Electric lawn mowers are great. Quieter,
more powerful, no toxic fumes or gasoline, and far less maintenance than a gas mower.
However, there’s another way to level up your electric lawn mower game and that’s with the
latest onslaught of robotic mowers hitting the market. Autonomous mowers that use proximity
sensors, computer vision, and accurate to the centimeter global positioning systems are
everywhere now. Last year I beta tested a model that’s out on the market now, and this year
I bought myself a second one for comparison … and because I have a tech addiction problem … I even
have a third, but it’s technically not a mower in its current configuration. It’s a yard robot
with a snow blower attachment that I’m looking forward to testing out next winter. When I said
that these things were everywhere now …. maybe I just meant at my house. But seriously, how
well do they work and are they worth it? I’m Matt Ferrell … welcome to Undecided. This video is brought to you by
Surfshark, but more on that later. Cars have had autonomous driver
assist features for years now. Add to that autonomous robot vacuums
that are kind of ubiquitous at this point (I’m sure many of you have one … my
80 year old parents even have one). Well, this tech is starting to take on our yards,
which is why I wanted to cover this topic. I’m all for sustainable technology, so
going electric with our yard equipment is pretty straightforward. Electric also has
huge advantages over gas-powered equipment, which I’ve detailed in the past when I’ve
reviewed electric lawn mowers and snow blowers. Why an Autonomous Mower? What I have here are the Segway Navimow
H1500-VF and the Mammotion Luba 2 AWD 3000H. As I already mentioned, I
didn’t pay for the Navimow because I was a beta tester last year, but I
did buy the Luba 2. In either case, my opinions are my own and neither company
has anything to do with this video. I’m assuming the appeal of a robot mower
should be obvious: you don’t have to spend time mowing your lawn. For those of you
that like mowing your lawn … godspeed. The problem with previous generations of robot
lawn mowers was that they required a perimeter wire. You were supposed to tack down or
bury a wire around the edge of your lawn, which would define the boundaries of the
area to mow. Installing the wire is time consuming and can easily be broken by
a wayward garden tool or outdoor cat. These new models can use a combination
of proximity sensors, computer vision, and RTK global positioning systems for hyper
accurate location tracking. It’s the RTK system that’s the game changer. The way it works is that
you set up a base station somewhere in your yard, which can receive the GPS signals.
The robot mower also has a built-in GPS antenna, which means it’s using two
locations as reference points in order to narrow down the precise location
to within a centimeter to two. As for the computer vision systems, it’s not
unlike what you’d find on a modern car like a Tesla, Rivian, or Ford. The mower uses machine
learning to recognize objects, like people, pets, trees, bushes, etc. in order to either stop for
safety or navigate around the object. There’s additional safety features like proximity
sensors and pressure sensitive bumpers, so the mower knows if it’s bumped into
an object, if there’s something close by, or if someone has touched the mower and is trying
to lift it. In that case the mower quickly shuts off the blades to avoid any injury. These
mowers are extremely safe from my experience. Speaking of the experience … how’s the setup? While you don’t have to bury a wire
around your yard, which is a huge boon, there’s still some setup work here.. This is
something that I see get glossed over a lot in robot mower reviews. It can be tricky
to find the ideal location for the base station’s RTK antenna and the mower’s charging
station. This is true of both the Navimow and Luba 2. The antennas and charging station
need power, as well as an unobstructed view of the sky. Depending on where your outside
outlets are located, and what your house and surrounding situation looks like, if you have
a lot of trees, this can be a big challenge. For the Navimow, you only need one power plug
to power both the mower’s charging station and the RTK antenna. The reason? The RTK antenna
is connected by a long extension wire to the charging station. While it’s nice that you only
need one outlet, the issue is that you may have to string the wire to the antenna across
your lawn to get a clear signal somewhere. That means stretching a wire right along the
path the mower might need to mow. Just like the previous generation of robot mowers with
a perimeter wire, this could easily get cut or damaged. Or in my case last year when I was a
beta tester, chewed threw by a hungry chipmunk. Thankfully, in my case I have an
outlet located in a great location, which makes it easy to keep the wires off the
