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From laminate to tiles, say hello to sparkling floors with the GHI's top mops Mop And Bucket Floor Cleaning System
Cleaning hard floors can be tedious, but the best mops have been designed with ease and efficiency in mind. Most use microfibre cloths that pick up and grip onto a lot of dirt, meaning you can get the job done faster.
Some are self-wringing, others are designed for both wet and dry mopping, and many have telescopic handles that can be extended or shortened to suit your height. Spray mops, which do away with the need for a bucket, are another great option that can help make a mundane task simpler.
If you want squeaky clean floors on any budget, we've tested and selected the best mops available to shop now:
The GHI team put a range of mops through their paces across vinyl, ceramic tiles and wood laminate. Our rigorous testers dirtied each floor with mud, tea and cooking oil and left the stains to set.
They then recorded how many sweeps each mop took to clean the floor fully. They also judged how comfortable each one was to hold and manoeuvre.
This mop comes with a bucket that has a built-in spin system designed to wring out water more efficiently. It's a really handy feature, although we found the splash covering around the top of the bucket a little tricky to remove when trying to empty it.
The microfibre mop head cleans up all dirt with two speedy swipes though, and the telescopic handle means you can adjust it to suit your height. The mop head struggled to clean corners and grouting on test due its round shape, but it's machine washable and our floors were dry just 11 minutes after cleaning, making it a top all-rounder.
This flat mop is made for sprucing up hallways and kitchens. Its large head makes quick work of big spaces and is flexible enough to clean under appliances or furniture.
It performed particularly well on vinyl and the cleaning cloths are attached with Velcro, meaning they can be easily removed for machine washing. It’s also lightweight to use with an extendable handle to save you from back ache.
Simply a scaled-down version of the previous mop, this miniature model is perfect for bathrooms as it's nifty enough to reach into awkward spaces. It’s compact in design and really easy to store, making it a top choice for smaller homes.
Like its big brother, it fared fantastically on vinyl. However, it tends to redeposit a small amount of dirt and it struggled to clean grouting thoroughly.
This flat mop’s innovative accompanying bucket wrings out enough water to make it suitable for use on wooden flooring. It left our tiles almost spotless and lifted all dried mud from laminate, both with minimal effort. On vinyl, it cut through most grease but struggled against some stubborn stains.
Its pivoted head proved easy to control and made tackling awkward areas easier. The microfibre cloth can be removed and washed without getting your hands dirty, earning it further ease of use points, but note that the non-adjustable handle is on the long side.
This mop was a fast mover in small spaces, comfortable to use and effective at reaching tight or awkward corners. The mop head edges flip up too, so you can clean skirting boards, while the flat design fits neatly under appliances.
The wringing system let it down somewhat – we found that it didn’t remove as much water as we’d like and the floor took almost half an hour to dry as a result. And if you deal with muddy paw prints, you might want to look for an alternative, as the mop became saturated with dirt quickly. For more lightly soiled surfaces though, it’s ideal.
If you’re after a fuss-free, wallet-friendly mop that’ll do a decent job, consider this flat Flash. It doesn't feel the most sturdy, and you can’t adjust its handle, but its head pivots into tight spaces and its recyclable, scrub-tipped cloths proved straightforward to fit and remove. They were also fantastic at grabbing and trapping dirt, which made for a satisfyingly speedy cleaning session.
In action, it fared well on tiles but the grouting called for a bit of extra scrubbing and collected some excess soap. It didn’t glide as easily on vinyl as it did on laminate, but it cleaned both to near perfection.
If it's versatility you're after, this spray mop's easily manoeuvrable head features a slide-out scrubber for more focused cleaning on tough stains.
It gave an excellent performance on vinyl but redeposited dirt on laminate. The spray bottle was a doddle to fill but our fingers got caught between the trigger and the handle if they slipped forwards during use. Ouch!
This flat mop's circular-shaped scrubber head cleverly folds up so it can easily sweep along skirting boards and into tricky corners. Plus, the centrifugal spinner means there’s no need to bend down.
Unfortunately, it struggled on heavily soiled floors and the head clogged up quite quickly, meaning it needed regular rinsing. Luckily, the head is machine washable, so it's very easy to clean.
