Best Handheld Vacuum 2016

If you ask me, handheld vacuums are all about quickly and easily cleaning up messes, in tight areas. Standard vacuum cleaners are ideal for carpets, but think of all the jobs they aren't suitable for: cleaning the car, stairs, pet hair, the sofa and dealing with small spills. For these jobs you need a more compact handheld vacuum.

The trend with handheld models, over the last few years, has been that they have gotten more powerful and versatile, while their prices have come down.

Weight and comfort
There are a few handhelds that are just too heavy, making them uncomfortable to use for longer periods. When selection one make sure the handle is comfortable and the weight is manageable.

Cordless?
Hand-held vacuum cleaners can be divided into models with and without cords. The cordless units are fine for cleaning small messes. If however, you need the power to clean pet hair out of your couch, you need one of the vacuums that plug into the wall.

With the cordless units there is quite a range in the length of time that one charge can last. Some models gives you only five minutes while others will last for almost thirty.

I would also recommend selecting a model with a charging mount, as they are more comfortable to use.

Warrranty
Handheld vacuums are cheaper to maintain, but more likely to break down, than traditional vacuum cleaners. It is therefore important to take a close look at the warranty.

The handheld vacuum’s dimensions are 6 x 8.8 x 12.8 inches and it weighs 3.25 pounds. If you take the 15.6 Volt engine into account it is a relatively compact and powerful model. I found the weight and handle comfortable, the on/off button is also well placed.

In my opinion the best feature of the Dirt Devil is it’s power management. It doesn’t waste any power and the way it charges the battery reduces degradation of it’s performance. Users that have had the vacuum for a few months have reported no noticeable reduction, of the effectiveness of the battery. When fully charged it runs for 20 minutes and it takes 6 hours to charge fully.

The vacuum has a flip out crevice tool, to clean in hard to reach places. Some users feel that the nozzle on the tool is a little short. I think nozzle length is a side effect of how the tool operates and it’s not really an issue to me. The Dirt Devil also has a retractable brush that helps with some types of messes, like on carpet.

The Dirt Devil is a bagless vacuum cleaner. The dirt is collected in a dust cup. The cup can easily be removed and emptied out.

The Dirt Devil comes with a 3 year limited warranty.

The biggest problem with the handheld Dirt Devil is the wall mount. It does work, but it doesn’t click into place. The products that click into their mounts, just feel a bit more secure.

The Dirt Devil isn’t perfect, but until something better comes along it is the best cordless handheld vacuum of 2016.

The 71B is 15 x 7 x 7 inches in size and weighs 5 pounds. It has 5.5 amp suction and separate motors for the suction and the brushes. So it’s significantly heavier and more powerful than the Dirt Devil.

The 71B is the best at doing 2 things: vacuuming carpeted stairs and cleaning pet hair out of upholstery. It is great for these jobs because of the moving brushes and the rotatable visor. The visor changes the 71B from vacuuming vertically to horizontally and back quickly. The 71B is popular with professional cleaners, they tend to use their commercial vacuums on the carpets and then the Eureka 71B on furniture.

The vacuum is bagless, the dirt collects in a cup and filter. You can see the dust collecting inside and cleaning it out is fairly easy. The power cord is a nice long 20 feet.

The vacuum cleaner has a hose that attaches to a crevice cleaning tool. The hose length is 17 inches. I have always had a problem with cleaning the dust out of my computer. The compressed air I used before just wasn’t getting the job done to my satisfaction. Lately I have been using this vacuum with a micro vacuum attachment kit and it works very well. It cleans all the gunk out of my keyboard and box easily.