The Vax Blade has a sequel and it claims to have a feature set, along with technological performance improvements, that make it a market leader for £199. We’ve had the Vax Blade 2 Max 40V (Hoover in the USA) at the studio for a number of weeks to see how it faces off against our highest rated and considerably more expensive cordless, the Dyson V11. Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com

Design

Vax have definitely found a design ethos with their cordless series. We remember when the brand only ventured upon the traditional upright design, with the likes of the Air Cordless Lift, but by erasing any trace of such a history with the latest cordless lineup, Vax now exclusively sell handheld stick styled appliances. The 3.1kg Blade 2 Max features a removable horizontal bin via a latch, a pole, motorised brushbar and a large selection of easily interchangeable attachments that can click into the pole or directly into the cleaner itself. Unlike Dyson cordless models, Vax don’t include a trigger and the Blade 2 is no exception. The power, along with the boost and brushbar toggle buttons, reside on top of the handle for convenient thumb access to all. In front of these is a four bar LED battery display indicator, something all Vax cordless models had long before the recent Dyson cordless had any battery read-out.

The design encourages you to unlock the bin from the cleaner body to take it away and dispose of the contents easily. Whilst we have little complaint to make about the accessibility of its design, it is worth noting that this is a cordless which really doesn’t like being overly filled with collected debris (possibly because of the horizontal cyclonic design). Whilst it doesn’t show any loss in suction (unless you don’t align the dirt bin when re-equipping - far too easy to do), you will pay for not emptying when that dust begins to hover above the max line. This is because debris quickly gets clogged around the metal air vent and is a static point for more debris to collect within the area of the bin. Inside there’s a flat filter and it’s a fairly easy component to access, laying on top of the motor within the dust bin. Knocking out the dust from filters is never fun and this is required to be done every 4-6 uses and washed every 3 months. This is an area in which Vax still has much work to do; the filter is something most customers don’t want to worry about and definitely have no desire to deal with regularly. Make it a rarer sight, Vax!

Battery Life & Charging

Charging is straightforward with the minimal design wall mount supplied, and this is not visible when the cleaner is on the wall. Charging time is roughly 3 hours.

Put simply, if you want to achieve the claimed 45 minute runtime, it is achievable but not likely. The reason being is that if you’re exclusively cleaning in handheld mode it can get clear of the 45 minute mark, but attach the brushbar (with it turned on) and that runtime drops to around 25 minutes - half the time the Dyson V11 offers on floors, and this is also slightly exacerbated with Vax’s narrower motorised cleaner head. Most people have a cleaning mix between handheld and floor - which results for us in around 35 minutes of total usable cleaning time. Within the price range that the Vax Blade 2 sits, this runtime is respectable given the amount of power offered. The Dyson V11 offers almost consistently double the total runtime in most like for like modes, but then the Vax is easily less than half its price.

Performance & Ease of Use

Floors: The Vax Blade 2 Max has a brushbar and pole combination that makes it relatively easy to navigate around legs of furniture, along edges of walls and also cleaning the steps of stairs isn’t over taxing due to the favourably balanced design. We absolutely approve of the DustTracker LED headlights. They effectively highlight all dust and hair when sliding the pole at a low angle underneath dark areas, such as underneath bed frames; something that all previous Vax cordless upright designs we’ve tested would never be able to squeeze under, let alone from one side to the other.

With the brushbar enabled, the Vax Blade 2 can certainly be described as if 'it pulls you along' on short pile carpets and it defeated our flour test in one pass - matching the Dyson V11 result. Across all our different carpets and rugs the Blade 2 Max has impressed with consistent thorough results restoring the original pile, and its brushbar design is particularly good at dealing with strands of long hair and large debris, such as whole cornflakes, without leaving a trail of crumbs behind. With boost mode enabled, the Vax Blade 2 Max is a bit of a beast and it’s a mode that is certainly not needed for day to day cleaning needs, as the default setting is more than adequate from our testing. The boost mode should be used sparingly - if you just want to speed up your cleaning or when truly required - for the sake of your battery as it only offers 12 minutes of suction in this mode. An example of how effective the mode can be, however, came when we had stubborn dirt from crayon shavings engrained in rugs, along with lots of hair, from guests staying with a child, and we didn’t want this beaten into the fibres by the brushbar. Thankfully the Vax Blade 2’s suction on boost mode, from its 40V motor, may well sound like it’s about to take off, but it, along with the good brushbar design, eradicated the path of debris with mostly single passes. The crayon shavings on a warm morning were indeed waxy, yet the Vax refrained from letting these get intertwined with the fabrics of the rug.

Vax told us they configured their brushbar design to be exclusively used on carpeted floors in their press release. However, we generally don’t disable the brushbar on hardfloors, such as on tiles and laminates, because no negative consequences have come of it. Nevertheless, when our Vax strolls onto our real wooden floors, we do disable the brushbar as it can cause surface scratches and there’s no equivalent Vax offering to something like the Dyson Fluffy attachment. So again, this is where boost mode comes into play. It should be noted that the suction power is plentiful without boost mode, capturing day to day dust between the grooves of each wooden board, but we do enable it on specific areas where we need to spot clean vicious dirt, and it works well enough, with the occasional combination of some handheld dusting afterwards. It really is a shame that there’s no brushbar solution for wooden floor owners though.

Handheld: A free toolkit worth £50 is currently bundled with every purchase of the Vax Blade 2 Max. With these four extra tools added to the two base ones found within the box of the cleaner, it’s definitely a comprehensive bundle for cleaning homes, and the storage bag keeps all neatly organised for us. Cleaning tight spaces, such as the car, behind radiators or under low profile furniture and appliances, is made especially easy with the flexible crevice tool. We were impressed too with the textile tool that is handy for curtains and clothes, thanks to the static ability of the brush that lifts off hairs easily. We think that the dusting tool could be tweaked ever so slightly with increased bristle length; offering more effective dusting results on the tops of our furniture and when using it to get into corners of rooms to remove cobwebs, etc.

Interestingly the stretch hose was an accessory we had imagined we’d make more use of. Yet now we’re seasoned with using the Vax Blade 2 Max in handheld mode, we never found any purpose, or rather an application, where it was deemed to be necessary. Reasonably lightweight cordless handheld designs like this are, after all, made so you don’t require the hose; it being a prerequisite of an upright design.

Verdict

The Vax Blade 2 Max is the best performing cleaner we’ve tested from the brand, regardless of it being cordless or not. That attractive price point of £199 is unarguably great value, albeit there are definitely drawbacks from certain design elements, such as the filter that should ideally not need so much maintenance. Battery stamina also looks a bit pinched when compared to the Dyson V11 that can near double every battery runtime result of the Vax in like for like modes and usage scenarios. Although the Blade 2 Max delivers a respectable 25 minutes of real world floor cleaning, larger homes will need to split up jobs between charges. It’s a compelling bundle that, with the current promotional toolkit included, can clean almost every surface and area of your home effectively and nips keenly at Dyson's heels on this front. Importantly, it's a cleaner that’s up for the challenge of replacing your corded upright and removes almost any excuse about the price of going cordless while doing so. Amazon.co.uk | Amazon.com