Robotic vacuum cleaners are effective, but they have certain limitations. Case in point, SwitchBot S10 still requires a fair amount of effort to set up and assemble. Due to their large size, it’s difficult for them to slide under low-clearance furniture, like sofas or tables. This is where handheld vacuums and dedicated floor cleaners excel, delivering a more comprehensive and precise clean. With an array of options available on the market, choosing a reliable, trusted brand makes the most sense. That’s where Dyson comes in. The company has just unveiled the PencilWash wet floor cleaner, which offers a “lighter, slimmer, and smaller solution for wet cleaning without sacrificing hygiene.”
First reported by The Verge, the PencilWash serves as the perfect counterpart to Dyson’s PencilVac, the world’s slimmest vacuum cleaner, introduced in 2025, with its motor and electronics cleverly packed into a narrow, broom-like handle. The PencilWash follows suit, but shifts focus to wet cleaning. PencilWash integrates a clean water tank, a dirty water tank, and a microfiber roller into an impressively slender design, making it ideal for reaching tight spots and handling hard floors with ease.
Much like its vacuum cleaner version, the wet floor cleaner measures 1.5 inches in diameter from top to bottom and weighs 4.4lbs. Compared to the specs of other handheld vacuum cleaners on the market, PencilWash is ridiculously compact and lightweight. This brings us to the units of the vacuum cleaner. As detailed by Tech Radar, the floor cleaner body comprises the handle, the floorhead, and the dock. We’ll get to each unit separately.
First up is the handle, which is roughly 1.5 inches in diameter and features a shrunk-down motor. Besides the motor, all the mechanics, including the battery and other electronics, have been squeezed into the narrow handle, while the water tanks are tucked into the cleaning head. The battery is positioned at the top section of the broom handle, while the front section features an interface comprising control buttons alongside a screen that shows battery levels and the mode you are currently operating in. Users get two hydration modes for light spills or stubborn stains, an on-board display showing battery level, and a floor-level charging dock included in the box.
It is to be noted that, unlike traditional vacuum cleaners that rely on suction, the PencilWash floor cleaner “uses a combination of hydration, agitation, and extraction technologies to ensure only fresh water is used to clean your home.” As per the company’s press release, “a precision-engineered 8-point hydration system that delivers a consistent supply of fresh water to the roller, owners are always using fresh water to clean the floors.”
From a configuration standpoint, the Dyson PencilWash weighs just 4.9lbs, and 0.84lbs in hand. Another USP of the PencilWash is the high manoeuvrability that allows it to steer naturally with a simple twist. “It lies flat to 170 degrees to clean under low furniture and reach tight spaces without losing performance,” the company notes.
Next, we have the floorhead. This particular unit features two small water tanks, one for clean water and one for dirty water. The high-density microfiber roller features “64,000 filaments per cm²”, spinning rapidly to handle wet and dry debris simultaneously, while a built-in scraping system continuously extracts dirty water from the roller.
Notably, the PencilWash ditches the traditional filter entirely, a design choice Dyson says “eliminates the risk of bacterial buildup, sludge, and performance drops over time.” A 10 fluid ounce clean water tank can cover up to 1,076 square feet of flooring, with up to 30 minutes of runtime per charge and a full recharge time of approximately 3.5 hours. Lastly, we have the conical-shaped dock that is primarily meant to charge the machine.
With all these points in mind, it’s pretty evident that the machine is best suited to two-bedroom homes or tiny houses, where its limited tank size and runtime make the most sense. Larger households may prefer Dyson’s WashG1, though that model retails at $770 (currently 48% off), but lacks the PencilWash’s ability to clean under low-profile furniture.
The PencilWash goes on sale in the UK on February 23 at £300, in the US on March 17 at $350. The US price sits notably below the WashG1 and includes the charging dock, making it an accessible entry point into Dyson’s wet cleaning ecosystem.
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