Dyson’s AR app will help you never miss a spot when cleaning – but there’s a catch

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We’ve all been there. We think we’ve finished vacuuming, put everything away, and then later discover dirt in patches of our carpet that we’ve forgotten to drag our vacuum cleaner over – but what if it didn’t have to be like this? What if you could know exactly where you had and hadn’t cleaned in your home to help you make it spotless every time?

That’s where Dyson’s new creation comes in: the Dyson CleanTrace – which is scheduled to launch in June this year. This AR tool allows your phone – provided it has a LiDAR scanner – to track your vacuum as you clean. Everywhere that your Dyson vacuum has passed over will be mapped in purple, while uncleaned sections of your floor will be left blank.

It takes inspiration from the tech used by Dyson’s 360 Vis Nav robot vacuum cleaner – which recently arrived in the US – and as pointed out by Dyson, this tool will not only help you give more attention to those often forgotten recesses of your living space but should also save you time as you won’t go back over sections that you can see have been vacuumed already.

What’s more, because holding a phone up while you clean would be a challenge Dyson will also be releasing a Dyson CleanTrace phone clamp that’ll hold it in place for you. Unfortunately, Dyson hasn’t yet said how much the clamp or the Dyson CleanTrace service will cost, but with it launching in only a couple of months we shouldn’t have long to wait before we know this vital information.

Only one Dyson vacuum supports the AR tool…

(Image credit: Dyson)

This AR cleaning tool looks a lot like a demo shared on Reddit by developer u/push_matrix, and when it popped up we and many in the various subreddits where the clip was shared had the same reaction: this look super helpful. So it’s pretty exciting that Dyson has managed to bring a version of it to life in a form that seems more accessible – chiefly by swapping a mixed-reality headset that’s used in the Reddit version for a smartphone.

There is just one fairly big catch: Dyson’s CleanTrace AR cleaning tool only works with a Dyson Gen5detect – one of Dyson’s most expensive models (though as we point out in our Dyson Gen5detect review it is impressive).

This is a shame as we’d love it if it could be used by other Dysons that populate our best cordless vacuum guide like the Dyson V15 Detect Absolute or more affordable options. Right now though it’s unclear when or even if CleanTrace will be expanded to other Dyson vacuums – though we seriously hope it will be.

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