Bagless vacuum cleaners are jumping in popularity every year. They’re cheaper to run, faster to set up, and kinder to the environment. The clear canister is easier to monitor as it fills, and vacuuming up your wedding ring won’t require you to rip open another bag and go sifting through the filth.
No one likes fiddling around installing bag liners, remembering to purchase the bags, or the associated ongoing costs. Worse still, after a few years the bags made for a specific model of vacuum become harder to find on shelves and easier to find in landfill, encouraging owners to upgrade before it’s really necessary.
However, there are also some disadvantages to bagless cleaners. When the vacuum cleaner sucks dirt into the chamber, rather than being directly sealed into an air-tight bag, there are some opportunities for micron-sized dust being leaked back into the room.
Emptying the canister can also create a cloud of dust as it falls into your bin. To combat this, always look for HEPA or whole-machine filtration, and hygienic ejection of dust to minimise exposure. Of course, you could always empty your vacuum into the garden, too!
As long as you dispose of dust thoughtfully, bagless vacuum cleaners are cheaper, simpler to use, and far more environmentally friendly. But which one is best for your situation?
We’ve weighed up the advantages and disadvantages of the best bagless vacuum cleaners on the Australian market at several price points, combining them into a handy list to offer you the best value on any budget.
1. Dyson V11
The highest performing cordless vacuum cleaner available
If we’re genuinely judging the best, without considering other factors, Dyson’s V11 is hands-down the best bagless vacuum cleaner currently available on the market for all situations and all floors, costly though the machine may be.
The latest in technology has been thoughtfully applied to all elements of this graceful 3-kilogram machine. As with all Dyson V-Series, whole-machine filtration and painless maintenance access comes as standard. The main digital motor is their newest and most powerful, and the direct motor drive in the torque powered head intelligently senses changes in flooring and adapts suction to the situation as you vacuum.
The LCD screen above the handle gives information about the battery, power, and efficiency of the machine available at a glance, and also allows touch-screen navigation of settings and other options. The screen will even display short video clips to demonstrate how to remove any blockages it senses are impacting efficiency.
The battery technology here is the absolute gold standard for this year, offering 60 minutes of runtime on standard, with a capacity that is going to fade far slower than most other batteries on the market. As a bonus, the battery pack on the V11s can be easily clicked in or out of the unit for charging, or even replacing if the power is fading after several years of daily use.
In terms of attachments, the basic V11 model already includes an array of extras: a combination tool, a crevice tool, a mini soft brush, a stubborn dirt brush, and a mini-motorised tool for that stubborn pet hair and ground-in dirt.
However, if you have wooden floors, it might be worth it to go for the V11 Absolute Extra sub-model, which features a soft fluffy roller head that vacuums and buffs the hardwood, clinging to dust without slowly eating away at your high-gloss finish over time.
For those people with large homes, you may rather want to consider the Outsize Pro, with an extra 25% length of roller head, to cover more area with each pass. The canister too holds 50% extra capacity without sacrificing power through the larger area, meaning you can vacuum longer and empty less often.
All that said, the price tag is expensive. Very expensive. There are other stick vacuum cleaners that perform half this well for a fraction of the price, and it’s worth considering that a less efficient, better value machine may be all that you need. However, if you want a top-of-the-line vacuum cleaner that will last you for years to come, this is undeniably our winner.
best for carpet
2. Shark Navigator Lift-Away Professional
The best bagless vacuum cleaner for carpets and corners with lift-away portability
For high-performance vacuums to compete with the top Dysons, they have to stay competitive with suction and features, but also offer something unique. Shark has focused on offering the reach and portability of handheld vacuums, while still providing the premium power and deep cleaning of the best upright vacuums to deserve that higher price.
This 2-in-1 Shark vacuum has been a highly popular import choice for over 10 years now, with the new “Professional” being the most recent iteration. It features a much larger dustbin capacity, longer cord, and additional mini-motorised tool to effectively lift pet hair and tough dust from upholstery. This mini tool particularly shines on stairs, and the portability of the lift-away canister will be hard to resist for multi-storey homes.
The Lift-Aways have a complete sealed system with HEPA filtration to avoid allergens escaping back into the room, an important factor considering the focus of this machine’s design on pet hair pickup.
With a simple side-button push, the canister and motor lift away from the floor head to make your vacuum more portable and convenient for higher jobs like upholstery or ceiling fans. Long attachments are easy to use in hard-to-reach places due to the weight balance located in the handle, and the swivel design of the vacuum in upright mode will allow easy access to any hidden pet fur under the couch.
A 1200W motor and direct drive in the floor head provide ample power and agitation to ensure deep cleaning of your carpets, and the bristle materials are short and flexible enough to handle longer pile carpets that other vacuums struggle to move over.
For hard floors, this model comes with a Dust-Away attachment with microfiber pads that will cling to dust and softly buff wooden floors to keep them looking glossy and fresh.
