Carpeted floors can add luxury and warmth to a home. But, they can be a hassle to keep clean. Between dust, dirt and other messes – sometimes a vacuum cleaner isn’t enough.
With the right carpet cleaner, you can easily eliminate persistent smells and stubborn stains from your carpets.
We’ll explore the best carpet steam cleaner on the market. With our list of the features you should look for, you can find the best cleaner for your carpet needs. Here are our top 8 carpet cleaners.
Our Top Picks
What We Like
- Powerful cleaning system
- Fast drying with Express Mode
- Easy to clean brush roll
What We Don’t Like
- Unit can leak water
It can be hard to find the time for deep cleaning your carpets. But, with this Bissell, the process is a lot quicker!
The Bissell Proheat 2X Revolution carpet cleaning machine takes a lot of the hassle out of cleaning your carpets. It has a MAX clean mode that delivers powerful cleaning to remove deeply embedded dirt in one pass. So you won’t be wasting your time moving your cleaner back and forth on your carpets to get it clean.
The 12 rows of rotating dirt-lift power brushes lift the dirt as you go. That means you don’t have to do any scrubbing or extra vacuuming during your clean. This cleaner does it all at once.
Plus, it has a pre-treater function that targets spots and stains with a stream of concentrated cleaner. So you can easily remove stubborn spots and marks in traffic areas with this carpet stain removal cleaner.
- $258.99 on Amazon
Key specifications
Weight: 17.5 lbs
Tank Capacity: 1 gallon
Carpet Types: Carpet, Upholstery
Usage: Pet hair, Stain
Best Budget
:Hoover PowerDash Pet Compact Carpet Cleaner
What We Like
- Lightweight and easy to transport
- Compact for easy storage
- Antimicrobial pet tool
What We Don’t Like
- Small clean water tank
You don’t have to break the bank to have clean carpets. This powerful pet compact carpet cleaner is a great product if you’re on a small budget.
With HeatForce technology, this Hoover PowerDash cleaner dries your carpets quickly. So you don’t have to spend hours waiting for your soaking wet carpets to dry. You’ll be able to walk on the carpet as soon as you’ve cleaned them!
This pet compact cleaner also has double the cleaning power than a lot of other carpet cleaning machines on the market. So you can enjoy a deeper clean. This is especially great for high-traffic areas. You won’t have to spend hours scrubbing or drying to get your carpets clean!
- $99.99 on Amazon
Key specifications
Weight: 12.5 lbs
Tank Capacity: 0.5 gallons
Carpet Types: Carpet, Area Rugs
Usage: Remove pet messes, Stain
Best For Spot Cleaning
:Bissell 3624 Spot Clean Carpet Cleaner
What We Like
- Multiple cleaning attachments
- Long power cord
- 2-year warranty
What We Don’t Like
- Fragile Hose
This powerful and portable carpet cleaner makes it easy to spot clean as you go. It’s lightweight and compact, so it’s easy to transport around when you need to clean.
It features a powerful spray, scrub, and suction process that gets deep into your carpet to remove stubborn stains.
And the long 5-foot flexible hose makes it easy to clean hard-to-reach areas. So it’s great for cleaning stairs, area rugs, under furniture, or as an upholstery cleaner.
Many reviewers also love the large tank capacity of this portable cleaner. It can hold ¾ gallons of water, so you won’t have to stop for refills in the middle of your clean.
Plus, it comes with an 8-ounce bottle of professional deep carpet cleaning formula. The solution gets deep into the fibers of your carpet to dissolve tough stains. So it’s a great solution to try out with your cleaner without having to purchase an extra product.
- $189.99 on Amazon
Key specifications
Weight: 13 lbs
Voltage: 5.7 amps
Tank Capacity: 96 oz
Carpet Types: Carpet, Upholstery, Area Rugs
Usage: Car interiors and car seats, Pet stains, Stain
Best for Pets
:BISSELL TurboClean PowerBrush Pet
What We Like
- Easy to clean design
- Lightweight and maneuverable
- Easy to store
What We Don’t Like
- Cord hard to stow
Keeping your carpet clean with pets in the house is a big challenge! But this carpet cleaner makes it a lot easier.
It features a powerful turbo clean for deep stains and pet accidents. So you won’t have to spend any time scrubbing on your carpets.
Plus, Bissells oxy formula is specifically designed for removing pet stains and odors. So you can get rid of pet smells or urine odors that have soaked into your carpet.
It also has four-rows of dirt-lifting rotating brushes with powerful suction for removing pet hair and ground in dirt. It’s perfect for cleaning muddy paw-prints if your pet runs inside from the yard.
- $178.49 on Amazon
Key specifications
Weight: 12 lbs
Voltage: 3.4 amps
Tank Capacity: 0.5 gallon
Carpet Types: Carpet, Area Rugs
Usage: Stain, Small messes (pet)
Best Portable
:Bissell Multi-Purpose Portable Carpet Cleaner
What We Like
- Sustainable green cleaning
- Versatile wet/dry vacuum
- Self-cleaning feature
What We Don’t Like
- Very loud operation
This Bissell multi-purpose portable carpet cleaner has a unique look, but it packs a lot of power.
This small, compact machine has an easy-to-carry design. So it’s easy to transport around your home. And the comfortable handle makes it easy to clean upholstered furniture or your car interior.
Plus, with powerful spray and suction, it’s easy to tackle stains effortlessly. And the long flexible hose can help you reach any area of your carpet. So it’s great for any soft surfaces.
