Compare Our Picks
Others We Tested
Photograph: Molly Higgins
Bissell CleanWell Self-Cleaning Litter Box for $399: Cleaning titan Bissell is entering the pet tech game with this new automatic litter box and a cat water fountain I recently tested. The design is similar to many popular models on the market today, with a stand-on-legs build, a backward-rotating globe, front-facing buttons for controlling settings, and a connected app for monitoring usage and waste levels and adjusting settings remotely. Throughout testing, I was generally happy with the product—it cleaned consistently after my cats used it, the app was responsive, and both of my cats adapted easily to the familiar open-top design. However, many people online have complained about litter and urine getting trapped under the globe, as well as litter tracking onto the top of the globe, which adds more frustrating disassembly and cleaning. It worked well during my more than two weeks of testing, but I can’t fully recommend it as a top pick when other users have reported the design flaw. Hopefully, the engineers at Bissell can find a solution soon (and I can retest!).
PetPivot AutoScooper 12 for $140: If your budget is $200, this is so much better than a traditional box. However, I still think the picks above are the cream of the crop. This is the new-and-improved version of the 11 model below. It doesn’t have a connected app, which I don’t love because I like to track my cat’s weight and usage, and I like being able to adjust settings from afar. But if you’re looking for a more hands-off model without much maintenance, a simpler, budget box like this may be a good option.. My main gripe is that my cats kicked out so much litter during use due to the low, open-top design. If you go with this model, be sure to use litter tracking mats or have a vacuum cleaner on standby.
PetPivot Autoscooper 11 for $160: Though it doesn’t have all the bells and whistles of some others on this list, I still liked this PetPivot model. It has an open-top design that remains fully open throughout the cleaning cycle and has sensors to know when the cat has used the box and when or if the cat reenters during the cleaning cycle. Like most others, it spins dirty litter from clean using grates, and the dirty litter is deposited in a drawer below the box. The litter box is the smallest and lightest I’ve tested, and the only assembly required was popping on the legs and inserting the drawer (and putting a waste bag liner in). There’s no app required for use, and functions can be controlled by three buttons on the box—clean, refill litter, and power on/off. When you want to completely empty the litter, you attach a plastic cover that pops on to scoot all of the litter into the drawer below. Since this has no app, you won’t be able to closely monitor your cats’ usage or get alerted when the drawer is full, so this requires more check-ins than other WIRED-tested automatic boxes on this list.
Photograph: Louryn Strampe
Homerunpet Self-Cleaning Litter Box CS106 for $773: This model is huge, with a 106-liter capacity (and holds 8 liters of litter, plus a 4.5-liter reservoir), making it ideal for big, chonky cats weighing up to 20 pounds (or multiple-cat households). My cat gets claustrophobic in most domed boxes, and she used this one right away. I like that it dumps and refills its own litter, and that it has anti-pinch sensors and two escape routes that are always open. There’s a drawer for storing the waste bags that line the poop drawer, as well as underneath the box, so you can dump all the litter at once. It cleaned itself efficiently and quietly. One thing to note is that the box is absolutely massive upon arrival—I couldn’t fit it in the back seat of my Mazda 3—and the litter box itself is huge, with a frustratingly short cord that might make placement inconvenient. My other gripe was with the app, which had some poorly translated instructions and alerts that sometimes left me feeling confused. —Louryn Strampe
Whisker Litter-Robot 5 Pro for $999: This model is part of Whisker’s newest Litter-Robot lineup, which also includes the mid-level Litter-Robot 5 and the base-level EVO. It has an AI-enabled camera that can recognize up to five cats and WasteID technology to determine what type of visit your cat had. The dual-camera system captures external motion outside the box and inside the litter bed. It also charts trends over time to help you more accurately understand your cat’s health and habits, so you know if anything is amiss. Plus, depending on the type of waste, LR5 Pro gives more targeted odor control, cycling immediately for solid waste and waiting for urine to make sure it clumps. The drawer is also more sealed and larger, with up to 10 days of waste storage per cat. It looks similar to my personal favorite auto box, the Litter-Robot 4 (above), but has a built-in camera, a touchscreen rather than physical buttons, a wider and shallower drawer, and a taller (removable) lip in the entryway. Maybe I’m just partial to the older model, but I think all of these changes make it less user-friendly than the 4 model. The touchscreen is finicky, the drawer liners are harder to place perfectly with the shallow design, and the removable entryway lip is much harder to attach and detach with smaller insertion tabs that feel like they could break off. Setup took several days because onboarding requires scanning a QR code with the built-in camera, but the camera never auto-captured the code. It’d be much easier if you could enter the code manually rather than relying on the camera. The camera always panned to the outside of the box rather than inside, and rarely showed footage of the stool/pee. Plus, the AI to differentiate cats only works reliably with the Whisker+ paid subscription plan ($80/year).
