You may believe that a regular mop does a good enough job cleaning your floors — but a good steam mop will change your mind. Instead of covering your floors in water, they blast them with a flood of hot steam that loosens up all the dirt and grime invisible to the naked eye, revealing how surreptitiously dirty your floors really are. While we’ve written about plenty of cleaning products before, including vacuums, robot vacuums, mop slippers, and even a giant lint roller for pet hair, we haven’t always taken mops and steam mops as seriously. Here we’ve collected a list of the very best steam mops, as praised by the most enthusiastic reviewers on Amazon.
Best-rated steam mop
Reviewers of the Bissell 1940 PowerFresh mop repeatedly praise its ability to handle the most stubborn stains and messes, even ten-year-old dirt-caked grout, according to one reviewer: “When I was deciding whether or not to purchase this mop, I had one concern: Can or will it effectively clean our 10-year-old grout? It cleaned my grout! Granted I used the little scrubber brush on the back of the unit (which I do wish were a little longer), but I carefully pressed on it with my foot so it would ‘scrub’ and reach down in the gap, and in two minutes’ time the floor went from black to nearly new clean.” Another reviewer claims this Bissell steam mop is effective because it gets terrifyingly hot but warns that “when using your foot to press down on the scrubber, be careful! The steam can burn your toes (yes, it gets that hot — which is good!)” It also easily cleans other pesky messes like pet hair and litter. Another user adds, “We have five cats — yes, five cats — and this mop has cleaned up their hair and the litter that sticks to floors outside the litter box like a plague. It cleaned that up! I KNOW, CRAZY!”
Best-rated (less expensive) steam mop
Many reviewers of the Shark Steam Pocket Mop claim it did a better job at lifting dirt and grime than professional cleaning services they’ve used. One reviewer writes, “No disrespect to the cleaning service, because they did their best, but this mop pulled up the ground-in dirt and grime that a traditional mop couldn’t hope to touch. The bright white mop cover came up dark brown after just one pass!” Others who need to clean large areas appreciate the Shark’s powerful steam function. One notes, “I bought it because we were housing some friends during Hurricane Irma who had dogs, and literally EVERY square inch of floor had to be cleaned. Too big a job for the ol’ knees, you know?” The Shark Steam mop gave another reviewer “OCD-perfect results” and sanitized the floors “without the use of toxic chemicals.” Others love the mop’s 25-foot power cord, which means, as one reviewer describes, “no stopping midway to find another outlet. I cleaned my galley-style kitchen (approximately 18 feet long) and small dining area with only one refill of the water tank and only used one of the large pads.”
Best heavy-duty steam mop
Reviewers say this Bissell Power Steamer mop is a heavy-duty powerhouse capable of tackling even the toughest stains. “This product definitely means business,” writes one reviewer. “It heats up great and will clean my whole kitchen and dining area in one go.” Multiple reviewers go so far as to call the mop “a beast,” with one writing, “I have white matte tile floors in my kitchen with two 8-year-olds and a dog. They get gross. This thing got it all and leaves no streaks.” The steamer also comes with plenty of different handheld attachments, which means that you can attack any manner of surfaces and leave them sparkling: “This thing took the dirt and grease and grime of everything. Microwave, spotless. Stove top, spotless, oven, spotless. Refrigerator, spotless,” says one satisfied reviewer. “I love, love, love this little machine. Good work Bissell.”
Best multipurpose steam mop
Floors, furniture, windows, carpets — this Light ’n’ Easy steam mop handles it all with ease thanks to its various attachments, such as a squeegee and a bristle scrub brush. “I tried it out on our kitchen floor (natural slate), then on the hardwoods, and then in the master bath,” one reviewer writes. “GAME. CHANGER. It comes with useful tools, great mop or handheld options, fast heat up, multiple steam settings … HOW DID I NOT KNOW THESE THINGS EXISTED??” Another reviewer calls it “the most versatile cleaner I’ve ever had!” and loves how it leaves “no residue or streaks” and how once you’ve used it “the floor actually feels clean.” It works so well for floors, in fact, that they say they “use it to sanitize toys, furniture and countertops.” A third reviewer first used this mop on their tiled kitchen floor, then their living-room hardwood floors, with great success. “Both are spotless now!” They then tried it on the rug, which was “getting funky” due to their two dogs. To their delight, “It got rid of the dog smell. I’ve tried Febreeze, a carpet cleaner, carpet freshener, nothing has even come close to what this thing does … Man this thing delivers.”
Best all-in-one steam mop and vacuum
“I used to ‘mop’ on my hands and knees and rinse the rag between sections because traditional mopping smears the dirty water around the floor rather than removing the filth like elbow grease does,” writes one meticulous reviewer, who adds, “This machine sucks the dirty water off the floor and out of the cleaning brush as you go … It definitely saves you physical effort; it’s as easy as a thorough vacuuming. And it cleans WELL. Dare I say better than hands-and-knees cleaning section by section.” As another reviewer notes, “I have 2 small children who are ALWAYS spilling milk, water, juice, food, snacks, and more. We have oil splatter from frying, coffee grounds, and 3 shorthair dogs that all shed (even though you wouldn’t think they shed this much, they DO). But one pass with the CrossWave and these nasty spots and my floors are as clean as when they were first installed.” Reviewers also like that they no longer have to sweep before mopping their floors, because of the CrossWave’s wet-dry vacuum design. As one person writes, “I purposely did not vacuum, dust, or sweep floors from the day I ordered it. I was SHOCKED when I finished and cleaned out the dirt-collection cup. Thought I kept a truly clean house! This little machine even picks up the driveway grit from the scatter rugs by our doors.”
Best all-in-one steam mop and vacuum for pets
Reviewers attest that pet messes don’t stand a chance against this steam mop, largely because it’s also a vacuum. One reviewer who owns 15 dogs says they didn’t initially expect much from the combo device, but was pleasantly surprised by how powerfully it cleaned their floors. “It sucked up all the hair … [and left] the tile just shining!” One reviewer says that “if you have hard floors but don’t have a Symphony steam mop, your floors aren’t clean.” They have “dogs that love to dig” and track “lots and lots of mud” in the house. But after just one pass with the steam mop, you wouldn’t know: “No streaks. No smears. No mess. Just clean floor.” And this mop works magic on animal “accidents” as well — another reviewer who owns a cat with “kidney/bladder issues” bought it to see if it “could help get [rid of] old cat urine from our concrete basement [floors].” They say that “after a single use the smell and staining improved by about 80 percent. After seeing how much improvement happened after just one use I can’t wait to see how the floors look after I do this a few times.”
Best steam mop with detachable scrub brush
The Bissell 1806C Powerfresh Deluxe has a removable mop head and steam brush that reviewers recommend for lifting stains that might otherwise require some additional elbow grease. As one reviewer who purchased this Bissell for a cleaning job writes, “One of the nicest features is the brush, which is very handy for cleaning grout.” This reviewer estimates that “the original brush shows a little wear after cleaning about 1,600 linear feet of grout, with about 15 strokes per foot. (No guarantee against tendinitis of the elbow after doing this kind of work, though)” but notes that “replacement brushes are available from Bissell and are inexpensive.” Another person — who “used the scrub brush with the hot steam to easily scrub off dried orange hard-water residue that lined the bottom outside of the shower door” — remarks that without the brush, they “would have had to use a knife to loosen up hard residue” in addition to doing “lots of hand scrubbing.”
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