Amazon.com: Customer reviews: WORX WG794 Landroid M Cordless Robotic Lawn Mower with Rain Sensor & Safety Shut-Off

Reviewed in the United States on August 4, 2015

The media could not be loaded.

Update 8/16/2015 - added a video when I increased one of the areas into an area of the yard that had not been mowed in a month by anything, so you can see in the video how it does cut rather well. This grass was 6-7" tall in spots, it did need a few passes to get it all looking good. Added some comments below with an "Edit" tag.

Currently going with 5-stars, but like most robot mowers you have to work around the issues that allow them to work best in your lawn.

Starting with Cons -
* Not yet selling an extra perimeter switch, making setup with fences between yards a bit harder. (They do sell another docking station for ~$110 which to be fair is not far off from the price of just a "perimeter switch" from other companies)
* Not enough stakes included in the box for our yard size (11,000 sqft plus - to be fair our yard is on the upper end of what this mower was made for, zoning has made that better) EDIT: Local big box stores have metal stakes ($9.00 for 75) that work well enough, this helped me complete what I needed.
* Does not always drive in a straight line, almost like it follows gravity or uneven terrain causes it to slightly turn if one wheel only hits that bump. I am still watching this trying to figure out what the cause is, might be a combo of the two. Not sure this is truly a bother, as it still gets the job done.
* Complicated yard setups with lots of fences or features does prove problematic for when it needs to return for charging. Right now we have one spot where if it decides it needs to charge, it will try and follow the line under a fence and not give up.
a. I can either move the charging station to this spot or b. add a relay and switch to control the boundary wire allowing me to effectively have a switch track control.
EDIT: Fixed this by simply adding a new wire that returns from the other side. If you have a corner post, and the two wires, it will follow the wires around the corner post instead of trying to go straight on the wire that runs under the fence. This helped me create a zone out on the side yard. For the front yard I simply hinged a few of the fence boards and it will push that open to get to the front. It returns to the back yard through another hinged spot on the opposite side. Works rather well, and with the zoning feature makes it easy.

* Rain timer seems to have a bug - the mower went off to mow shortly after the morning sprinklers got it wet. Going to email their tech support on this.

Now for the good things.

* My yard looks really good, even the tall grass it was able to handle after a few days work and I did not have to get the big mower out like I had thought. Just give it a few days and it will be under control and maintained.
* My yard has never been cleaner! Since I had to find all the rocks, twigs and such before letting it wander off to work.
* Handles the carpet grass fine, the Bermuda grass is fine, and the few spots of turffalo (short Buffalo grass) all get cut well.
* Nothing prepares you for how silent this thing is - you hear it actually cutting things over any motor noise. Walk around in the dark and you might be surprised by it.

EDIT: Needed extra wire, ended up using yellow pet fence wire from the local big box store (500 feet for $25). After a few days I could not see the wire and it spliced in just fine with no errors or confusion from the mower, works fine even when buried.

Setup was not all that bad, did take me a few hours as I had to get rocks up and out of the ground and do some tree work. I did make my own set of measuring jigs as I was not all that impressed by the cardboard measuring tools that they give you. So I just cut two sticks out of some spare PVC, one to 14", the other to 2.5' as this really helped me speed along while setting the wire and pins.

I did update the firmware before turning on the mower, this was a rather painless process as long as you are comfortable with a screwdriver and USB memory stick.

I am glad it now has "Zones", as that was one thing I did not like about this model when reading other reviews in the past.

It has been stuck a few times, so in those spots I just level out the dirt or make an incline a bit smoother.

Programming is easy enough, and with the Texas sun I programmed it to run well into the night. I did not like that the starter program would have it mowing in the morning dew, I wish they would think about changing that.

Runtime seems pretty good so far, and as the batteries get a few more cycles on them I can see three hours being doable.

I will update this review as time goes on, we do plan to make a barn for it with some sort of auto door as my wife fears some jealous neighbor might try and swipe it. It is pretty hard to see at night, so I do not think it will get much attention from anyone passing by.

So far we are much happier with this mower than our lawn crew, or doing it ourselves with allergies and the heat. Plus our lawn looks better than it ever has, so that was an unexpected bonus. I do want to try the Bosch mower blades to see if they make any difference to how much it cuts on one pass, or to how long the blades might last.

Payoff is around six to eight months, depending on how many times the lawn care company was doing things.

17 people found this helpful

Helpful

M. Yoon

UNIT SHUTS OFF BY ITSELF! YOU WILL NOT GET ANY MEANINGFUL SUPPORT IF THE UNIT MALFUNCTIONS!

Reviewed in the United States on July 15, 2015

Style: Landroid onlyVerified Purchase

This product is not ready for public release. It woks well when it works. But the #1 problem is that the unit shuts off during charging and because of this does not follow the weekly programming. This is a real problem as it doesn't automatically cut. You have to manually reset the device. USELESS.