lawn and in relative safety. These mowers all come with some kind of pole you can use and
stab into the ground to secure it. For my Navimow I was able to attach the antenna to a
mount on the side of my house. That’s ideally what you’d want to do. It keeps it out of the
way, clear line of sight to the sky, and safe. This is where the Luba 2 actually
comes out slightly ahead. Before I get into what that advantage is, I need
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Link is in the description below. Thanks to Surfshark and to all of you for supporting the
channel. So why does the Luba 2 have the edge? The base station RTK antenna doesn’t
need to connect directly to the mower’s charging station. Instead it communicates
wirelessly using LoRa to the charging station, which is a form of long range wireless
technology. That means it only needs its own power outlet to plug into. Mammotion is
selling a solar panel accessory so you can place this thing anywhere in the yard without the
need for an outlet. I ordered one to test out, but am still waiting for it. In my book this
is the best type of setup because you can put the antenna on the complete opposite side of
your house if you need to for a clear line of sight to the sky. That’s exactly what I
did for my testing setup (I am planning on mounting it to the house, or the fence with
the solar panel, in the near future though). Once you have a good location figured out, you’ll need to run through the setup process
using a mobile app. In the case of the Navimow, it detected the mower via bluetooth right away,
then I followed the steps to get it onto WiFi, and also to activate a cellular connection. Cell
service isn’t required for either of these mowers, but it does give some additional security
in case someone steals the mower from your backyard. You’ll be able to track down where
it’s been taken to. Even if someone does make it away with your mower, they won’t be able
to use it because it’s locked to your account. The Luba 2 was a little trickier in my initial
setup because you have to pair both the mower and the base station RTK antenna, which wasn’t
exactly clear when I first started. The setup of the mower itself was virtually identical to
the Navimow (bluetooth detection, connect WiFi, and then install your own SIM card), but I kept
hitting a roadblock trying to start mapping my yard due to a poor GPS location. That’s when I
realized that I had to also pair and connect the RTK antenna to my WiFi. Once I did that everything
was able to advance to the mapping your yard step. Mapping for both is pretty straightforward,
but also slightly embarrassing as you slowly walk your robot around the yard. It’s quite the
show for the neighbors. Just a man taking his robot for a walk … nothing to see here. You drive
the mower around the perimeter of each section of lawn you want it to mow. You’re supposed to keep
it about 3-6 inches from the edge of the lawn or obstacles where it could get caught up on. The
Navimow’s UI for this needs some work because it’s not really intuitive how to make corrections
after the fact. The Luba 2 has a more intuitive UI for creating sections, pathways, and editing
them after the fact. For instance, on the Luba 2 it was very easy to create a zone for the side
yard, then the front yard, and then to create a pathway between the two across the driveway.
On the Navimow I still get warning boxes that I haven’t selected an object to edit when trying
to make a change. It’s really not clear when the map boundary you want to edit is selected
or not, so I keep making the same mistake. What about the features? I’m not
going to go feature by feature, but here’s a quick high level comparison
chart between the two units I have. As a former UX designer, I’m not big on the spec
sheet checklist comparisons because they don’t tell the story of what it’s like to actually use
the product. For instance, it looks damming that the Luba 2 has a shorter runtime compared to
the Navimow, but the Luba 2 has AWD and can easily handle slopes and rougher terrain than the
Navimow, which is why it has a shorter runtime. From my experience with both of these units,
the runtime isn’t a big deal at all considering you’ll most likely be running these when you’re
asleep or doing something else. You won’t notice or really care. They’ll wander back to their dock
to charge up and continue their jobs as needed. Where the feature set differences do matter
is around noise levels, mowing heights, and slopes. The Navimow is virtually silent when
mowing, while the Luba 2 has a noticeable (but quiet) whirring sound as it makes its way around
the yard. Both are quiet enough to run whenever you want without worrying about bothering your
neighbors, but the Luba is slightly louder. The Navimow at my old house got stuck easily in
a few spots of the yard that had pretty steep slopes slightly past what it could easily handle.