Petkit Purobot Ultra for $800: I liked this automatic box a lot, even if some of the features are a little over the top. (Read the full review here.) It uses a camera and AI technology to monitor litter box usage and lets you see your cat’s stool to help you more closely monitor their health. This upgrade has a large horizontal footprint and a camera on an arm in front of the opening, which swivels and follows your cat when it senses motion and records inside the litter box (it also has night vision). It has auto-bagging and -sealing features, so you never have to deal with the stool. The app logs and monitors usage, including the number of times used and the average duration. The camera has 180-degree viewing, two-way audio, and 24/7 streaming. It uses AI to identify which cat used the box, and while it doesn’t explicitly note whether a cat peed or pooped, you can review the footage to determine. Although this is a good idea in theory, the videos inside the litter box aren’t hi-def and are always in black-and-white, which makes it very difficult to actually observe anything in detail. The arm’s placement is awkward, making it extremely challenging to refill the litter box. This litter box always worked well and kept smells at bay, but the AI analytics fell a little flat for me, and it was needlessly tough to refill the litter.
Litter-Robot 5 for $799: The middle model Litter-Robot 5 offers several improvements and design tweaks over the base Litter-Robot 4: easier assembly and waste removal; an LCD screen; and, if you have a Whisker+ subscription, a new WasteID feature that is supposed to distinguish between feces and urine. This only worked intermittently in the first four months of testing, as did the LR’s ability to tell my cats apart by their weights. However, the firmware on the 5 was recently updated and has improved greatly over time, with fewer error codes and more consistent WasteID readings. I very much prefer Litter-Robot’s larger opening to Petkit’s, the ease of cleaning, and the fact that it can hold 10 days’ worth of waste from my two cats before needing to be emptied. It’s also a step up from the base-level EVO in that it can accommodate five cats up to 30 pounds. I highly recommend adding on Litter-Robot’s new ramp ($75) and litter-trap mat ($50), either of which helps to cut down on litter tracking, but both together resulted in a significant reduction in how often I had to vacuum. —Kat Merck
Petcove PurrTek Covered Self-Cleaning Litter Box for $360: I was surprised when my two large cats easily took to this very small automatic litter box. I wasn’t even sure my 16-pound cat would be able to fit inside. I’ve grown to really appreciate easy outside buttons, which are a game-changer when the often buggy app crashes or you aren’t near your phone. Like many automatic litter boxes I test, this product would be vastly improved with a better app interface and clearer English translations. It was very hard to figure out what the settings were asking or even if they were set, mostly because of the poor translation. Waste bin calibration could be set from zero to 15, and the litter leveling setting could be set from zero to six, seemingly arbitrary numbers that didn’t seem to change the settings. “Do not disturb” mode could be set, but only for a specific clock time, such as 11:30 pm, rather than a time span, which wasn’t useful. It also took an egregiously long time to empty the waste, at almost four and a half minutes for the whole cycle. I wish the waste bin were at the bottom of the device, because emptying and refilling the bag was often messy and had litter leakage. The device worked without issue overall, and my cats liked it, but for almost $400, I’d get the Petkit PuraMax 2, which fluctuates at a similar price but works so much better.