8/9/2015 So the unit had some issues with it running out of bounds at a specific spot. I reworked the boundary wire to make sure no overlaps were present. It still managed to go out of bounds. And once while it was out of bounds someone stole it. The good news is that they figured out they can't use it without a pin and returned the unit after a few days. Now here is where I have a major issue. I call WORX technical suport. After waiting 10 -15 minutes I get connected to a support advisor who really doesn't know anything about the unit. She tries to help me but after a few minutes I get disconnected. She probably just disconnected the call because she wasn't really able to help me. I call the support number again to wait 10-15 minutes and finally just decide on to let worx give me a call. Terrible customer support. Some issues are going to be expected with a new unit like this but a company should stand by their product with great support. WORX is not doing that. What good is a 3 year warranty when the support people have never even heard of their own device?

****************************9/20/2015***************************
After writing this negative review a customer service representative directly contacted me. I told them my issue and the only support they gave me was asked me if I updated to the latest firmware update. I told them more than a few times that I did. He told me that he has to get in touch with the service manager and he will let them know what needs to be done. A few days later he sends me the link to the update that I already applied. OF COURSE THIS IS NOT GOING TO FIX MY PROBLEM. I bought a $1000 paper weight. Be happy that your unit is working right now because when the unit breaks it will take forever before the company will take back the unit. I don't have many regrets in life but purchasing this piece of junk is one of them. I would have been better off losing $1000.

94 people found this helpful

Helpful

K. Mara

Worth the money!

Reviewed in the United States on May 26, 2019

Style: Landroid onlyVerified Purchase

I have to admit I was skeptical, but I hate mowing, so I wanted to try this. This thing is amazing. I followed the directions and had it working in less than an hour (our back yard is only 1500 sq feet, and this mower can supposedly do much more). Plenty of wire was included, as well as the pegs and anything else necessary to make it work. I had to make a few adjustments. The manual said you need 14" clearance to the edge of the yard, but would trim 8", and then it also said you only need 4" if the border is a driveway. I compromised and allowed 10"-12", which seems perfect. I usually have about half a centimeter before it hits the fence but it stops and turns, so it is really close. We have a small hill at the bottom of the grassed area our yard which leads into a much steeper hill. I was worried about that. I did notice that at that hill I have to give 14" or longer clearance, because the robot does brake but it can slip on the grass and go farther on the hill than it should. I think at the top of a hill I could probably get a way with 8" clearance since the robot would be driving uphill and wouldn't have to brake. Before I discovered this and added room at the bottom for braking it did overrun and go tumbling down the bigger non-mowed hill once or twice. It only took me a few minutes to fix.

Mow quality: It mows great and the obstacle algorithm is fantastic. I was not sure how it can get the whole yard mowed without GPS but it does. The first day or two might be patchy, but then it starts to look really nice.

Obstacles: It can escape almost anything once you get the wires set up properly. The only thing it has problems with are smooth cylindrical objects (e.g. poles or pressurized hoses) laid flat. For some odd reason the tires have a rigid staggered tread, which means that on smooth, hard objects the tire might as well be bald (the staggered tread keeps the tire from "sinking in" when the tires come across a perpendicular obstacle). We have a jungle gym made up of a bunch of concentric poles, some of which are laying flat, and most of the time the landroid navigates through it properly. However, if we move the jungle gym (to avoid grass patterns) then it sits higher on top the grass and the mower has a hard time gripping the poles, and sits forever with its wheels spinning against the pole, not knowing it is trapped. Everything else that gets in the way of the landroid, not a problem. Paver stones, kid's toys, satellite dish, small trees, swingsets, kids, dogs--it navigates over or around (and often under) just about anything we've thrown at it, as long as the wheels can get a grip. if the landroid gets in a position where it straddles a hose or a laid-down pole in a parallel fashion (one wheel on each side of the object, traveling lengthwise), when it tries to turn the front wheels cannot rotate in time to roll over it and it will get stuck. Thankfully if it has room to back up, it will back up and turn until the front wheels wedge on the object and then pop off. If the object is moveable, like a pressurized or rigid hose, then this trick will not work and the robot will stay stuck.

Volume: it is QUIET. There is only a slight whir. The only time we notice it is running is if it goes over a tall patch of grass and we hear little clipping noises from the razors hitting the grass. Also, every so many minutes it stops and beeps as it re-verifies the wire signal. I originally thought it was changing blade spin direction but wear analysis shows that manually flipping the blades every so often is still required.

Ease of use: Excellent, if you adjust your boundary correctly and don't put giant, complex obstacles in front of it like I did. I didn't even bother making boundaries around trees or the satellite dish like the instructions said; I just made a big box around the yard, and made sure there was about 2-3' of clearance between objects for the mower to go through. If the obstacle is near the fence, less than 2' might still work with a very precise cable installation.

For the first few days after installation, make sure you can watch it to correct any issues with boundary or obstacles, and then you should be able to mostly forget about it.

I don't know if this is normal, but it returns to base after about an hour (~50% charge). From what I've read, you need to set your schedule to allow for a charge and return (e.g. 5 hours for 2 hours of working + 3 hour charge).

Overall: Highly recommended, especially for small, flat lawns without high obstacles to drive over. Be careful of smooth obstacles it has to drive over, even if they are not very high. Would be five stars if the tread on the tires was changed to allow it to grip better on hard surfaces.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

ZapD

I for one welcome our robot underlings.

Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2018

Style: Landroid onlyVerified Purchase

The media could not be loaded.

I have this little Landroid mowing 1/3 of an acre of nothing but grass. My lawn is level with only a septic system as an obstacle, so it was idea for a little robot to mow. However, it even handles a few foot deep recesses in the yard without issue.