My new yard doesn’t have as many steep slopes, so it’s handling it like a champ. However,
it has still managed to get itself stuck and wedged against the rock beds along part
of the house. Since it’s only RWD drive, it doesn’t have enough power and traction to get
itself out of a jam like that. On the flip side, the AWD Luba 2 is a little powerhouse.
It’s had zero issues navigating the same types of rock beds if it gets
itself into a tricky situation. For me, the mowing height is the biggest
difference between these two. For a standard lawn you ideally want to cut the grass to a height
between 2-3 inches (50-76mm) high. Granted, this is going to vary a lot by what your turf
is made up of and what the water situation looks like. Taller grass will have a more
established root system, which means less watering is needed. That’s my biggest problem
with the Navimow. The highest it can go is 2.4 in (60mm). While good enough, I’d prefer to cut my
lawn closer to the 3 inch mark (76mm). The Luba 2 can go between 1-2.75 inches (20-75mm) in
the base version, but they also have an H (for height) variant that goes all the way up
to 4 inches (100mm). That’s the one I have. So what’s the user experience like actually
living with these things? Well, in a word: awesome. I have a lawn that looks like
a consistent height all the time. All I have to do every week or so is go out
with a lawn trimmer and get the areas the robot mowers can’t get to. You’re
talking about spending 15 minutes every week or two trimming the lawn versus a
couple of hours every week mowing it. Both mowers have a scheduling function where
you can tailor not only the time it mows, but how it will mow the yard (ie. changing
mowing height or direction, zones to mow, etc.). The Navimow has a bit of an edge on
this feature though because it automatically alternates the mowing direction with each
scheduled mow. For instance on day one it cuts diagonally to the right, and then on
day two it cuts diagonally to the left. This helps to keep any ruts from forming and also
ensures every blade of grass gets cut over the course of a week. The Luba 2 doesn’t
automatically change cutting directions, but you can program in specific cutting patterns
for different tasks. While it’s not automatic, you can manually get to a somewhat similar place … but
I really prefer the way Navimow handles this one. Probably the coolest feature, and one I’m
still trying to figure out an actual use for, is the FPV mode for the Luba 2. You can
watch a first person perspective video feed from the mower as it mows your yard. It’s
both insanely cool and yet an incredibly dubious feature. You feel a bit like Honey I
Shrunk the Kids while watching the video feed. As Paul Hibbert would say, now we have
to address the elephant in the room. If you’ve ever used a robot vacuum cleaner, you’ll
know that these things are far from perfect. While they do remove the chore of mowing the vast
majority of your lawn, they bring along some new, minor fiddliness. You may have to rescue it from
time to time when it gets stuck (and it will get stuck). You’ll have to hose it down from time
to time and change the blades. You’ll have to keep the sensors and cameras clean, so it can
do its job effectively. But all of that isn’t the elephant in the room … it’s the cost. These
things are expensive. The Segway Navimow H starts at $1,899 and goes up to $2,599 at the time of
making this video. With the increase in price you get a mower that’s capable of handling
a bigger yard. The Mammotion Luba 2 starts at $2,099 and goes all the way up to $4,099.
Yeah … what’s your time worth? While that is crazy expensive this may make sense for someone
that’s paying a lawn service to cut their lawn, or for someone that has a hectic schedule and
doesn’t have time to mow the lawn themselves. Or in my case, you could hate mowing lawns with
the fiery passion of 10 suns going supernova. If you don’t fall into one of those buckets, then
you’d be better off getting a great electric lawn mower and doing it yourself. You can pick up
an Ego mower for between $400-$1000. I love mine, but … if I’ve got to be honest, I
love my little robot lawn mowers more. Which one is better? They’re equal as far
as the cutting quality and reliability, but I’d give the edge to the Navimow for
cost, but would recommend the Luba 2 for overall feature set, power, and
robustness. If you have a large yard or lots of slopes/hills, the Luba 2 is
going to probably handle it like a champ. So what do you think? Do you welcome our
robot overlords or do you still prefer to do this kind of work yourself? Jump into
the comments and let me know and be sure to listen to my follow up podcast Still TBD where
we’ll keep this conversation going. Thanks as always to my patrons for your continued
support. I’ll see you in the next one.
