I use the premium Dreame Aqua10 Ultra robovac in my own home, but this alternative at 44% off is a smarter buy

I've been testing and writing about robot vacuums for nearly a decade here on TechRadar Australia and one of the standouts for me in the past 12 months was (if you'll excuse the pun) an absolute dream machine.

If you read my in-depth Dreame Aqua10 Ultra review, you'll know just how impressed I was with its overall performance, and my nitpicking complaints were mostly to do with how its battery gets used, which honestly isn't even a complaint — perhaps more of an observation.

It is, however, a premium model that I've only very rarely seen discounted. Its slightly cheaper sibling, the standard Dreame Aqua10 Roller, though, is almost as good and also currently 44% off on Amazon, and just AU$69.35 more than its Prime Day price from earlier this July.

That's still a sight better than having to pay nearly three grand for the Ultra version.

The differences between Aqua10 Roller and its Ultra sibling may seem like a long list, but trust someone who's still using the latter in her own home — it's overkill and not worth the extra cash.

So what are those differences? Well, for starters, the LiDAR turret doesn't lower itself automatically on the standard Roller version, but that's not unique to it, especially at this price. It also misses out on the 3D mapping that the Ultra version does but, again, a 2D map is pretty much all most people will need (floors, after all, tend to be pretty flat). And it gets a single-compartment soap dispenser instead of the dual-slot one in the Ultra which, again, isn't necessary unless you want to use an odour-neutralising solution as well.

For your money, you're still getting a whopping 30,000Pa of suction which, going by how well my Ultra version utilises it, will do very well on carpets and I am in awe at how well the roller mop works on the Dreame. There are plenty of intelligent features available on the Aqua10, including intelligent stain removal, so if you think your robovac has forgotten its navigation path and is circling, that's likely just its sensors picking up extra dirt in a small area and getting the bot to clean repeatedly for a thorough job.

It's also a machine that promises excellent edge cleaning, since it uses the exact same side brush and extending roller mop as the Ultra model. And the Roller even has the same automatic mop cover, which comes on as soon as it detects carpet to keep the mop head clean and your carpet dry.

While the Roller doesn't quite match the Ultra's ability to move over thresholds and steps up to 8cm tall, it's capacity to tackle heights up to 6cm is still above average, and means it can potentially head into patio areas if your sliding door frames aren't very high.

If it performs anywhere as well as my Ultra model, I think the Dreame Aqua10 Roller will be hard to beat at its current discounted price.