First off, this isn't a "power mower". So many people expect a robot mower to be like their traditional power mower. No, instead it is more like a robotic goat: Eating away a little bit of lawn with each pass, eventually getting the whole thing. But in just a few days it catches everything, and you don't have to worry about any high spots.

Installation:
Why didn't I install it earlier! I bought this on Black Friday, and waited for six months before installing it. Mowing my yard every two weeks, which was a chore each time due to the fast growing grass. I kept telling myself that installing the mower would take all day. In the end, it took as long to install as a single session of mowing.

I installed the charger base right next to my porch, with about one foot behind it to the wall of the house. This is similar to how it is shown in the install video. Ignore the "6ft" on both sides in the instructions. You need only about 4 to 6 feet of wire in front of the charger for it to dock properly.

The perimeter of the area I was installing is 400ft long. There was more than enough wire and stakes to do that entire space, including surrounding a few obstacles. The included wire is very tough, and held up to lots of adjustments and tugging as I went along.
Tip: Don't put the perimeter wire at the bottom of a slope, ensure it is flat on both sides, or the Landroid goes quite slow as it has to keep moving back to the wire if it rolls down the slope.

Two week review:
The lawn has never looked better. It's April here in Texas, and everything including the lawn is growing very fast. Typically I have to move every week during this time of year. But the Landroid is taking care of it for me. There isn't a missed spot in the whole lawn that I can find.

It is very quiet. The noise level isn't even an annoyance when the mower is right near you. It is about a quiet as a running fridge. The sound of it hitting some taller grass it louder than the motors.

It moves quite slowly. While trimming the edges of the yard, I can beat it around the whole perimeter. It handles downward slopes, and dips well. My dogs also are not bothered by it at all. I don't mind it working slowly, as it works all day. I have it set to run 6 hours a day, 7 days a week. During the past two weeks, I has only gotten stuck twice. Once on a rock I forgot to move, and once when it hit its charger at just the wrong angle, and lifted up a bit. It automatically stops, and is easy to reset.

It has rained twice during this time. Each time it parked itself properly and waited for the rain to stop. It seemed to handle damp grass without any issues.

I will post updates over time, but for now, I am happy with my purchase.
I only wish it could handle the much steeper and complex nature of my front yard.

One Month Review:
The robot has gotten itself stuck a few times more, mostly when moving along loose rock near the boundary edge.The manual specifically does say to not run it on gravel, but I can't help it in some parts of my yard. Each time it just waits for me to notice, move it and then goes on its way.

The boundary wire has broken three times. The first was due to a puppy eating everything it can find. The second was due to the robot actually catching the wire in a spot where I didn't stake it down well enough. The third time seems to be a spot where I had too much tension on the wire in a place where there was also a factory splice in the wire. Just a weak spot I guess. However, repairing the boundary wire only takes a few minutes. Purchase yourself some Solder Seal Electrical Connectors, these are waterproof electrical connectors that you simply put a wire into each side, and heat it using a torch or heatgun. The solder needed is already inside, and the whole things seals up. It makes fixing a broken boundary wire take only a few minutes.

I am still very happy with my Landroid. It just does its job with very little fuss. The yard looks amazing, like it was mowed just yesterday!

One year later review:
It has now been a year since I installed the mower. The mower is still going strong. Other than a safety label peeling off the side, there is little sign of wear. It mows 6 hours a day every day. We did have two months of heavy rain, so I had to re-adjust the boundary wire to cut off a portion of the yard that was a near-swamp.

The boundary wire has broken a few times more, the included stranded wire seems to be spliced lengths at the factory, and brakes at those splice points. I will be replacing it with a solid-core wire with a thick surround. I decided not to bury the wire, it does end up hidden in the grass, but I can still adjust it.

I just found out that Worx has discontinued this mower, so get it while you can.

7 people found this helpful

Helpful

Preston Wiley

Buyer Beware: Boundary Wire Issues

Reviewed in the United States on April 13, 2019

Style: Landroid onlyVerified Purchase

When the lawn mower works, it does a pretty good job at cut my grass and doing things on the schedule that I've told it to use. It isn't great at transitioning between areas so there is some manual intervention in getting it from place to place, but it is straight forward to deal with and not a big issue. The biggest issue that I've had is random issues with the boundary wire installation. If you make a mistake with the installation (which you probably will), you are going to have to splice the wires together, which seems to be the cause of my issues, but I'm not sure. My lawnmower can work correctly for weeks and then have out of boundary issues for weeks. The base LED stays green, which means it thinks everything is connected correctly. There is no easy way, as far as I know, you troubleshoot this issue and working with support didn't help as the issue seemed very random and hard to reproduce. I probably need to redo the entire boundary wire installation to fully solve my problem, but I installed the wire as per the manual instructions.

Be careful when buying this lawnmower as it is an expensive device and is not without its frustrations and maintenance.

Also note, that I have updated my lawnmower to the latest firmware.

Helpful

raphe

has potential, but serious flaws are a nonstarter (updated)

Reviewed in the United States on June 19, 2015

Style: Landroid onlyVerified Purchase

The media could not be loaded.