3. Bissell Cleanview
A great value upright vacuum that works hard for less
Don’t let the plastic appearance fool you. Bissell has been earning a reputation lately for good value, making inexpensive machines that feel unfortunately flimsy, but do the job well and live long lives. This excellent bagless option is up there with the best, despite being a few hundred dollars cheaper than the best.
The Bissell keeps neat on-board storage in the plastic frame for the included extension wand, crevice tool, dusting brush, and mini-motorised tool. One bonus side effect of the all-plastic casing is that this is one of the lighter uprights around, at only 6 kilograms.
The Cleanview gets its name from the transparent plastic that covers the brush-roll, a convenient window to be able to see when hair is becoming tangled and allowing you to maintain it before it can ever impact performance.
Powerful and efficient suction comes from an 8-amp motor with a motorised spinning brush-roll designed to avoid scattering debris as it moves over hard surfaces. The filters can be washed with warm water and are extremely inexpensive to replace. While not truly HEPA-grade, the filtration system is decent and should contain 99% of the catchment.
On the less positive side however, the 1.8 metre hose is a little on the short side for a vacuum designed for portability. You would ideally want two metres to make the best use of these attachments and be able to comfortably reach into tricky areas at floor level. Also, bizarrely, the cord does not automatically retract like every other modern vacuum cleaner, which is strange because it would cost so little for Bissell to add this convenient feature.
best for pet hair
4. Dyson V8 Animal
The great all-rounder cordless stick vacuum that can’t be beat
For stick vacuum cleaners, as always, you want the Dyson. If you’re hesitating to break the bank for the latest V11, we have to recommend the V8 as the all-rounder that will outperform most stick vacuums for the best value-for-cost ratio.
The direct-drive vacuum head packs a great punch, where carbon fibre and soft nylon bristles will consistently pick up invisible dirt along with larger debris on the first pass.
The digital motor is still really the best available at this price point, 5 years later, and the battery will give you a runtime of 40 minutes on standard, providing years of fade-free power to your investment.
The Dyson V8 Animal is the best bagless stick vacuum for pet hair. The whole-machine filtration will outperform HEPA filters, keeping the allergens inside the vacuum, and the included mini-motorised tool will make short work of your dog’s bedding or cat fur that rubs up against stairs.
This is a stick vacuum that’s worth the cost, with power approaching that of a corded upright machine, with all the manoeuvrability and weightlessness of stick vacuums.
5. Miele Blizzard CX1 Excellence
A silent monster tough enough to take on your rowdiest kids and pets
There’s a reason why the Miele Blizzard CX1 Excellence is Amazon’s (at the time of writing) #1 best bagless vacuum cleaner with HEPA filter. This robust machine delivers quiet powerful suction and excellent filtration at a modest price, making it ideal for active families.
This is Miele’s first bagless cleaner, a sign of good things to come, as the suction far outperforms expectations of an 1100W motor thanks to streamlined airflow using vortex physics to vacuum air through the machine at over 100kph.
A maintenance-free HEPA filter captures coarse and fine dust several times through the air’s vortex course, resulting in a higher catch rate without passing on the expense of extra materials to the consumer.
Minor features of this vacuum are so simple and useful it’s a wonder they don’t come with every machine. A long 10 metre cord is an underrated pleasure, meaning less plugging and unplugging between rooms. The adjustable handle easily extends for taller people, and adjustable suction is attached to a sealed dial rather than a manual gate. Even the attachments neatly slide and transform to nozzle, so you’ll never lose your crevice tool at the bottom of the misc. drawer.
For an extra hundred dollars, get the Cat & Dog model in a sleek autumn red. The turbo motorised head is more than worth it for pulling deep filth and fur out of carpets, and your other surfaces will see the benefit too.
6. Electrolux Pure C9 Eco-Friendly
A value buy made of recycled plastics that keeps allergens at bay
Environmentally friendly design with excellent filtration and a turbo head make the Electrolux Pure C9 the best bagless vacuum under $500.
The seven-stage filtration system is a sealed system that minimises suction loss and dust leaks, leaving your lungs and carpets dirt-free. Within the sealed system is a removable HEPA filter, which can be periodically washed with detergent and warm water to keep your machine running at maximum efficiency for years.
This environmentally friendly machine is made from 60% recycled plastic to reduce your bagless vacuum eco footprint even further, and as a bonus, these materials make the machine light, gliding effortlessly across your carpet on large easy-roll wheels.
Attachments include 3-in-1 cleaning tool, combination floor tool, and turbo brush for lifting embedded dust in your carpets, all of which can be kept handy at the vacuum shaft where they won’t be lost and can be easily switched out when they’re needed.
Intuitive simplicity is key in the design, with a single point of entry allowing access to all filters and other elements for easy maintenance, and an “easy empty” system to hygienically dispose of dust from the 1.6 litre canister.
7. Hoover Eco Pets Turbo
A simple but effective vacuum with reduced energy consumption
Designed for families that love the environment as much as they love their pets, this simple barrel vacuum is one of the best bagless canister vacuum cleaners for pet hair with few features but excellent and efficient operation.
