Robot vacuums still struggle with object avoidance, as we learned in our recent lab exclusive, where we discovered that even the best robot vacuums we recommend weren’t capable of avoiding every single object we test against, and even the ones that claim superior avoidance weren’t so good at it. The Narwal Flow 2 is here at CES 2026, and the company’s newest flagship says promises it’ll come with significantly improved and AI-enhanced object avoidance that can even help find your lost valuables. It’s an appealing promise, but it’s one I take with a grain of salt from any robot vacuum manufacturer.
Still, I got to take a look at the Flow 2 and other products in Narwal’s lineup for CES, and there’s a lot to be impressed by beyond just the improved object-avoidance technology, though that will be the standout feature if it works as promised. Here’s some of what stood out to me.
The Flow 2 improves on the previous model with higher temp mopping and a dustbag that's reusable. Ajay Kumar/CNET
Object avoidance and identifying valuables
The Flow 2 comes with Narwal’s NarMind Pro Autonomous System, a new navigation system that features dual 1080p RGB cameras with a 136-degree field of view. It runs the VLM OmmniVision AI Model, which Narwal says enables the Flow 2 to have unlimited object-recognition capability, unlike other robot vacuums that typically have a list of 20-30 objects they’re trained on.
Narwal says that Flow 2 is capable of capturing and interpreting surrounding spatial information in real time. If it can’t identify an object for local processing, it captures an image and sends it to the cloud-based AI model for analysis. Narwal says the combination of on-device processing and cloud-based AI makes it faster and more precise for obstacle recognition and avoidance.
Notably, the company says that it allows the robot to have millimeter-level obstacle avoidance strategies that can be tailored to the obstacle types. There are four different modes, including Pet Care, Baby Care and AI Floor Tag, that let it adapt cleaning to accommodate pets, babies and households. The Pet Care feature supports automatic cleaning of pet zones, finding your pet and even video calling for your pet. (I don’t think my cats would be able to figure this out.)
Narwal says the Flow 2 can even tag valuables and assign it the highest avoidance priority. Ajay Kumar/CNET
The Baby Care mode switches to quiet mode near cribs, sends reminders for lost toys and and avoids areas your baby crawls, though this seems a little counterproductive if you want to keep that area clean, so presumably there’s a way to change that setting. Lastly, the AI Floor Tag is a mode that recognizes valuable items and assigns them the highest avoidance priority, logging them in the app to send you an alert.
On a more practical level for cleaning, the Flow 2 can recognize different types of dirt and adapt the cleaning strategies depending on whether the dirt is wet or dry or heavy or light. It can also decide when the Flow 2 needs to return to the base station to rewash the mop and remop specific areas. These are all fairly useful features, and obstacle avoidance is a fairly tough nut to crack, as I learned in one of our most recent lab stories. As many experts have told me, the problem lies more on the software end than the hardware end, so I’m looking forward to getting the chance to test the Flow 2 at CNET Labs to see if the puzzle has finally been solved.
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