Final update (8/22/15): I finally convinced tech support to send me a new robot. What's more, they cross shipped it to me, so I was not without a robot during mowing season. I guess my comments about tech support were taken to heart, so that is good. I'm boosting this up to three stars now, reluctantly, to account for the tech support and the fact this new robot does follow the boundary wire and does have a lot better traction, proving the old one has an issue. It does not solve all my problems. This robot will not mow your whole lawn. Over the summer, I've had to slowly cede areas that the robot just can't handle. There were already a few areas like this, but I've had to add more and more area to the manual mow list. Sometimes something as simple as a tiny twig after fallen a rain will completely alter the robot's course over your lawn. It might cause the robot to get stuck where it never previously did get stuck. There are a ton of caveats, but with a lot of work, and a non defective robot like I eventually got, you can get a large part of your lawn mowed. I'm leaving the old review below intact so others can see my trials and tribulations.

UPDATE: sadly, I have to downgrade this review to one star. It simply isn't worth the time and effort. My robot develops problems faster than tech support can fix them. Now the robot simply can't return home. It reproducibly takes a sharp right turn off into the out of bounds area when following the wire home. A setup it has been fine with for weeks is suddenly completely unworkable. At this point, it's very clear this thing is either just plain defective, or they have advertized the robot to be capable of things it simply is not actually capable of. Tech support is VERY leisurely about solving the problem. The only thing they have done thus far is tell me to download new firmware, and I have been talking to them from the first week of owning this thing. They seem unaware that if they get around to solving my problem in December or January, it won't be very helpful for this summer and the mowing I need done right now. Honestly, the tech support I'm getting is seriously minor league. It's about at the level you would expect for a $20 product, or say for an app on android. It's not what you'd expect after spending $1000 on something. Be prepared to buy a conventional mower to finish the job.

Old review:
I really want to like this mower. I want the dream of mowing free weekends to be realized. I'll still need to use the edger, but that will be much easier. Unfortunately, after two weeks with this mower, and without having completed a single mowing cycle successfully in all that time, I can't recommend this mower to anyone in its current state. I have a mildly hilly back yard, where the mower is going to do most of its work. However, the steepest slope that the mower has access to is 17 degrees (measured with an accelerometer and orientation sensor, more gear than the robot has at its disposal). I have to say, the claim that the robot can handle 20 degree slopes easily is just wrong. It can basically barely handle them without falling apart. On the other hand, that's not really a big problem; it can handle slopes on some level, so just set it and forget it right? Unfortunately no. The robot always manages to perform some boneheaded maneuver, such as backing out of its base and then proceeding to just ram back into it three times and call it quits before mowing anything (see attached video for one of these maneuvers, luckily it seems an update fixed it). Or deciding to try and follow the boundary wire around an island on the way back to the charging base. Hello? Buddy? You're going to be driving in circles forever.... Obstacles in my yard are a nonstarter. It approaches them, backs away, and then reapproaches at EXACTLY the same angle of attack, ensuring three perfectly identical bumps followed by a "trapped" or "wheel blocked" error (this is the polar opposite of what the robot should do to actually get around the obstacle). I have been able to reproduce this 100% reliably and easily, so it is obviously a bug. UPDATE: It does seem that the latest update has fixed it.

It also has a very tiny battery. I contacted tech support who told me that it can cover 1/4 acre before needing a charge. UPDATE: After working with the robot a lot, I found that the battery readout is terribly inaccurate. I thought it had only covered about 10% of my lawn with a full battery, but it turns out that it probably had only about half when I set it down, even though the meter read full. Sometimes if I set it to go charge and the battery reads full, once it hits the charger it will start charging with a message that it is 35% full.... So that can lead to some problems if you want to move the robot and you think the battery is full. On the other hand, I tried moving it when I was sure the battery was full, and it was able to cover closer to half of my front yard on one charge. That's better, but it still ought to be able to cover the whole thing based on their specs. I also note that amazon sent me a clearly used robot (visible dirt in the box, scuffs all over robot, it had obviously been cleaned, torn cardboard inserts, used manual with cracked edges, etc.).

My robot came with software version 0.86, it could not drive in straight lines, and it would randomly just freak out and say "not in working area", or "upside down" when neither was the case. By the way, the robot will think it has launched into the air and flipped over if it hits a tiny bump in my lawn. You literally need to have no bumps in your yard....

I downloaded and installed the latest update, v0.92, and it has fixed many of these problems, especially with the robot thinking it's upside down. It can now drive in closer to straight lines (but still in an arced path), and seems to handle the advertised slopes slightly better. I still haven't got a complete cycle out of it, but when I baby sat it tonight it had only a single fault during the first cycle. So, perhaps this weekend, i'll finally see the mower finish a job at least once. Until then, it's a one star device. There's really no excuse for the two weeks of hard labor I've had to put in to get this thing up to working order.

Lastly, I've noted that this thing is really designed for utterly flat, perfectly square shaped, tiny yards, like the European lots it originally was sold for. However, if I have a super easy to mow, <1000 Square foot lawn that is perfect flat with no obstacles, why would I buy a mower like this at all? I could have it done in ten min myself. So, unless this mower can now at least moderately difficult lawns, the places I can easily mow but get tired of, it's essentially not worth the trouble. And let me tell you, it is a LOT of trouble, hard work, and sweat to set up. It's a multi day effort that can drag on for a while as you try to adapt your yard to the mower's finicky behavior. Prepare to play whack a mole with the problem areas, as the mower's inconsistency will you lead to think an area is solved, only for it to fail later.

