Editorial notes last verified: September 2026
The Mijia 1C launched in 2019 as Xiaomi’s budget-level cleaning robot. An
interesting detail: the device wasn’t manufactured by Xiaomi, but by Dreame,
which at the time wasn’t yet known under its own brand. This is one of
Dreame’s early works, the same company behind several flagship models reviewed
on this site today, and it was sold exclusively under the Xiaomi label.
To cut costs, the Mijia 1C used a combination of an upward-facing camera and a
gyroscope instead of LiDAR. That’s still a common approach in today’s
budget robots, but it brings real limitations in practice.
With 2,500 Pa of suction power, it ranks 164th out of
181 models in today’s active catalog. The
brand’s own active catalog didn’t have enough data for a meaningful
comparison, so this measures it against every active model on the site.
Today's active catalog, suction power (Pa)
The picture is even clearer on the noise side: at 72 dBA, it ranks
64th out of 66 models in
today’s active catalog, among the loudest few.
Today's active catalog, noise level in dBA (lower is better)
Highlights from user reviews
- A Reddit user who used the device for five or six years describes almost no
obstacle detection: it trips over chair legs and knocks things over, so they
don’t trust running it while they’re away from home.
- The same user notes that nine times out of ten, manually moving the robot to a
room and asking it to clean only that area failed because it couldn’t find
its position.
- The same user says the brush constantly tangles with hair, making cleaning a
chore, and that the mop function doesn’t provide any real benefit, seeming to
be there just to check a box.
- Another user describes the device suddenly stopping after about three years
due to uneven cell degradation in the battery pack, flashing a red light
indefinitely.
- On the other hand, the same first user notes that running the device with the
community-made Valetudo firmware worked noticeably better than Xiaomi’s own
app, and that gaining root access was relatively easy.
The Mijia 1C lags behind today’s standards in both suction power and noise,
and its camera-and-gyroscope navigation lacks real obstacle detection. But its ability
to keep running for years, and its convertibility with community-made firmware, still
make it a name that draws interest from enthusiasts.
See how robot vacuums have changed since 2016 →