Els Pet Orbitie for $260: This has a lower price point, but it functions much like the more expensive automatic litter box models, with an internal 65-liter-capacity orb that rotates and catches clumps with a plastic grate, depositing them into a bag-lined box below. The opening is a generous 12 by 12 inches—plenty big enough for my two 8-year-old cats, who took to it almost immediately despite never having seen anything but a traditional litter box. The accompanying Orbitie app doesn’t offer an extensive amount of information; it tells the user the volume of litter and what step of the cleaning phase the box is currently in, as well as how many times the box has been used and at what times. The first test unit I received was faulty—it sent multiple phantom alerts to the app, letting me know it had cleaned itself as many as 36 times a day, which I knew for a fact was not true. The replacement unit, however, works just as intended, though the bin beneath fills up fast (about every other day with my two cats), and it needs to be disassembled and cleaned every month or so, as tiny pieces of cat litter have a tendency to get in the gears beneath the orb and make a loud grinding noise. Online reviews panned an earlier version of this box, but Orbitie says this is an improved version. Thankfully, like the bigger brands, Orbitie also offers a 90-day money-back guarantee if you’re on the fence. —Kat Merck
FurryTail Automatic Litter Box Pro for $260: I was surprised by how quickly and easily my cats took to this device—even my larger cat, who hates change, started using it right away. Setup was super easy, and the box comes with a year’s supply of waste bag liners, an additional grate attachment, and a mat to reduce litter tracking. Similar to many models, the spherical orb rotates, sifting dirty litter into a waste bag, which, on this model, is on top of the machine rather than below. The box has both a manual display and buttons on the machine, as well as an app to adjust settings. I’d include this model in our top picks because of how easy it was to set up and use, as well as how much my cats liked it, but the app was basically useless. Through the app, you can adjust settings like timed cleanings and do-not-disturb modes, manually clean, and monitor waste levels. However, the app never tracked usage or weight, and for the majority of the time, didn’t clean when I manually instructed it to. The sensors would sense ghost cats and refuse to clean, with the device not automatically cycling for the majority of the day (which sort of defeats the purpose). This automatic box has tons of potential, but I can’t fully recommend it until the kinks (especially in the app) are ironed out.
Casa Leo Leo’s Loo Too Automatic Litter Box for $600: This automatic litter box was a top pick for a long time, but it’s pricey and a bit cramped for some cats. We still like it, but think the options above are better for most people (and cats). There are four weight sensors inside the barrel to detect when a cat is still inside (it needs just 1 pound of weight to detect your cat), an anti-pinch sensor (for fingers and paws), and a radar system that detects when anyone, feline or human, is near it. For extra cleanliness, it also uses ultraviolet light for extra sanitation. The Smarty Pear app alerts you when the drawer is full (about once a week), records the times your cat uses it and the cat’s weight, and you can set it to automatically clean six seconds to 20 minutes after your cat uses it. You can start a cleaning session manually from the app or use your voice if you connect the box to Alexa or Google Assistant. Former WIRED reviewer Medea Giordano’s biggest struggle using the Loo Too was pouring new litter into it, which can be tricky because of the small entry hole. The barrel is also pretty cramped, especially for her 12-pound cat.
PetSafe ScoopFree SmartSpin Self-Cleaning Litter Box for $340: This basic automatic litter box is around half the price but has a similar design to more expensive models. This futuristic-looking pod on legs has a rubbery bottom, a weight detector that sets off the cleaning cycle a few minutes after your cat has done its business, and a slide-out tray in the bottom. After they’ve been, the body rotates, and a mesh catches the clumps and deposits them in the tray, where there’s a bag with a wee deodorizer unit that smells like watermelon. You can connect it to Wi-Fi and review your cat’s toilet visits in the app on your phone, where each entry displays the time they went, their weight, and toilet trip duration. This self-cleaning box was easy to build and works surprisingly well, even though it feels kinda cheap. Ultimately, as a relatively affordable self-cleaning device, the PetSafe ScoopFree SmartSpin is worth a look. —Simon Hill
Not Recommended
Petlibro Luma Smart Litter Box for $600: I’m a big fan of Petlibro’s automatic feeders and fountains, but I’ve found that the brand’s other tech products, like this automatic litter box and AI-enabled pet camera, aren’t on the same level. First, we cannot recommend any model that closes completely during cleaning cycles. The Luma is outfitted with tons of sensors to prevent cleaning while a cat (or any object) is inside or near the entrance, and I highly doubt injury would occur. But the globe spins backward and forward, rather than clockwise and counterclockwise, meaning that the entrance is closed during cycling. If a sensing malfunction happened, the cat would be trapped inside. I appreciated the button controls on the outside top, which allow for manual control. However, they’re on a touchscreen above the camera. So, oftentimes, when I tried to manually reset, the camera caught me and wouldn’t continue the cleaning or the control I asked of it, because the safety features would prevent action inside the box. It was very frustrating. When I went out of town, it got stuck in the middle of the cleaning cycle for two days because it kept sensing a ghost cat. The globe was mid-cycle, and the entrance was covered; I couldn’t bypass it via the app to keep cleaning. (Thank God I had a second litter box for my cats available, or I would’ve been out of luck.) The auto-deodorizing feature goes off automatically for five minutes after each use and sounds like an airplane engine. There’s no way to turn it off; you can turn the power down to a lower level, but it’s still egregiously loud. Right now, I can’t recommend this model (mostly for safety reasons), but a lot of the design flaws could be fixed in future iterations to make it a solid choice.