UPDATE: so, the mower basically has no problems with my front lawn (the much easier to mow area), and it looks like it would take it about 5-6 total trips to cover the entire 3500sq ft. However, since my rear and front yards are not contiguous (I run the boundary wire through a joint in my driveway), I will need to buy a new charging base to allow it to do its front yard duties for half the week The catch is that Worx tells me an extra charging base costs $186.17 with shipping. That's pretty steep, and it worries me that the simple charger with power supply for the boundary wire makes up such a significant portion of the bill of materials. The saga continues to bet it to succeed in the backyard, but at least with the new smarter programming it is no longer pathological; I can work with this. Added one star for the robot's potential in the front, once a new base comes in (Worx still hasn't told me how to actually BUY it though, and I've asked three times...)

2nd UPDATE: since the robot can handle the front seemingly OK, and Worx agreed to give me a slight discount on the 2nd base station, considering the hefty price, I'm happier with the robot. I still haven't received the charging base, but I'm hopeful it'll handle the front without too many issues when left unattended once I get the base. If I could give half stars I would. I can't justify adding a whole star up to three because of all the troubles it took to set this thing up. It still hasn't completed a cycle in my back yard yet, and there are a few drawbacks to mention that are totally independent of the trouble I had setting it up. These are: it doesn't do edges very well (but we all know this), but what comes as a slight surprise is how much of an indention in the grass the robot leaves when it goes around the edges. I get an outline around my yard, which doesn't shock me too much, but some might not be expecting it. The robot is also a bit heavier than I expected; there are places in the yard where it spins its wheel a bit and tears up the grass and dirt sometimes. The wheels in front are nonfunctioning, and can get caught in an errant tree root or even something very simple like a small bump in the yard. This is most obvious when it's trying to turn. When that happens the robot will try for a while to continue turning and will displace some dirt until it has moved its rear to the point that its satisfied that it can move forward. It definitely has traction issues unless the yard is absolutely flat. The way it turns is by spinning its rear wheels in opposite directions. The problem is that for this to work properly it needs ideal conditions: both wheels need perfect traction and neither of the front wheels can meet any resistance. If one rear wheel loses traction for a second it will move forward instead of turning. This can be an issue near a boundary wire. However, this isn't a big problem in my almost-flat front yard.

Over all it has not performed as I would have liked, but it has some potential. Ultimately, I'll keep it, because I know that the other mowing robots are going to have the same problems, but they cost more. Perhaps the $2500 Husqvarna might do better, but I doubt it as the basic design is almost the same: two rear wheels with a dinky office chair caster in front (that is truly what it is). In fact, the Worx design might be better, since it includes two wheels in front which adds a bit of stability. This is not an example of you get what you pay for. The automower market is instead at such an early stage that we are pretty much beta testing, regardless of whichever brand you might consider.

91 people found this helpful

Helpful

RaggedRocks

Saved a lot of money by replacing my lawn service with the Landroid.

Reviewed in the United States on May 30, 2017

Style: Landroid onlyVerified Purchase

Update after 1.5 months of usage:
- Unit continues to work great...able to deal with most small objects which blow or are left on the lawn
- Neighbors think the lawn looks as it good as it did with the lawn service...for a lot less (admittedly the service did trim the lawn, which I now have to do).
- Makes virtually no noise.
- Sufficiently dependable that frankly it has become boring.
- It has freed up enough time to work on other projects around the house.
-------
Original review:
I needed a small lawnmower..the choices were spend $400 for a push behind mower or go crazy and spend $900 for a robotic lawn mower which I did not see how it could work. Of course being technically oriented, I put caution to the wind and went for the robot. My wife laughed that setting up this robot would take all summer and I would end up purchasing the push behind mower anyways. Well, 4 hours after opening the box, the landlord was busily cutting the grass and has not stopped in the last two weeks. Even my wife admitted the lawn looks better than it did when we had the $3,500/year lawn service cutting the lawn. All I have to do now is spend 15 minutes per week trimming around the edge of the lawn. Net savings: $2,600 (for the first year) and 1 hour pushing the lawn mower each week.

The Landroid robotic lawn mower is such a hit that the family has even named it. Of course the landlord is not perfect. Below is a list of pros, cons and lessons learned:
Pros:
- The boundary wire sets up very quickly if you follow the instructions
- The small 28 volt battery does not really affect performance, because the Landroid will automatically return to base
- Because it is designed to run every day there are no clippings to clog the lawn mower shot and then drop off in a back compost pile.
- The Landroid is VERY VERY quiet. You will not even notice it running on the lawn. Much better than my previous lawn service.

Cons:
- If you lay the boundary wire on the lawn secured with pegs, be prepared for line cuts. The documentation does state you will want to bury the line once the positioning is right.
- The ruler provided on the box to measure out the distance between the lawn edge and the boundary wire did not seem very accurate. I spent a lot of 4 hours setting up the unit just moving the wire around.
- There is not a phone nor web app to let you know if the Landroid is running or has gotten stuck. Fortunately, it has only gotten stuck once in the last 2 weeks.
- If you let the lawn get a little long prior to installing the landroid, borrow a neighbor's lawn mower. It really does not like long grass (that was another hour out of the 4 hours total setup time).
- The rain sensor as some have already mentioned in their review does not seem to engage during light rain.