It also has two removable tanks. This way you can easily add water and carpet shampoo without making any messes.
- $98.00 on Amazon
Key specifications
Weight: 12 lbs
Voltage: 3 amps
Tank Capacity: 48 ounce
Carpet Types: Carpet, Upholstery, Area Rugs
Usage: Car interiors, Stain
Best for Professionals
:Bissell Big Green Professional Carpet Cleaner
What We Like
- Cleans on forward and back
- Powerful suction
- Long flexible hose
What We Don’t Like
- Large and bulky
For professional-grade cleaning results, this heavy-duty cleaner is the one to use.
Equipped with two large 160-ounce tanks for clean and dirty water, you won’t have to stop for any refilling. Even if you’re cleaning a large area of your flooring.
And it has a 25-foot power cord so you can move around with freedom. You won’t have to worry about unplugging your cleaner as you go. So it’s perfect for cleaning a large room at once!
The large dirt-lifting brushes efficiently lift the dirt as you clean. This means you won’t have to scrub any dirt in high-traffic areas. This heavy-duty green professional carpet cleaner does it all for you.
Plus, with a 5-year warranty, you can trust that the Bissell Big Green Professional won’t let you down. You can have confidence in the quality of this heavy-duty cleaner. And you know you’re covered if anything goes wrong.
- $411.99 on Amazon
Key specifications
Weight: 41 lbs
Voltage: 12 amps
Tank Capacity: 1.75 gallons
Carpet Types: Carpet, Upholstery
Usage: Pet messes, Stain
What to consider when shopping for a carpet cleaner
Types
- Upright carpet cleaners are tall, all-in-one appliances. They’re also known as extractors or carpet shampooers. Because of their tall designs, carpet shampooers are great for cleaning large areas, whole rooms, or wall-to-wall carpeting cleaning.
- A handheld carpet cleaner is a small and portable cleaner that can be easily held while cleaning. They’re easy and convenient to use for quickly spot-cleaning small areas of your carpet, for carpeted stairs, area rugs, car interiors, and as an upholstery cleaner.
- A spray carpet cleaner is a cleaning solution in a bottle. It’s ideal for spot cleaning fibers on carpets, area rugs, upholstery, and runners.
- A steam carpet cleaner is a unit that expels high-pressure steam at a high temperature to remove bacteria, dust mites, and odors from carpets or soft materials. It’s also versatile for use on other surfaces.
Weight
Carpet cleaners are heavy machines. And they’re even heavier when you fill up their tank. Adding a solution or water to the models in our ratings adds 6 to 15 pounds to the weight of the unit.
So the lighter the machine, the easier it is to use. A lightweight unit will be more maneuverable and make the cleaning process a lot easier.
Brushes
Depending on your needs, having a large variety of options regarding your brushes is important.
For instance, pet owners need brushes to get rid of stubborn pet hair. And if you have stairs in your home, small brushes will be handy to clean them.
Tank
Some models only have one tank for both water and the cleaning solution. Whereas others have two separate tanks.
Plus, if your unit has a large tank for water, you’ll be able to clean more of your dirty carpet at once. However, a large water tank can also make the unit heavy and difficult to maneuver.
Advanced Features
Some have advanced features such as an internal heater, or automatic solution mixing tanks.
Some machines also clean automatically as you push. So you don’t have to pull a trigger to dispense the solution or pull back the unit to let the machine suck the dirt in.
FAQ
Carpet cleaners follow a spray, scrub, suction method.
First, they spray a mixture of water and cleaner into the carpet fibers to soften and loosen the dirt.
Then, they scrub the carpet. An upright carpet cleaner has rotating brushes that spin and lift the dirt towards the surface of your carpet. Spot cleaners are similar but don’t have spinning brushes. Instead, you scrub manually using a handheld brush with bristles. This can require some elbow grease.
The last part of the process is suction. Carpet cleaners use vacuum suction to remove the dirty water from your carpet. The dirt is lifted from the carpet with the water, and your carpets are left clean and dirt-free.
Abusively called “steam cleaners”, carpet cleaners don’t use steam at all. They can work with hot water, of course. But don’t use it to produce steam.
Most professionals use the hot extraction method.
Also known as steam cleaning, this method uses hot water at high pressure to reach deep into the carpet fibers to break down and loosen dirt and bacteria.
Then, the hot water is extracted using vacuum suction. As we explained above, dirt is lifted with the water as it is suctioned up.
Yes, all carpet cleaners can remove pet odors. However, some models are more effective at fighting pet odors than others.
Manufacturers recommend properly cleaning your carpets at least 2 times a year. But, under some circumstances, you should clean your carpets more regularly.
- For example, if you have indoor smokers in your home, it’s important to deep clean your carpet every 3 to 6 months.
- If you have children in your home, we recommend cleaning your carpets at least once every six months.
- Lastly, pet owners should deep clean your carpets at least every six months.
Why Trust Thehousewire?
Claire Onidi, writer and editor at TheHouseWire, specializes in reviewing home improvement tools and cleaning solutions. Her expertise isn’t just in identifying carpet cleaning products with high potential; it’s in understanding what makes a product truly beneficial for the user. Claire prioritizes products based on an in-depth analysis of consumer feedback, standout features, cleaning performance and overall value for money, ensuring that their selections meet a high standard of practicality and efficiency.
For her selection, Claire focused on a comprehensive evaluation of market trends, expert opinions, and user testimonials. This approach allows TheHouseWire to cover a wider range of products and provide advice that’s not only trustworthy but also inclusive of the diverse needs and preferences of homeowners.
