Aero Ultra Steam Review: A Surprisingly Versatile Wet And Dry Vacuum

Whenever I write a review about a new product, I spend at least a week using it, testing it, and trying to push it to the limit. The Dreame Aero Ultra Steam Wet Dry Vacuum found its way to my doorstep a day before a flood watch, which meant that before long, my dogs would drag in as much mud as their sticky paws could manage. This afforded me the rare chance to not only use a new device and put it through its paces quickly, but it also meant that I had some seriously dirty floors that needed cleaning.

Dreame is well known for its robotic vacuum cleaners and mowers, but it's not limited to those products. The Aero Ultra Steam is powerful, and it includes a variety of special features that set it apart from other cleaners in its class. After reading up on the machine before it arrived, I can honestly say that I got excited to try it out, which is coming from someone who prefers to leave floor cleaning duties to a robotic vacuum cleaner.

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The Aero Ultra Steam works with a powerful 30,000Pa suction, which outperforms its contemporaries/predecessors (the Aero and Aero Pro) considerably. Dreame designed the Aero Ultra Steam for homeowners who need to deal with messy floors often, and while its cost of $649.99 might put some budget-conscious consumers off, I had to check it out for myself to see if the product warranted the high cost. Here's what I learned after using it to tackle a seriously messy floor.

As soon as I pulled it out of the box, I could tell that Dreame made a quality product, as it's well-designed and has a surprising (but not displeasing) weight for its size at a full 14.3 lbs. without water or cleaning solution. It comes with several accessories and components, including two bottles of Dreame cleaning solution, a cleaning brush, and an extra filter. In terms of size, it has a remarkably low profile of only 3.88 inches, so it can be pushed under a lot of low furniture, which is nice when you need to get in deep to do a good cleaning.

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Because it's wireless, it charges on the base (pictured below), which gives it ample energy for most cleaning jobs. You can use it for approximately 100 minutes before recharging, though in steam mode, this is cut down to 30 minutes. This is because the Aero Ultra Steam heats the water itself, which takes about 60 seconds. In terms of heating, it has a 392-degree Fahrenheit steam wash as well as a 194-degree hot water degreasing and FoamWash capability. I purposefully filled the reservoir with chilled water to see how long it took to heat, and it only needed a minute.

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Whenever it switches modes or begins charging, the Aero Ultra Steam lets you know in a loud, pleasant, succinct feminine voice, which startled me at first, as I wasn't expecting it. That's one of its more interesting features, and I found it helpful. The Aero Ultra Steam has five cleaning modes: hot water, eco, steam, smart, and suction. It also has a drying and self-cleaning mode that you can start once the device is docked.

As I mentioned, a flood watch brought a lot of mud, which always finds its way into my dog's paws. This offered the perfect opportunity to deal with an ever-present problem in our home. I asked my wife to help with the unit so I could take pictures, and she tackled the areas where the dogs tracked in the most mud. A single pass with the Aero Ultra Steam on SaunaClean steam mode was enough to wipe away the paw prints completely.

Seeing this, she decided to continue mopping the floor, though I told her she didn't need to do that — it was on a Sunday, which is our relaxation day. Regardless, she kept going, and when she finished, she told me, "I really had fun doing this. This was fun!" Now, I'm not saying that you'll have a blast cleaning your floors as we did, but we're a mop and bucket family ... at least we were right up to the point when the Aero Ultra Steam arrived. I've never used a high-end floor cleaner of this magnitude, though I have used buffers, carpet cleaners, and a multitude of vacuum cleaners.

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While the Aero Ultra Steam is very intuitive to use, I did find myself referring to the manual a few times to get accustomed to the various icons and buttons. The first time I used it, it went into Smart Mode, but each subsequent time I turned it on, it fell back to the last-selected option, which is a nice feature to have. Also, it didn't frighten my dogs like most floor cleaners do, as you can see in the above image.

The first thing my wife and I noticed while using the Aero Ultra Steam is that it's self-driving. You don't have to push it so much as hold onto the handle and guide it wherever you want to go. You see this in a lot of high-end vacuum cleaners, so I was happy to find the same feature with this device. While it's primarily suitable for wet cleaning, the Aero Ultra Steam is more than capable of dry cleaning as well, thanks to its incredible suction of 30,000Pa.

The lighted brush head is another nice feature, as it highlights everything you'd want to clean off your floors. The system utilizes multispectral sensors to detect the type of mess you're cleaning. The product website describes being able to distinguish between pet food, beans, wine, Coca-Cola, and ketchup, using color, temperature, and brightness. Depending on what you're up against, the Aero Ultra Steam modifies its cleaning by optimizing suction power, the water level, and solution ratio needed to properly address whatever's on your floor, whether it's a difficult stain or a spilled soda.

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As you can see from the above image, the brush head is tangle-free, which was my experience, as it can clean up hair and strings without having them wrap around the head. I tested this with several items, and it worked each time. Depending on which method you use to clean, the battery will drain to compensate, and while I didn't use it straight for 100 minutes, I did knock out over an hour of cleaning without running out of juice.

When you're finished cleaning with the Aero Ultra Steam, it needs to be properly cleaned, which it tells you via a voice prompt. Thankfully, Dreame made this process incredibly easy. You can remove the dirty water tank (pictured above) and pour the water out, which is the first step. The next step involves removing the filter and rinsing it of the dirty water (pictured below). This process takes about 20 seconds or so, making it simple and fast.

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Once you're done with this, you can put the parts back into the machine and place it on the dock, which is where the real cleaning work begins. The self-cleaning function is a bit noisy at first, but not more so than using the cleaner. Once you press the appropriate button, the cleaning process begins, which goes through two phases. The first takes about five minutes, which includes using steam to heat the parts and cycling clean water over the dirty bits to ensure that your next operation begins with a clean machine.

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This collects in the dirty water tank (pictured above), which you'll want to empty once the entire process is completed. The second phase involves drying the unit, which takes around 30 minutes and isn't as audible as the first phase. Once it was cleaned and dried, I inspected the entire system, looking for pet hair or other gunk that might wind up inside. I found nothing at all, and I didn't even need to clean the roller brush, which makes the self-cleaning mode one of the Aero Ultra Steam's best features.

When I received the Aero Ultra Steam Wet Dry Vacuum to test out, I wasn't sure how I'd feel about using it. As I mentioned, I've been a mop & bucket cleaner for ages, and it's always worked for me. One thing I've never been able to do well is clean my garage floor. After testing the unit out in my home, I went into the garage and gave it a whirl. While I didn't throw away my mop and bucket, I don't think I'll ever use one again.

Every attempt to test the Aero Ultra Steam on a long-enduring stain proved its worth. It wasn't difficult to use, nor did it take a lot of effort to get things clean. One thing I must mention is the reservoir, which isn't very large. The clean water tank holds 30.43 fl oz, while the used water tank holds 20.29 fl oz. While I didn't have any issues with the cleaning solution tank (3.38 fl oz), I did have to stop cleaning to empty the dirty water tank multiple times.

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I tested it out as much as possible, and it met or exceeded my expectations each and every time. I do recommend it to anyone with high-traffic floors that are difficult to clean, but I must highlight the price, as it's high. As of this writing, you can order your own Aero Ultra Steam from Dreame for $649.99, and it comes with a free VCP20 Car Vacuum Cleaner (regularly $79.99). Amazon lists it for $799.99, so if you can, try to find a sale, but if you have the means now, you should absolutely pick one up.