Lessons Learned:
- Have electrical tape ready before you start installing the landroid
- If setting up the Landroid over the weekend, know that the standard program won't start executing until monday and will stop on Friday
- Get the boundary wire as close to the lawn edge as you can to avoid using the lawn trimmer
- The manual says that the boundary wire should be at angles greater than 90 degrees. I have found on my lawn that you can get very tight with the angles as well you have have spaces smaller than 3 feet wide. But of course, following the manual's instructions probably is better idea :).
- Don't worry about bumps in the lawn nor 'small roots' which are lower than the blade height. The large wheels have successfully cleared some obstacles I missed during the setup when I was trying to even out the lawn and make it easier for the Landroid.
- Make certain you have a weatherproof plug and water tight box for the charger. The day after installing the Landroid we had a major rain storm and the Landroid charger tripped the GFCI circuit breaker. A week later had a similar storm after securing the charger and no such problem.

161 people found this helpful

Helpful

Robert

Not very good, seriously

Reviewed in the United States on November 1, 2016

Style: Landroid onlyVerified Purchase

Edit: 9/2/2018
One of the front wheels has broken completely apart, I will be contacting worx to see if they offer this as a replacement part. Earlier this summer it simply stopped working and stating "out of bounds" on the screen. I've been push mowing the last 3 weeks because its less hassle. At this point, plan to only get about 3 years out of this product, so factor that in to your costs. I did get a chuckle when this little thing ran directly towards the bird bath, and kept trying to push.. until all of the water came flying out right on top of it. But back to the wheel, it looks like it rusted out and all of the bearings disintegrated. One of my original complaints was that the "its raining, dont cut" sensor doesnt actually do anything, and Landroid would always be out mowing in the rain. This greatly contributed to its demise I'm sure.

There is also a small wire bundle that connects from the charging area (the outer part that moves around a little bit) to the main part of the unit. This material has crumbled and broken apart and there are now wires exposed outside of the bundle. Doesn't give me a warm and fuzzy.

Also, still no RMA on the broken base unit from further down this review (maybe 2 years ago now?)
---
Often requires being moved back to the base manually, at least 50% of the time. It complains about being out of boundary, or wheel stuck, or some other goofy problem. Also, it runs constantly in the rain. Support said to do a firmware update, but there have been none. The base failed after just over 1 year, and the RMA received from the company is incomplete and missing parts. This is a terrible product, except for during the few times it does work. If you like constantly babysitting stuff, this is the gadget for you.

Company blames customer for communication issues, dropping a star.

120 people found this helpful

Helpful

ped28

Very fun for the technically interested

Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2016

Style: Landroid onlyVerified Purchase

The media could not be loaded.

Background
I like mowing my lawn with a push mower. I purchased this so that I would have more time to fertilize and water the lawn and work on my vegetable garden. My 20 year old son studies robotics and computer science in college; we like technical things, aren’t afraid to try new technologies, and enjoy tinkering with things. I’ve been looking at robotic lawnmowers for several years. Their price drops and improvement in function over the last several years have reached the point where I was willing to try it out. This model was less expensive, yet seemed to do as well or better than other models based on reviews I read. This largely (see “Final Summary” comments) replaced my eGo 56V electric mower, which is an excellent push mower..

Initial Impressions
The mowing unit is very light making it almost toy-like, but it feels sturdy. The charging base and mower were well-packed in their box. It came with 200 or 250 stakes and 580 feet of wire. I needed more wire (100 feet) and stakes (110) to wire the perimeter of my 3500 square foot lawn (which excludes the size of my house on the property).

Setup
The perimeter wire took most of a full day in total to lay down, done in parts over two days. I would have finished it in one day except that I ran out of stakes first and then wire. 100 stakes cost $23 on Amazon and the stakes were better than the ones that came with the mower. I needed 110 extra stakes and 100 feet of wire in addition to what came with the mower. Black wire hides as well or better than the green wire included in the package. I followed the provided directions to the letter when wiring the perimeter wire, figuring I might modify the perimeter later. The directions were clear, with good diagrams. I had seen online videos on YouTube, so I was already familiar with what I was getting myself into.

Working Impressions
I had left some extra wire to work with at both ends of the perimeter and I tucked the wire underneath the charging station as the instructions were unclear about what to do with the extra 3 feet of wire it suggested leaving at both ends. This misled the mower to believe that it was “out of bounds” or the perimeter. I cut the perimeter wire short near the base so that there was little excess wire. That solved this problem. I didn’t bury the wire, but I took the time to make it tight and near the roots of the grass. This has worked well for me so far.

You set the mower to mow a certain size lawn and the mower automatically selects a schedule for you, in my case mowing for two hours per day five days per week. The mower mows relatively randomly, although it follows an algorithm to help it continue up a narrow channel to ensure it reaches all parts of the lawn. The mower takes 10 hours per week to do something that took me at most one and a half. It would be nice if mowing was even less random, then theoretically it could go out less frequently and might leave the grass with the “freshly cut” look.

