Dreame Aero Ultra Steam Review: A Floor Cleaner Suitable For City Living?

We may receive a commission on purchases made from links.

As someone who lives in New York City, where square footage is at a premium and life moves fast, I don't have the space or time for brooms, mops, and bulky vacuums. So when Dreame sent their Aero Ultra Steam Vacuum Mop for a no-strings-attached review, I was excited to test out a product that seems to do it all with what Dreame calls their "Tri-Force" cleaning system. This involves a deep SaunaClean steam feature that reaches 392 degrees to lift dry stains, a ThermoRinse hot water feature that eliminates greasy stains with 194-degree water, and a floral-scented FoamWash that neutralizes 99% of pet odors — all within a slim, 3.88-inch body design.

Unveiled in July 2026, the Aero Ultra Steam is the latest wet-dry vacuum in Dreame's Aero series.  Once fully charged, this cordless unit can provide up to 30 minutes of runtime, but in eco mode, it extends to 100 minutes, providing enough time to clean larger spaces. It is designed to clean hard floors, including sealed wood, and touts 30,000 Pa of suction power — which is on the higher end compared to other vacuums. As a busy New Yorker, what I'm most excited to try out is its self-cleaning capabilities. If there's a chance this can replace some of my cleaning supplies and reduce time spent cleaning, it could be worth the $799.99 investment. But first, let's put it through a few tests to see how it performs. 

I used Dreame's Aero Ultra Steam over the span of four days in a 700-square-foot home I share with my pet. Each day, the unit was fully charged before use and then cleaned at the end of the day once the tests were completed. The vacuum mop was used to clean wooden floors where pet fur, cat litter, dust, and hair tend to build up, as well as old and dry pet food and water stains. 

Tile floor cleaning tests involved dry food, wet cat food, a coffee drink, and ketchup and mustard splatters, and were concluded by feeling the areas and wiping them down with clean paper towels to ensure there was no residue left. Additionally, I used cleaning settings designed to address the type of mess I was cleaning (sticky, greasy, dried-on, etc.), and the tile floor cleaning tests were all repeated to measure performance consistency.

A few weeks ago, when I first heard I would be receiving Dreame's Aero Ultra Steam, I decided to let a few of my cat's smaller food and drink messes sit on the wood floor to see how the unit would handle old, dried-up stains. I filled the clean-water reservoir and set it to the SaunaClean steam mode and waited approximately 30 seconds for the water to heat up. Although it felt a bit heavy at first, the Aero Ultra Steam ran smoothly on the floor and around furniture legs and other obstacles near the dried stains.

It took about four passes, but the device completely eliminated the stains. I found this incredibly impressive because one of the stains, a small, 3/4-inch-wide patch of dried cat food, normally would've required a scrubber or scraper! Another one of the dried spills was a simple water stain that was up against carpet tile, so it gave me the perfect opportunity to see how closely it can clean edges. To my surprise, it really performed edge-to-edge steam cleaning and removed that stain after just two passes. The cleaner did leave behind some light streaks of water, but they dried rapidly and there was no damage to the wood floors. Giddily, I finished up by steam-cleaning the rest of the wood floor areas in the living room and bedroom, leaving them feeling and looking cleaner.

Next, I moved on to wet messes, which I created on the tiled kitchen floor. I set the unit to the ThermoRinse hot water cleaning mode and first tested it on spilt coffee. I was happy to see it cleaned it up with one pass. I proceeded with viscous condiments — ketchup and honey mustard — and in just three passes, the messes and sticky residue were gone, which I verified with a paper towel. When I repeated this test, I increased the volume of ketchup and honey mustard, and there was still some ketchup left after two passes. I took this as an opportunity to try the foam-cleaning mode, using the included proprietary solution designed to deodorize pet messes, and pressed the trigger to spray it from a front nozzle. After completing two passes, I saw that it was clean.