A powerful energy-efficient 1100W motor offers strength of suction at a lower power consumption, using analogue technology through multi-layered cyclones to increase the rate of airflow through physics, rather than brute energy.
Adding to the energy efficiency of this machine, the floor head has a motorised turbo roller to pull extra dust and fur embedded into the carpet to reduce power consumption further.
A HEPA filter is a must if you have pets, to capture allergens and dander from pet hair. The filtration system expels only clean air from the vacuum cleaner, but is also fully removable and washable to keep filtration at maximum efficiency without incurring ongoing maintenance costs.
This model has a large 1.7 litre dustbin capacity, which is a great bonus for pet owners; pet fur tends to take up a lot of room inside vacuum cleaners, greatly increasing the regularity with which you’ll need to empty out your bin.
The button release for this bin is inbuilt in the canister handle, making it extremely easy to remove, dump, clean and restore without twisting your hands awkwardly or exposing them to dust.
For only an extra $30, pick up a mini hand turbo brush attachment to get right into pet beds and stairwells, an unusually low price for a feature you’ll use regularly.
8. Hoover Essential
A highly effective all-rounder for a great price
This upright vacuum from Hoover is no feature-laden fantasy, but does a job better than the sum of its parts, making it the best bagless vacuum cleaner under $200.
The machine pivots and glides smoothly across your floors. A detachable wand with flexible hose is an impressively long 2.4 metres, allowing great versatility to reach all corners and awkward hard-to-reach areas of your room. The included crevice tool, dusting brush and upholstery tool are conveniently fitted into a transforming attachment that can stay attached to the machine when not in use.
For the carpets, however, you’ll want to stick to the convenient extra-wide brush bar in the floor head, a high-turbo motorised roller that we wouldn’t usually expect in this kind of price bracket. The bristles are tough and do a great job of pulling away pet hair and dirt, but you may find this roller a little too rough on delicate rugs or medium-to-long pile carpets.
The large 1.6 litre dustbin pulls away easily, to be hygienically emptied away from the user and restored without fiddling. The motor has perfectly decent suction considering the lower power of 700W, with that nice lower noise volume to avoid bothering your neighbours at night.
The main drawback of this vacuum might be the 6 metre cord. It’s more than enough to handle a single room, especially with that long hose, but you’ll need to plug and unplug it for each room you want to vacuum. The higher placement of the extender is also quite thoughtless; in larger rooms you may find this cord winding up in your tripping zone a little too often for comfort.
9. Electrolux Ease C3 Origin
A tiny-but-mighty gorgeous canister vacuum that packs a punch
The big draw of this vacuum is excellent variable suction from a 1700W motor for a low, low price. This tiny vacuum is perfect for small homes with plenty of foot traffic, making this Electrolux the best bagless vacuum cleaner with HEPA filter at the ~$200 mark.
A strong feature for this price point is the four-step filtration system, which includes a HEPA 12 washable exhaust filter, to ensure only clean air returns to the room. This is one of very few budget machines that can offer this level of filtration.
This vacuum features a variable power dial to control the high suction it can deliver if you’re finding it hard to move over carpet. This suction makes up for the lack of motorised head, but won’t be so much help for pet fur. Sand and dirt, on the other hand, will prove no problem for the power and filtration provided. Two layers of dedicated cyclones within the body separate large and fine particles to improve the airflow, resulting in less clogging for the machine, and less filter maintenance for you.
The sleek, ice-white body is a mere 4.5 kilograms, very light and manoeuvrable across floors. The light weight in combination with large stable wheels ensure that you’ll barely feel the barrel gliding around behind you as you vacuum. The 6 metre cord is unfortunately a little short for some rooms, but at least stays at ground-level.
The large 1.8 litre capacity dustbin easily releases from the machine by simply pushing the handle as you pull up, allowing easy emptying with a single button release for effortless and hygienic dust disposal.
10. Puppyoo Upright Vacuum
A feature-filled vacuum with super suction on a tight budget
Much like a real puppy, the Puppyoo upright vacuum is energetic, eager to perform tricks, and unfortunately quite noisy!
The power of this machine is excellent for the price. Not only does it offer competitive suction and a high-powered motor, it also comes with a pet hair brush to drag fur out of the carpet into the vacuum.
While that’s also useful for many non-pet situations like human hair and pilling on your jumpers, if you have a real pet, this is perfectly safe to use directly on their coat.
Unfortunately such a pet will need to be brave to put up with this noise. The main drawback of so much motor power through a large space is excessive noise pollution, so you won’t get away with vacuuming while anyone’s asleep.
The height is manually adjustable for five different settings: Tiles and lino, wooden floors, low, medium, and high-pile carpets.
The absolutely enormous 2.9 litre dust canister is a breeze to lift out and empty hygienically, where all filters and parts are also accessible for cleaning with detergent and warm water. For such a large dust canister, this 4.5 kilogram machine is surprisingly light and manoeuvrable.
For some, the 5 metre cord will be a miserably short tail for this puppy, but this is compensated for somewhat by the longer 2 metre flexible hose with long stick wand for long-reach vacuuming.