The mower follows the perimeter line back to the charger when either the battery is low or when it’s done with its day’s work. At first the mower was getting stuck in some areas, particularly where there were tight turns. The instructions showed a picture of rounding out the turns, and so after watching the mower navigate around the perimeter several times (I learned you can push the “plug” button on top of the charger to send it straight to the perimeter so that it will go charge itself), I rounded out the turns in the areas where it was getting stuck and now it reliably gets all the way around the perimeter wire to the charger. I am still tweaking the perimeter to get it more perfectly around our property. 14” between the wire and solid objects is probably more than ones needs. 8-10 inches is probably better for straight areas, although 14 inches might be best for areas where there are curves next to a solid object. Some objects, such as trees can be left inside the perimeter as the mower with merely bounce gently off them.

The mower is very silent and it’s not obtrusive even at close range. I can’t hear it even if I am right inside the house next to where it is working. Members of our household are often pleasantly surprised to see it working when I go outside. You could easily schedule it to run in the middle of the night and no one would know it was there. I’m building a garage to protect it from the elements and to keep it out of sight.

There’s a moisture sensor and the mower seems to stay in its charger when it is raining or wet. This is good since the mower does not seem powerful enough to cut very wet grass, though it seems to have no problem with moist grass.

The quality of the mowing is very good. Since it clips only a small amount of grass at a time and since the pattern is relatively random, you won’t see the satisfying appearance of a recently clipped lawn as you’d with the lawnmower, but the lawn is always neatly trimmed. You’ll be left with some areas around the edges that need to be trimmed with a string trimmer and you’ll have to do the edging as usual.

The mower seems very safe. It immediately stops if it is lifted. I feel safe if it hits me. It is light, runs into things with only a tap, and turns a different way. I have a three year old son and he loves to follow the mower around. I like to supervise his activities with the mower, however being a three year old with a mind of his own, he goes out to play with “his robot”. The only way he can get hurt by it is for him to allow it to run over part of his body, which would be nearly impossible since it turns at the slightest brush with something. Still I would advise caution with pets and children.

People are fascinated by this mower. The neighbors have texted my wife to alert her that my three year old’s toy is running by itself in the yard. I sometimes see bunches of people in my lawn following the mower around the yard. I just wave to them and this does not bother me; others may not have the same reaction. I have often found the mower out of bounds. Sometimes it is likely that someone who was curious picked it up; once that happens it will require you to enter the password to make it work again. I have seen it leave the boundary at times and am working on solving that problem by manipulating the wire. If you have an area that is at the bottom of a hill, you may need to babysit the mower and bring it back in bounds a few times per week.

We often send it out even after it’s been out so that we can watch it run. I have it run sometimes while I work around the yard. I have now had this mower for the whole season and have yet to use my push mower other than for the area between the sidewalk and the street. I've reduced my effort on my lawn from an hour and a half per week to about 15 minutes (for the edging and touch up and bringing the mower back to its base when it gets lost). My neighbors' lawns grow taller during the week and my lawn always looks exactly the same.

Final Summary

Cons:
The perimeter wire is the main downfall of this and mower, as it is with all others with which I am familiar. The wire could somehow get broken by digging or mowing, etc. The wire would have to be moved if we made changes, such as added a patio or deck.
The area between the street and the sidewalk is impractical to include in the perimeter and that needs to be mowed with the push mower.
I don’t get the “perfectly manicured” look that I saw using my push mower.

The mower does not stay within its boundary every time and needs to be monitored.

Pros:
I have more time to spend doing other things such as fertilizing, watering and gardening.

There is some entertainment value in having a robotic lawnmower as well as curious neighbors to watch.

My lawn is always well trimmed.

You would save you money if you are paying someone to mow your lawn, though keep in mind there will still be some maintenance to do, such as edge trimming, fertilizing, and watering.

Final note:
I would recommend this mower to someone who is not afraid to try something new and doesn’t mind the small challenge of placing and maintaining the perimeter wire.

I will provide updates on quality of mowing over time, other findings, and blade changing. I’m not sure where to get blade replacements, though the unit came with 4 sets of blade replacements and I could probably sharpen them as well.

109 people found this helpful

Helpful

PianoLover

An honest installation experiance

Reviewed in the United States on May 21, 2018

Style: Landroid onlyVerified Purchase

My gas powered mower quit on me, and I immediately started searching for an electric mower. I came across the landroid and started doing some research. I am still amazed that I was unaware how long these robotic mowers have been in service and how good the reviews are. I ordered one without too much hesitation.

My property is a flat common rectangular lot in that is approx. 1/4 acre. My house is mostly rectangular that is pretty much centered on the lot. I have some large gardens and trees, a double concrete driveway and concrete walkway in the front. I did download the install guide prior to purchasing the landroid to learn as much as I could. I did some preliminary measuring and layout. I have some narrow paths that are less than the three foot wide minimum requirements. This would require the landroid to have to cross concrete. I found out that this is not really a difficult problem.

My typical suburban lot became an exercise of trial and error that I would tackle in phases. This would allow me to do some troubleshooting - do some learning - then expand to the entire property.