Oneisall Ease S1 Self-Cleaning Litter Box for $240: Full disclosure: I tested this in a beta version before it was released to the public, so I hope my major complaints have been fixed in later manufactured models. This automatic box is constructed from hygienic stainless steel to keep things cleaner and less prone to harboring odors; it has a simple design, and it’s affordable. I’m generally a fan of Oneisall’s pet tech; I’ve been impressed by various models of the brand’s simple, affordable automatic pet fountains and automatic pet feeders. This model is also super simple, with a few front-facing buttons to control settings and no connected app. For the first five days of “testing,” the automatic box detected a cat and stayed perpetually in cleaning mode. No matter what buttons I pressed, there was no way to override or reset it; even when I unplugged and replugged, the cleaning cycle would continue without end. When leveling litter, it would sense a ghost cat and stay perpetually in a wonky position for hours, if not days. Once it eventually went into standby mode, the litter wasn’t flat, and the box was slightly angled. My cats were too freaked out to use it regularly because it was always moving or at an odd angle. I love that it’s affordable, simple, and has hygienic stainless-steel construction, but some serious design changes need to be made—primarily a way to override ghost sensing to complete a cleaning cycle, and perhaps a connected app—before I can recommend this model.
PetSnowy Snow+ Self-Cleaning Litter Box for $530: This box looks like something from Kubrick’s visions of space travel, or if Eames started making plastic litter boxes. It takes up quite a bit of horizontal floor space, so it may not be ideal for those in cramped apartments looking to conserve space. Note that this globe is closed during cleaning, which could cause injury if the machine malfunctioned and didn’t sense a cat. The box also doesn’t tell you when the litter’s low or needs to be refilled. My cats had a really hard time using it—they just couldn’t understand that it was a litter box. Older cats could have a tough time jumping into it, and the smaller opening could be a problem if you have bigger cats. It might be great for someone who wants to keep things tidy—it’s extremely clean, smells good, and hugely reduces litter tracking. However, we just can’t recommend the device since it’s closed during cleaning, which is not safe.
The Pet Zone Smart Scoop for $166: This is probably the least “smart” automatic litter box we’ve tested—it’s a typical rectangular plastic box with an automatic arm that acts as a rake and scoops the clumped (soiled) litter into a small bin on the other side. Once the cat leaves, it begins a 15-minute countdown and the rake slides over the length of the box, (ideally) scooping up the waste and lifting it into the receptacle. You’re only allowed to fill the device with about an inch and a half of litter, which my cats didn’t like (they prefer a few inches to really bury it). The rake doesn’t stop when it’s in the cleaning cycle—even if something jumps in, which is potentially dangerous. My cats tend to pee on the side of the litter box, which, because of the rake’s placement, means it misses an inch on either side—I still had to scrape the caked-on litter from the edges. The cycle timing can’t be adjusted, so the litter didn’t have time to clump completely, and the rake would immediately break it down into smaller clumps that would then be missed because they were too small. For me, the hassle’s not worth it, and I’d rather just scoop it myself.
How Do Automatic Litter Boxes Work?
Automatic litter boxes vary depending on the brand and litter type. Generally, they have sensors, either by motion or weight, to tell when a cat has entered or exited the device. Usually customizable and controlled via app on your phone, or on a more rudimentary timer system, the cleaning cycle will begin a short time after the cat has used the box. With dome-shaped litter boxes, the cleaning will happen via a cycle where the litter spins and rotates around the spherical interior; the bigger soiled clumps will be deposited into the waste basket while the clean granules pass through the grates and get recycled back into the box.
