Samsung Bespoke AI Jet Ultra review: Your data for details

On its own the Samsung Jet AI Ultra is a high-powered, high performing stick vacuum, but its most advanced features are paywalled. No, you won’t need to succumb to micro-transactions, but you will need to pay with the most valuable online currency there is - your data.

AI Cleaning Mode 2.0 is the flagship upgrade, but its additional capabilities remain locked until you’ve signed up, and connected to Samsung’s SmartThings app. To unlock the vacuum’s ability to identify different carpet types you’ll need to sign away your name, email, location data, and agree to receive a variety of marketing emails from Samsung. Even then, there is no guarantee these features will work reliably - they didn’t for me.

At best, this kind of exchange is an interesting marketing strategy, at worst it is pernicious and misleading, but I tend to err somewhere in the middle. It isn’t illegal but it serves Samsung more than it benefits the consumer. First party data - the kind mined by strategies like this - is incredibly valuable to marketers and brands, but I’m not convinced Samsung is offering enough in exchange. Swapping your location data for a couple of unreliable cleaning modes isn’t a fair balance, especially when you have already paid $1,699.

For Samsung loyalists the hidden features will neither be hidden, nor an issue. If you’ve already committed to an interconnected device from the brand then they probably already have all your data, so adding some stick vac flavour to the mix won’t change the taste. It will however unlock AI Cleaning Mode 2.0, provided the connection stays stable. 1.0 could identify four floor types, but now the vacuum can also recognise what kind of carpet you’re cleaning, and automatically change suction and roller speed to suit it.

The key word being ‘can’. An active Bluetooth connection between the Cleaning Station and the Jet AI Ultra vacuum is required, but in my testing this was difficult to achieve and even harder to maintain. Once connected to WiFi the pair didn’t sync with each other, and Samsung’s main troubleshooting advice is to move the Cleaning Station to a spot without nearby obstacles. In my home - and I’m assuming yours - the only open spaces are right in the middle of a room, far away from any power points, and further away from the aesthetic vibe I'm trying to create.

While it is an objectively pretty vacuum cleaner, I don’t necessarily want it to be a focal point in my decor. Even so, once connected the only real difference is the vacuum detecting rug pile and adjusting for it. If you don’t have mixed carpet pile or you’re happy to manually change the speed setting on the in-built LED screen then 2.0 doesn’t add much tangible value.

I’m ambivalent about the whole slew of features SmartThings enables really. Another key feature allows you to get an alert on the vacuum if you receive a phone call or a text message on your connected Samsung smart phone. While I could see the use in this for some people, it once again requires a reliable Bluetooth connection which, as we’ve already covered, is trickier than it should be to manage. On top of that SmartThings lets you toggle the Dustbin Empty Duration between short, medium, and long, and access cleaning logs to see how long the vacuum has been used for. To each their own, but I don’t know how Type A you have to be to look at your own manual cleaning metrics.

Samsung is simultaneously doing too much and not enough with the interconnectivity element of the AI Jet Ultra. My personal viewpoint is that some pieces of technology never need to connect to your WiFi, and stick vacuums fall squarely in that category. Samsung (and every other connected vacuum manufacturer) need to either create more value to make it worth the hassle and data collection, or give it a rest.

Excluding all the connectivity aspects, the Bespoke AI Jet Ultra is an improved iteration on the already excellent Bespoke Jet Stick Vacuum. It has great suction, top-tier particle clearance, better manoeuvrability, and all the convenient extras we loved about the first one.

On hard floor and carpet alike the Jet Ultra had between 95-98% clearance rate of small and medium debris. Most of the leftover dander was fallout from moving the vacuum backwards, when the suction isn’t enabled. If Samsung adapted the current design to vacuum in both directions, like competitors such as Shark are doing, the clearance rate would have been even better. One for next time I guess. Edge performance is weaker with the clearance rate hovering around 80-85%. The roller heads are too thick on the sides to get all the way up to the wall, so you’ll be better off switching out to the crevice attachment in these areas.

One thing Samsung has taken from its competitors is the LED Brush+. Similar to Dyson’s Detect range, the LED Brush+ lights up the space in front of it while it vacuums. While Dyson’s option has a green, powerful light that surfaces small particles in all conditions, Samsung’s version is a bit underwhelming. The white LED works well enough in dark spaces like underneath the entertainment unit, or if you’re cleaning in the twilight, but during well lit hours it won’t illuminate anything extra to vacuum up. On the plus side the roller head did a stellar job evening out the tassels on my rug.

Other attachments include a flex tool, the Pet Tool+, and the Spray Spinning Sweeper which is ostensibly a mop head. This mop head has a mind of its own. Switched on the two mop pads rotate in opposite directions which makes the device bobble around like a jellyfish. With enough water spritzed out from the integrated water tank it easily dealt with sticky and wet messes, but it doesn’t have enough downwards force to get out baked in stains. I tried to gently press my foot on the mop head to add a bit of extra oomph to a particularly stubborn tomato sauce, but that triggered an error. A hard floor cleaner would do a better job overall, but the mopping efficiency surprised me overall.

While the device feels heavier than its predecessor it manoeuvres corners and low line furniture better. Even stretched down flat the AI Jet Ultra was able to effectively clean underneath my bed, and handled corners more cleanly than the older version without visibly compromising on suction.