Tineco A30S review: A quality stick vac with plenty of thrift

Stick vacuums don't get as many headlines as their disc-shaped siblings do nowadays but sometimes you've gotta get your hands a little dirty in pursuit of making your home a little bit cleaner.

Enter the Tineco A30S cordless stick vac. It's got clean looks, a decently-sized dust-bin, a solid amount of suction, a brush designed to defy tangles and a HEPA filter that promises to eliminate 99.7% of PM2.5 particles. That's a long list of bells,  whistles and premium economy promises but the real kicker is that it the asking price involved is a relatively reasonable one.

The Tineco A30S is not the thriftiest or slickest stick vac you could find nowadays but it offers a ton of bang for your buck and most of the modern conveniences you'd want. This isn't a revolution for home cleaning tech, but it is a great reflection of just how far your money can take you when it comes to buying a stick vac in 2025.

You call that a dust-bin? This is a dust-bin. I've found myself relying more on robot vacuums over traditional stick vacs more and more in recent times but one of the bigger downsides to that preference is that the dust-bins inside most robovacs isn't all that big. The dust-bin might be out of sight but it's rarely out of your mind for long since you have to empty it more frequently than you do with a stick vac.

By comparison, the Tineco A30S is absolutely packing with a 1L dust bin. That's significantly larger than what you can find in not only most robovacs but also a lot of the competition in the stick vac space. The value this inclusion adds isn't complicated but it's definitely appreciated.

But wait, there's more! A bigger dustbin is far from the only thing that the Tineco A30S has going for it. The specs on this stick vac swing well above the expectations that the price-tag sets up. While it takes a little longer than I'd like to  charge up, the 60 minutes of usage you can get out of the Tineco A30S meant that I had the freedom to use it at my own pace and get the most out of what the hardware could do. It ain't a fancy new feature but a longer battery gave this stick vac more time to shine, not to mention get the job done.

More suction, fewer worries. To round out the strong fundamentals found above, the Tineco A30S also offers an impressive 20,000pa of suction. Although I would not have minded a slightly larger brush-end or an extra attachment or two included the box, the results that this particular spec translates into more than met my expectations. The Tineco A30S has no trouble with both smaller particles and larger crumbs. In addition, I've also mostly found that its promise of a a tangle-free brush to be true. So far anyway.

Brighter headlights. Similar to the likes of the Dyson V15 Detect, the business-end of the Tineco A30S sports a set of headlights that are designed to make it easier to spot dust particles. Although it is nice to see this feature make its way into a much more affordable stick vac, I found its overall utility left something to be desired. The culprit, so far as I can tell, is likely the brightness of the diodes involved. In lighter environments, I found it had only a limited effect. If Tineco was to take a second-stab at things, the first thing on my wishlist would be a brighter set of bulbs.

More intuitive controls. They might look nice but the controls nestled in the handle of the Tineco A30S are a little too minimalist for their own good. There are two buttons here, one of which turns the appliance on and off. The other toggles it between its eco, auto and max settings. While there's an LED here that sort-of changes color as you toggle between the different settings, I struggled to keep track of what setting the unit was on at any given moment and had even less luck telling these different modes apart by sound alone.

More flexibility. While I was mostly satisfied with the height and reach offered by the Tineco A30S on a daily basis, I was a little irked that there were no ways to adjust it. The additional flexibility that this might provide would make it easier to recommend to more people but also to use in more situations. An extra attachment or a spare battery wouldn't hurt either.

The Tineco A30S vacuum costs $319.99 in Australia, but you can already grab deals that bring that price down.

The Tineco A30S isn't the flashiest or most futuristic looking stick vac out there, but it makes the most of a modest price-tag with firm foundations and a modest but surprising amount of premium perks and features. A larger dust-bin and extra suction aren't complicated but they add a lot of value that's easy to understand and make use of on an everyday basis. 

All told, the Tineco A30S is a great option if you're looking to dodge the premium that comes with Dyson and don't mind something that's more suited for smaller living areas than larger houses.