There’s no denying this is a serious investment, but if it’s a powerful spray mop you’re after, it’s worth the hefty price tag. Unlike the other mops featured, it has the power of electricity behind it, thanks to not one, but two, rotating microfibre mop heads that seamlessly pick up dirt as they go – we were particularly impressed with its performance on vinyl and linoleum flooring.
It didn’t perform quite as faultlessly on hardened mud stains, but it did clean up lighter stains in as little as two sweeps. Plus, it’s cordless so you can enjoy that mopping power without any plug woes.
This slim, battery-powered spray mop nips easily into all those hard to reach places, from around the bin to down the side of the fridge. It took seconds to assemble, with the included recyclable pads proving easy to attach, but the average-length handle sadly isn’t telescopic.
Performance-wise, it impressed us the most when cleaning ceramic tiles, quickly lifting grime out of grouting without the need to scrub. It glided well across vinyl and laminate, leaving it shiny and streak-free in only a few sweeps, although a little bit of dirty residue escaped its grasp.
Given its bargain price, we were surprised by how smoothly this spray mop swivelled and glided across everything from wood laminate to tiles. It cleaned the latter best, removing every speck of dirt, and it left vinyl completely grease-free. It took a few sweeps to leave laminate clean and free of smears, but we were pleased with our gleaming finish.
It has a big spray bottle, meaning fewer refills when cleaning large areas, but it did leak a little and sometimes failed to spray. The handle is a good length, but it can’t be tweaked if you want it longer or shorter. Overall, however, it ticked all our key boxes for under £20.
This spray mop is a breeze to use, thanks to a wide swivel head that glides smoothly and can be quickly disassembled for compact storage.
It cleaned all surfaces brilliantly, but while our floors dried quickly, there were some smear marks left behind that needed rubbing away. Our other small gripe was that the trigger started sticking after only a few sprays.
This mop happily comes with plenty of cleaning solution, which helped it produce first-class results across all types of flooring. Its flat microfibre head glides quickly and smoothly and emerges looking good-as-new after a spin in the washing machine.
However, this spray mop proved stiff to put together, and a more adjustable, comfortable handle wouldn't have gone amiss for the price.
If you’re concerned that a spray mop may be fiddly to use, think again; simply fill this Beldray’s 300ml tank, attach it to the handle and squeeze the trigger for blissfully bucket-free cleaning. Changing the two reusable heads was a doddle, and we like that it’s been treated with anti-bac protection to keep bacteria build-up at bay.
It could have been easier to manoeuvre, but it cleaned all our floors well. It left tiles shining, though we had to scrub the grouting a little ourselves, and it picked most dirt off vinyl and laminate, albeit it after a few takes.
This smartly designed mop’s telescopic handle ensures comfortable cleaning for people of all heights. Its sponge head scrubs and dries floors at the same time and there’s a wringing lever for removing excess water.
It gave us gleaming tiled, vinyl and laminate floors, and pet owners will be relieved to hear that it proved particularly effective at picking up hair. Our only complaint is that the head isn’t machine washable.
This sponge mop claims to absorb up to 400ml of liquid, with integrated rollers designed for fast, hands-free wringing. Despite this, it made our floors quite wet, but it did remove most dirt without scrubbing.
It lifted oil from vinyl in only two sweeps, making it our new go-to for mopping up spills, and it banished mud from laminate as if by magic. It moved stiffly on tiles, meaning we had to push with some force, but it left our grouting looking pleasingly fresh. Though not the smoothest operator, it’s intuitive to use and joyfully compact for storage.
This sponge mop is sleek and innovative by design, with a handy “kickstand” mechanism that means it can be folded flat and propped up during use to ensure even and speedy drying. We enjoyed great results on wood laminate and vinyl flooring but the wringer didn't remove enough water.
Its performance on grouting was notably lacklustre but we liked the comfortable feel of the non-slip handle. It's just a shame it's not telescopic to suit all statures.
Blossom is our Senior Homes Tester. Passionate about finding the best home products and appliances for our readers, she has tested everything from blenders to pizza ovens. Blossom enjoys delving into the intricacies of products and refining testing protocols for hundreds of items. Innovative items like robot vacuum cleaners and wine coolers are among her favourite tests to date, and her most notable accomplishment is toasting 360 slices of bread in a determined bid to find the best toaster. In her free time, Blossom openly admits to being a music geek and indulges her creative side through crocheting, baking, singing and writing.
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