Verdict

Pros

• Powerful cleaning on most surfaces
• Light and manoevrable
• Suprisingly good on pet hair
• Easy to empty
• Spare filter included

Cons

• Average on hard floors
• Some awkward design
• Very small dusting brush
• Short cable limits reach
• Poor energy and dust filter ratings

What is the Zanussi ZAN7620EL?

We all love a bargain and while the compact Zanussi ZAN7620L ErgoEasy bagless cleaner has a three figure recommended retail price, it is widely available for just £70 or £80. Its powerful motor nudges the EU’s 1600W limit, the 2-litre dustbin should last a while between empties, and it weighs just 4.9kg.

On the downside, it has a poor F energy rating and only an E rating for dust filtration, although this isn’t uncommon among very cheap vacuum cleaners. Can it do enough to make up for these weaknesses? We’ll see.

Zanussi ZAN7620EL – Design & Accessories

Not a cleaner to hide its assets, the Zanussi ErgoEasy mixes dramatic white, grey and yellow colours with bold legends advertising its easy emptying bin, cyclonic action and washable main filter.  The big yellow power button and cable rewind switch are foot operated, and between the two is a notched power dial that is very easy to turn by hand.

Two large rear wheels promise easy rolling and a central trolley wheel on the underside allow it to follow a tug from the hose like a bloodhound. The cleaner can be used flat to the ground or upright resting on its back, with handles top and front, and has slots to park the floor head and tube for both positions.

The main bin simply lifts out on its own handle. The top section and main filter come apart from the bin, making it very easy to empty and clean out. The cylindrical filter is protected from the worst debris by a nylon gauze, but can be unclipped for washing when it gets grubby. There is even a little brush attached to the side of the bin to help you remove larger debris from the filter’s folds.

As the filter takes about 24 hours to dry, Zanussi has thoughtfully supplied a second filter in the box to use while the other is drying. A post-motor exhaust filter on the back of the machine handles the finest of dust particles and this too can be unclipped and removed for washing. It only gets an E rating from the EU for filtration, so it only offers basic filtering.

The multi-purpose floor head is basic yet has a tilt and pivoting action with large rollers. A foot switch drops down nylon bristles for use on hard floors. It’s not weighty, but feels robust enough. This attaches to chromed-plated telescopes metal tubes, which have a solid ratcheting mechanism to adjust height.

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They look the part but are not without their flaws. Even fully extended they are only 75cm long and poor positioning of the clip and telescopic parts means that unclipping and extending the tube is a two-hand job. The plastic handle has a sliding suction release switch in the event that all that power means the floor head gets stuck down.

Two very small detail cleaning tools are supplied, an upholstery tool and combined crevice tool/dust brush. Despite their diminutive scale, neither can be stored on board the cleaner body. The dusting brush is the smallest we have ever seen – not much larger than a toothbrush – and it folds back on the short crevice tool making the nozzle quite chunky and, actually, not much use for crevices.

Come on Zanussi, if you are going to supply tools that can’t be stored on board at least make them big enough to be effective.

Zanussi ZAN7620EL – Cleaning

If you don’t like noisy vacuum cleaners, avoid the Zanussi. We often measured it at over 80 decibels, which is similar to sink waste disposal unit or traffic on a main road. It’s worse on hard floors, such as in our echoey conservatory, though reducing the power does help somewhat.

Thankfully all that noise gets put to good use. At full power, the ZAN7620EL produces prodigious suction that is sure to draw dirt from deep within your carpets or cracks in floorboards. The floor head is simple yet effective and produces very good carpet cleaning right up to the age of the skirting.

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Before
After
The disadvantage of all that suction is that on low pile carpets the floor head sticks down tenaciously, making the action of pulling it back and forth a heavy-handed job. The thumb switch on the handle will certainly be your friend to reduce suction power when things get a bit sticky.

With the nylon bristles dropped down the floor head glides across hard floors easily, even under full power, and comfortably pulled our test debris of oat flakes from tile grouting grooves. However, the front row of bristles tended to push some large particles away and then dumped them back on the backstroke without actually collecting them. This meant several passes were required to clear the hard floor test area and objects like tiny stones were simply pushed around the room.

Before
After

Opinions were a little divided about the general carpet and hard floor cleaning merits of the ZAN7620EL. Jackie rated it fairly highly overall, citing its sheer suction power, great carpet cleaning results and ease of emptying as strong plus – especially when you consider its exceptionally good value asking price.

I, on the other hand, argue that the ridiculously small secondary tools, the noise and the main floor head’s ability to bat debris around hard floors like a croquet mallet counted significantly against it. Ultimately, it depends on what you’re prepared to tolerate given the price.

Zanussi ZAN7620EL – Stair Cleaning

Weighing in at under 5 kg and capable of being stood flat or upright with corresponding handles, the ZAN7620EL should be easy to carry upstairs cleaning as you go. However, its ultimate reach is limited by the very short 4.5 m electrical cable, meaning there is very little danger of getting all the way to the top or the bottom in one sweep.

With a cleaning nozzle only 10 cm across, the upholstery tool is okay for detail cleaning on stairs but it will take a quite a while to do a whole flight. Our tool of choice for stairs was the main floor head attached directly to the curved handle without tubes.

This did a solid job on our carpeted stairs, but the floor head struggled to reach into the corners of turning steps. Here we would normally use the upholstery or crevice tool but, as they were not stored on board, this meant yet another trip downstairs and back up again to finish. Ho hum.

One other small issue we noticed was that when you stop cleaning, some particles and dust will fall back out of the tubes and floor head. Taking the tubes apart revealed that the simple pushover fitment meant that dust and dirt was getting caught at each joint and held there until the vacuum power is turned off or the tubes taken apart. At which point the dirt would drop out onto the floor.

No awards for clever design here then.

Zanussi ZAN7620EL – Pet Hair

As ever with cleaners without a rotating turbo brush, pet hair was always going to be a challenge. However, the Zanussi simply powered its way through the task, cleaning up our test pet hair through brute suction force and the stiff action of pulling the floor head back and forth.

A fair bit of hair got caught around the nylon bristles, but as these are placed relatively close to the vacuum nozzle, plenty got sucked in too. On the main pet hair test this model cleaned in around 17 seconds, which is actually very good for a cleaner without a turbo brush.

Things were equally quite impressive when it came to removing pet hair from dog beds and the sofa. The compact upholstery brush is fine for these smaller areas, has no brushes for hairs to get caught up in and its narrow nozzle concentrates the airflow into really good suction.

This did, of course, mean that you will be frequently using the suction release lever on the handle, but still a great result for a cleaner without any turbo tools. A small turbo tool is available from Zanussi as an optional extra.

Should I buy the Zanussi ZAN7620EL?

The ZAN7620EL is something of a curate’s egg – good in parts. While the annoyingly small tools, silly design flaws in the tubes and short cable make it far from an all-round best buy, its outstanding suction power, ease-of-use and great carpet cleaning make it a proper bargain at its discounted price. While not for everybody this Zanussi could be just the budget bagless for you.

Verdict

It’s cheap, light and powerful, but you have to accept its limitations.

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