Sheila Kim/Hunker

Since my tabby is a messy eater (who occasionally vomits), I ran the next test with fresh clumps of wet cat food — which drew a look of condemnation from him. I switched to smart mode first to see if it would detect the texture and volume and pick the clumps up accordingly. Unfortunately, it didn't and instead pushed the food across the tile floor. (To be fair, I left the clumps sitting about 1 inch high, which is a very high pile.) Setting the unit to suction mode, however, instantly cleared the cat food on the first pass. Then I switched to the hot water mode and proceeded to wash the area I just swept, getting clean results after two passes.

To make sure the Aero Ultra Steam could vacuum up dry debris just as well, I poured a bit of uncooked rice and dropped five pieces of dried penne onto the kitchen floor. On suction mode, it cleared the rice and pasta on the first pass. However, I found that two penne pieces got stuck behind the roller brush when removing and inspecting the waste tank.

I continued with the cleaning without removing those pieces to see how the unit would fare with stuck debris, and it swept up more uncooked rice effortlessly. I decided to try vacuuming tracked cat litter on the wood floor, and it picked up every single particle without a problem. Before moving on to other cleaning tests, I emptied out the dry contents. Note to cat parents: If you use clumping litter, you should probably do the same and make sure the waste tank is completely dry before vacuuming litter. It's a lot easier to empty out when not dealing with wet clumps!

After repeating a few of the tests and vacuuming other areas where fur, hair, and dust bunnies tend to accumulate, I placed the unit back in the dock to run the self-cleaning and drying process. When it was done, I found one missing piece of penne right by the roller and the other now in the waste tank. (It did one heck of a job sucking other debris up despite those large pieces being lodged in behind the roller!) I also found that the detangling worked, with none of my long salt-and-pepper hairs left wrapped around the roller.

As you'd expect, the dirty-water compartment contained a foul concoction of liquids, cat-food chunks, tomato pulp, hair, and fur. But you're going to face the same horror no matter which wet-dry vacuum product you use. One positive note is that the self-cleaning mode did a smashing job washing the roller brush and removing hair from it. I also found that the hair and fur were captured by the waste tank's inner cage-like compartment, which you lift out of the tank. This made it easy for me to pick off the hair before pouring out the wastewater.

You do have to use the included cleaning brush to reach into deeper nooks and notches of the tank and filter cage. And because the dirty-water tank separates into these two parts, it can get frustrating for germaphobes such as myself. Simply flushing the parts with water doesn't seem to remove anything that's viscous or solid. For example, I tried rinsing out the tomato pulp and wet cat food, then attempted to shake it out to no avail, but the brush completed the job in the end.

Dreame's Aero Ultra Steam is an intuitive product to operate, from setup and charging to filling the water reservoir and cleaning. Everything is controlled via an LED display with two buttons integrated right into the handle. There's also a trigger on the handle for spraying the foam solution. Every time you press a button, there's a voice prompt, so you don't have to remember which icon stands for which function.

I extended a few of the messes underneath furniture and cabinetry toe kicks to see how the unit handled those, and it did so with ease: The body can be reclined back all the way to the floor and it can pivot at different angles from the head, while the head's 4-inch-tall height allows it to fit underneath most toe-kicks and certain furniture pieces. Finally, I did feel that the unit was a bit heavy and cumbersome to lift, which could pose a problem to those with stairs, but moving it across the floor on its wheels is easy.

From my experience, Dreame's Aero Ultra Steam vacuum mop is a solid cleaner that does what it says well and can easily replace a mop and bucket as well as some other cleaning supplies, but it's also pricier than similar products on the market right now at $799.99. However, if performance and versatility are important to you, then this is a serious contender.

What I personally like about the Aero Ultra Steam is its powerful suction for both wet and dry messes, its ability to remove tough stains without damaging floors, its time- and space-saving potential (if one mode doesn't work, press the function button and another one surely will), and everything it can do with just water for chemical-free living. Those factors are why I think this could be a good investment for families constantly cleaning up after children or pets. This is also a fine tool for deep-cleaning a home, so if that's your thing, this is a product I highly recommend.