First phase install time: Approx. six hours.
Landroid: $916
Additional material: 3” Stake kit $10.99

Phase 1: Locate and install the docking station and run the perimeter wire around the two side yards and the entire backyard. Then test and evaluate. The location of the docking station turned out to be an easy decision because I only had one available spot with the required distances and electrical outlet that was in the vicinity. However this location was visible to the street. Would someone want to steal my Landroid? The docking station install was super easy. I took the advice of other Amazon reviews and followed the instructions when I laid my wire out. I started in the afternoon and laid the wire out and pegged directly on top of the ground. I did not want to bury the wire until I could prove that the Landroid worked. The next day I started out early and decided I would bury that portion using the trimmer method (trim a groove, bury the wire with a half inch of soil). I had enough wire for my loop, but not enough pegs? I had taken the time to measure and check the supplied wire to make sure I had enough. I just assumed that the peg quantity would match the supplied wire lengths. I had to order more pegs from the manufacturer. This delayed my install for about a week. I would advise any purchasers to download the install guide, estimate the wire lengths and pegs required so you can do the install in one shot. Once I got the pegs, the first phase went without a hitch. I fired up the landroid and it ran perfectly - never getting stuck or any other problems. I did have a few roots that I assumed would be trouble. I began to monitor the Landroid on it’s operation to see if there was additional work required. I started noticing that the Landroid would spend most of it’s time on my sixteen foot wide side yard. I solved this problem by segregating this area by looping the wire in such a way to create a barrier for the landroid (to keep it out of the side yard). I then used the zone feature to allow it into this area. This seemed to solve this problem.

Second Phase install time: Approx. eight hours.
Additional Material: Concrete saw blade (2) @ $30 total
Wire $48 (300 ft) total
Heat Shrink Tubing $9 total
Slab sealant 6 tubes $45 total
Filler rope $12 total
3” Stake kit $10.99

Phase 2: Install third zone (Remaining front yard of house). Step one was to figure out how to get Landroid to cross the concrete drive so that it could mow the front yard. I was going to use the existing expansion joints in the driveway, but then I thought it seemed like a waste to have my Landroid “mowing a large area of concrete”. I learned I could cut a 1/4” x 3/8” deep trench with a normal circular saw. I bought a concrete blade and searched Amazon for sealer. So I used an existing joint and cut a trench that was the three foot wide path that Landroid requires. I started laying out the wire and learned that I was short. I ended up buying 18 ga. wire from the local hardware store, but I was again short on the pegs. I ordered up some more pegs which delayed my install another week. I was starting to introduce splices into my wiring. My splices consist of soldering twisted wires and heat shrinking. I don’t know the reliability, but it’s working. I also have a five foot concrete path, so I performed the same modifications that I used on the driveway. When phase two was complete, I spliced into phase one.

Troubleshooting and experimenting: The Landroid quickly gets boring to watch - so I just let it run; however your neighbors will be amazed. Your neighbors will come and ask questions; the Landroid will put smiles on peoples faces. Problems: I started experiencing the Landroid running into the street. It wouldn’t happen everyday, but this was not going to be acceptable. Reliability is a must. I travel a lot and do not want a lawn service. So reliability is extremely important. The landroid must operate and return - I won't be around to rescue it if it gets stuck. My goal is to get it to run 30 days without getting stuck. Anyway, the Landroid would randomly end up in the street every few days. My lawn curves down to the street. This curve takes place at about 24” from the street curb. But it is also less than the maximum yard slope of the landroid. I first tried shifting the wire two additional inches from the street which did not work.

Third phase install time: Approx six hours
Additional Material: Soil fifteen bags $30 total
Ground stakes $12
6” high fence boards $30 total
Phase 3: Reslope entire front edge of lawn near the street. This was not a fun job. I had to cut lawn into sod, add soil and place sod back down. Did I say this was not a fun job? Although I am back into the testing phase, I think that this will be the last modification required for the install.

Add on items related to the landroid:

Since I do not have a fence, my landroid would be visible. To prevent theft, I built a Landroid house disguised as a planter (see photo). I also installed a IR beam that is hooked up to a raspberry pi (see photos). The pi emails me whenever the landroid leaves and returns to the dock. This info is useful for many reasons. It lets me know if it ran - or didn't. It lets me know how long the mower will run on a charge, and how long it takes to charge. If it is stolen, the pi will let me know when it was taken. I also have an outdoor security camera that is monitoring it.

The house also doubles as protection from the sun and rain.

9 people found this helpful

Helpful

5 star
4 star
3 star
2 star
1 star

WORX WG794 Landroid M Cordless Robotic Lawn Mower with Rain Sensor...

›

Customer reviews

Customer reviews

WORX WG794 Landroid M Cordless Robotic Lawn Mower with Rain Sensor & Safety Shut-Off

Top positive review

Top critical review

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

From the United States

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

Questions? Get fast answers from reviewers

WORX WG794 Landroid M Cordless Robotic Lawn Mower with Rain Sensor... › Customer reviews

Customer reviews

WORX WG794 Landroid M Cordless Robotic Lawn Mower with Rain Sensor & Safety Shut-Off

Top positive review

Top critical review

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

From the United States

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

There was a problem loading comments right now. Please try again later.

Questions? Get fast answers from reviewers

WORX WG794 Landroid M Cordless Robotic Lawn Mower with Rain Sensor...

›

Customer reviews