HOOVER Cordless Vacuum Cleaner, Powerful 30 min runtime, Anti-Twist Brush, Led lights, 5 YR Warranty, Red [HF9]

Product Information

If you need an affordable cordless vacuum from a trusted brand, then the Hoover HF9 Cordless Vacuum would make a solid choice. It's really easy to use and charge, and has suction power that will do everything you need it to. Throughout I've been comparing the Hoover HF9 to the Shark Stratos, as I think these two vacuums are close competitors. While I would say that the performance of the Shark Stratos may slightly tip the scales, the affordability and lightweight design of the HF9 makes it an option that I would tell anyone on a budget to go for, especially if you can find it at a discounted price.

The HF9 has a run time of up to 30 minutes – which is quite standard across the industry – although our device offered 33 minutes when fully charged. After doing the floors and the upholstery on a small flat, and then vacuuming the floors for a second time, we only used about 20 minutes of charge – this, we felt, was a pretty decent result. There are devices on the market that offer significantly longer suction time though. Above the buttons is a simple screen with icons showing what mode you’re in (carpet or hard-floor) and whether Turbo is engaged. The rest of the display shows the number of minutes of cleaning left on the device before the battery runs out. If the vacuum is plugged in, it will display the percentage of charge the battery has available instead. We usually vacuum once a week, and sometimes more if needed. To test the HF9, we allowed a full week to let the dust settle so there was plenty to clean. The light on the front of the suction head showed us exactly where the dust was while the wheels made manoeuvring the device easy. The suction head was also able to twist sideways to get into tight spots, which we thought was a great feature. In terms of size, the device is fairly standard, standing upright at 260 x 210 x 1,110mm (WDH). It weighs 3.4kg: the handheld unit is around 2kg, with the floor head and wand making up the remainder. Hoover advises empting the bin after every use and it makes this pretty easy. All you have to do is press a button on the front and the base will open to empty the bin. The opening of the bin is quite small so the contents don’t go everywhere like some models are prone to do.Finally, there’s the flour on carpet test. Here, the Hoover HF9 also performed magnificently. It collected the entire spill in terms of weight, and I couldn’t see any remaining particles when I inspected it, either. The best thing about the Hoover HF9 is it can stand up on its own, unlike many cordless vacuums that you need to lay down or lean on a piece of furniture when you take a break The battery is a 4,000mAh unit, which takes around 3hrs 30mins to charge. It’s easily removable, so can be swapped with a second device if you have the dual battery model, and it can be charged either in situ when installed in the vacuum or separately. It’s never good to leave lithium-ion batteries constantly charging as it wears down the overall capacity of the cell much faster than regular use and charging. Because of this, I am put off recommending the HF9 wholeheartedly, along with its inability to slurp up stubborn fluff in carpets. Price and availability Another frustrating flaw is if I stored the Hoover unplugged – but still with a good amount of charge left – it often won’t turn on. The first few times it happened I thought the battery had run down, but on plugging it into the mains charger I saw it always had over 70% left, and would only turn on after it had been plugged in a few minutes.

In use, the system is clear, informative and simple to use. It doesn’t detect carpet or switch power modes automatically but it’s easy enough to do this manually. At 0.7l the collection bin isn’t enormous but it’s a significantly more useful size than the 0.45l bin that comes with the Hoover HF500. This should be enough to clean a house without having to empty part way through, unless your house is particularly large or filthy. What you won’t have to do on a regular basis, however, is clean the roller bar. The vacuum has an anti-tangle mechanism that stops hair from getting wrapped around the roller and it works well. I cleaned all around the vanity stations of my long-haired family members and didn’t find a single strand of hair caught around the roller, so I’d put this down as a big success for Hoover’s system.

The side-loading of the suction pipe has its pros and cons. Yes, you can empty it without removing attachments, but it means fluff and dirt needs to pass through a tight u-bend as it transitions from the upward pipe to the bottom of the collection bin.