Use case · Home appliances
Choosing a robot vacuum for a home with cats
An open-ended question with no budget, in a category that runs from cheap no-name models to flagship docking stations. We gave it to Muse twice — once with gaisho connected, once with its own shopping tools — in fresh chats, one after the other.
The question
Shopper asksWhat are some good robot vacuums for a home with two cats? It's mostly hardwood floors with a couple of rugs.
Results
Muse with gaisho vs Vanilla Muse
- Time to final answer
- 1:07.0
- vs 7:14.5−84.6%
- Tokens (input + output)
- 556,620
- vs 5,119,228−89.1%
- Tool calls (main agent)
- 8
- vs 14−42.9%
- Recommendations
- 7
- vs 5+40.0%
One run each, Oct 22, 2026. Tokens are input + output for the whole run, including Vanilla Muse's browser sub-agent; the logs have no cache figures. Tool calls count the main agent's own calls; the browser sub-agent's calls aren't logged.
The two answers
Muse with gaisho
Quick overview first: robot vacuums span a huge range — median around $223.98 … What drives price most is dust handling (auto-empty docks ~$420 vs manual bins ~$80), navigation (LiDAR mapping ~$340 vs random ~$24), and mopping/suction upgrades.
- Roomba 105 Combo — $299The safest all-rounder. People clearly buy this one in volume, it handles the emptying chore for weeks, and the mop side suits hardwood without paying flagship money. Trade-off is price versus the cheaper unknowns.
- AIRROBO T25+ — $188.09Best value angle. Carpet detection is genuinely useful for your rugs, suction looks strong on paper, and self-emptying is included. Trade-off is a much smaller review base, so less proof over time.
- Shark EZ — $499The pet-hair specialist pick. Shark pitches it directly for that job and the row-by-row cleaning sounds tidy, but you pay a lot more for the brand and base.
The rest got bounced: duplicate Azomabox listings at three prices, a $799.99 wrydao listing from an unknown seller with only 50+ reviews, and mop-heavy flagships that feel like overkill for mostly hardwood.
Vanilla Muse
For two cats on mostly hardwood, anti-tangle brushes and a self-empty dock matter more than chasing the highest suction — and the sweet spot here is under $400. My top pick is [Dreame D20 Air Plus] at $269.99 — the lowest price in the set with dual anti-tangle, carpet boost for your rugs, and long hands-off emptying. The tradeoff is [Shark Matrix] at $329.99 on sale, if you prefer Shark's self-cleaning brushroll and matrix mapping.
The others step up in price for bagless emptying, stronger mopping, or a self-washing dock — worth it only if you want the mop to be hands-off too.
Final answers, trimmed. The gaisho run's opening line comes from its first message, sent while the search ran. Vanilla Muse showed its products in a results card next to the text; names in square brackets are filled in from that card. Prices as shown on Oct 22, 2026.
What it means for your agent
One search instead of a shopping trip
With gaisho, Muse answered in 1 min 7 s on 556,620 tokens. Without it, Muse sent a browser agent through store pages and answered in 7 min 14 s on 5,119,228 tokens, 9.2× as many.
Price context before the picks
The gaisho run opened with what robot vacuums typically cost and what drives the price — self-emptying docks, mapping, mopping — then gave three picks, each with a trade-off, and said what it ruled out.
What each side checked
The browsing run confirmed stock on live store pages after one large store refused its browser agent, and its top pick cost less than the gaisho run's first pick. The gaisho run's prices and ratings came from gaisho's product data at the time of the search.
Source: evaluation record D1, Oct 22, 2026 — Muse with gaisho (through a skill) and native Muse in fresh chats, run one after the other; message times, tool calls and token logs from Muse's own records.