The Petkit PuraMax 2, for example, rotates backward and then forward (rather than a clock-wise/counter-clockwise spin cycle) to sift the clumps from the clean litter, depositing the larger clumps into the waste basket. The Pet Zone Smart Scoop is the most rudimentary design we tested, simply using a rake attachment to scoop the bigger clumps into a waste receptacle in the back.
Are Automatic Litter Boxes Safe?
Pet owners should always do research and make an informed decision regarding which box is best for them and their cat. We only tested automatic litter boxes that remain open during cycling to ensure that if for some reason the weight sensors didn’t pick up on a cat being inside, the cat could jump out. We don’t recommend devices that close completely because of the potential that the machine could not sense the cat and kill it during its automatic cycle.
These automatic boxes use sensors—some only needing 1 pound of weight to detect your cat—where the cycle will automatically stop no matter where it is in the cleaning process. Many also have anti-pinch sensors. For added security, the devices on this list have customizable schedules, including “do not disturb” modes. If you’re a neurotic helicopter cat mom like me, you could only run the clean cycles when you choose, like when you’re in the room to observe the cycle (although if you do that, the box won’t stay clean for as long).
Where Should I Put the Automatic Litter Box?
All of these automatic litter boxes require electricity, so they will need to be near an outlet. Since cats will generally take a little while to get comfortable with their new potty, I recommend that you keep your old litter box until they use the device regularly. It helps to put the new automatic litter box near the old boxes to familiarize your cat with it. Adding in litter attractant and using old litter from the previous box also encourages your cat to use the new model.
As a general rule, for old-school litter boxes, you should have one box for each cat, plus one. With automatic models constantly cleaning, there is less need for multiple options, but we recommend leaving your old litter box out for an extended period to ensure the cat has acclimated to the new automatic box.
What Should You Look for When Shopping?
After testing around a dozen automatic litter boxes, I look for several things that make day-to-day life with the device easier for you and your pet. First, the connected app. This is what you’ll be checking daily, so it’s important that it works well. This is one of the reasons the Litter-Robot 4 was our top pick for a long time: its connected app is intuitive, simple to use, and reliable. I absolutely love the Petkit models we’ve tested, but the app is subpar, overcrowded with ads for other products and poorly translated. I also look for anything that makes filling litter easier: I love the Litter-Hopper attachment, which refills litter for you on Litter-Robot models, the self-filling litter reservoir on Homerunpet, and self-sealing waste bags. You’ll also want to keep the cat’s size in mind. My two cats are large, so I tend to opt for something with an extra-large, front-facing hole. Which box you choose depends on litter type and compatibility—if you’re using tofu litter, make sure you get a model that is compatible with your preferred type. Budget is also a factor, with some models as low as $150 or as high as nearly a grand.
How Does WIRED Select Models to Be Reviewed?
I do a lot of research, looking up other reviews online, including our competitors, to see which are getting buzz. Since I’m the pet tech writer here at WIRED, I also have knowledge from other pet tech brands I love for things like automatic feeders and pet water fountains. Most of these brands also have automatic litter boxes, which I always try to test among their lineup of new pet tech. I also talk to other cat parents to see what they’re using (and liking). I aim to test a wide range of styles and price points for every type of budget and cat.
How Does WIRED Acquire the Boxes?
Sometimes we reach out to brands we’re excited about and request samples for potential review, without promise of coverage; other times we will buy a model we’re interested in and expense it.
What Does WIRED Do With Them After Testing?
We keep some models on hand for long-term testing to see if they hold up over time. This is especially useful for our former top pick, the Litter-Robot 4, whose Litter-Hopper attachment stopped working intermittently after prolonged testing, or the Petkit models, whose AI starts falling flat without a Care+ subscription. Keeping some devices for longer-term testing helps ensure that we are giving our readers a comprehensive review. Most boxes we test for several weeks and donate locally upon completion.
History of the Automatic Litter Box
Rudimentary automatic litter boxes have been around since the late ’80s. These early models featured an automatic rake attachment (much like the Pet Zone Smart Scoop box) but had problems with reliability and loudness. It wasn’t until the 2010s that the devices started incorporating advanced tech like Wi-Fi and app control. In the decade since, that technology has continuously grown and improved, with most devices providing insight into your cats’ habits and health—truly becoming an asset in understanding your feline friends even better.
Power up with unlimited access to WIRED. Get best-in-class reporting and exclusive subscriber content that’s too important to ignore. Subscribe Today.
No Comment! Be the first one.