

Jennifer Pattison TuohySep 15

SwitchBot adds a roller mop to its pint-sized robovac.

I saw the upcoming S30 Mini at IFA last week, and my bathroom floors are excited. SwitchBot’s line of mini robot vacuums is great for smaller spaces like apartments, home offices, or bedrooms, but none have full mopping capabilities — until now. The S30 Mini adds a roller mop to the 11-inch-wide vacuum, and it looks like a good solution for small bathrooms. There’s no price or release date yet.

<em>An upgrade to its excellent K series, SwitchBot’s S30 Mini comes with a compact self-cleaning/refilling/auto-empty dock, and the option of</em> <em>a battery-powered auto-refill, auto-drain dock you can plumb into your home’s water system.</em>

<em>The robot vacuum has a self-cleaning, extending roller mop with an automatic cover that deploys when it detects carpet, along with 15,000 Pa suction and AI collision avoidance.</em>

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An upgrade to its excellent K series, SwitchBot’s S30 Mini comes with a compact self-cleaning/refilling/auto-empty dock, and the option of a battery-powered auto-refill, auto-drain dock you can plumb into your home’s water system.

Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge

Jennifer Pattison TuohySep 14

Roborock finally brings a roller mop to its flagship robovac.

The company’s Saros 20 Flow goes on sale today for $1,499.99 (down from $1,699.99). At 3.53 inches tall, it’s one of the slimmest roller mop models, and with 36,000 Pa suction, camera-based obstacle recognition, and the ability to climb multi-layer thresholds, this robot should be able to get the job done. I got a first look at IFA last week and plan to test it soon.

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<em>Instead of spinning mop pads or its signature VibraRise flat pad, Roborock’s latest robot vacuum uses a self-cleaning roller mop to scrub floors.</em>

<em>The Saros Flow comes with a new RockDock station that cleans and dries the mop with hot water and warm air and empties its bin.</em>

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Instead of spinning mop pads or its signature VibraRise flat pad, Roborock’s latest robot vacuum uses a self-cleaning roller mop to scrub floors.

Photo by Jennifer Pattison Tuohy / The Verge

Why Apple’s next computer should be for the smart home

Jennifer Pattison TuohySep 11

Allison JohnsonSep 10

This Qi2 ring charger has a built-in fan.

Charging your phone wirelessly can get mighty toasty. ESR’s new CryoBoost 25W charging pad has a clever solution: a fan built right into the charging puck. The company claims the design allows it to charge an iPhone 17 Pro halfway up to 28 percent faster than the official Apple MagSafe 25W charger. Maybe I’m no fun, but once you’re plugging a cable in to run a fan while you charge your phone why not… just use wired charging?

Update: We’ve seen chargers with fans (and some with fanless cooling too) before; let us know if you’re using one with this type of design and if they live up to the sales pitch.

Some of Dyson’s $500 toothbrushes are breaking

Jennifer Pattison TuohySep 9

Jennifer Pattison TuohySep 8

Everyone’s talking about home robots. But they still can’t do anything.

The buzz at IFA was all around robotics — humanoids, quadrupeds, and wheeled bots designed to be household helpers and companions. I was on a panel (watch it here) where roboticists and entrepreneurs insisted that in five years everyone will know someone with a humanoid at home.

I don’t buy it. Yes, I saw some impressive-looking robots. But behind almost every one was a human with a PlayStation controller.

Xiaomi’s wide foldable promises more power than Samsung’s

Dominic PrestonSep 8

Jennifer Pattison TuohySep 7

Watch this Roomba spit out another Roomba.

The Roomba Duo is a new concept from iRobot. Two vacuums in one: the larger robot is a vacuum and steam mop (I watched it suck up pasta from carpet) and the smaller one sits on top. When the Duo finds areas it can’t reach, it uses a mechanical arm to lower the second bot to the floor.

It feels like an overly complex solution to the traditional limitations of robot vacuums, but it’s nice to see some ambition from iRobot.

EcoFlow makes the miniature power station even smaller

Thomas RickerSep 7

Jennifer Pattison TuohySep 7

SwitchBot made an AI Furby that’s also a smart home controller.

The Kata Mini is one of those weird AI companions that have little purpose other than to be cute and creepy — speaker and microphone on your keychain plushie, anyone?

But the Mini, a portable, camera-less version of a Kata Friend companion, can also control SwitchBot smart home products. That’s a new way to turn on the lights. It’s coming later this year.

Sean HollisterSep 6

What if your 14-inch laptop literally stretched to become a 17-inch Netflix machine?

Lenovo’s Project Swan has a screen that literally unrolls. The prototype could use better speakers and some weight balancing, but I love watching it in motion!

Sean HollisterSep 5

This is Project Aeroblade.

Remember Frore and its fan-replacing AirJet cooling tech? Sure looks like Lenovo is taking it seriously!

Jess WeatherbedSep 4

XP-Pen has a new portable Android drawing tablet.

Following the standalone Magic Drawing Pad from 2024, XP-Pen is now launching the Android 16-based Magic Pro 13 next month to tempt creatives away from sketching on iPads. The price hasn’t been announced yet, but it features a 3096 x 2064 resolution LCD display, with 100 percent sRGB coverage, 650-nit brightness, and a refresh rate of up to 120Hz.

The XP-Pen Magic 13 Pro joins the small, but growing number of display drawing tablets that don’t need to be plugged into a computer.

Image: XP-Pen

Jennifer Pattison TuohySep 4

PSA: The SmartThings V3 hub is nearly sold out.

And they won’t be making more, meaning there won’t be a way to add Z-Wave devices to a SmartThings smart home. Aeotec, which makes both hubs for Samsung, told me they have about 10,000 left, which may last through the end of the year. Samsung discontinued the V3 last year and replaced it with the Smart Home Hub 2, which has twice the performance, but doesn’t support Z-Wave.