Shark NV680UKT Powered Lift-Away True Pet Vacuum Cleaner, Bordeaux

2 reviews for Shark NV680UKT Powered Lift-Away True Pet Vacuum Cleaner, Bordeaux

1. 

   Rated 5 out of 5

   Steven Mounfield – April 20, 2025

   I bought this based on it being a Which? Best Buy. Our previous vacuum cleaner died due to cable failure (from wrapping the cable round the hooks provided – bad idea apparently) and we decided to go for something a bit better. I was a little dubious because I’d never heard of Shark, but the five-year guarantee swung it for me. The vacuum arrived on time and well-protected without being ridiculously over-packaged. When everything was unpacked I was a bit surprised at all the extra bits that came with it; I expected an upholstery brush and a crevice tool, but there was also a large flat hard floor attachment and a pet hair removal tool. The power cable is long enough to clean all the downstairs from one power socket, which is great. The dust collector part is pretty small though – I’m not sure you could clean a whole house without having to empty it partway through.

   Tried it on the hard kitchen floor first and was glad to find that, as Which reported, it is great at cleaning hard floors. I was agreeably surprised at how quiet it is too – but only if you keep it switched to hard floor setting. Switching to carpet setting turns on the powered rotary brush, which is really loud on a hard floor. Can’t really call this a negative point though, as you’re obviously not supposed to do it anyway. Suction was great on hard floor, and it was pretty easy to get around.

   Living room carpet next. Now, I have to admit we hadn’t cleaned it since the old cleaner broke four days ago, and we have a black Labrador who not only moults hair but has a few cuddly toys that she likes to mother in between bouts of eviscerating them. So the carpet had dog hairs and lots of bits of toy fluff and stuffing all over it. Turned on the Shark, expecting the same loud noise the carpet setting had caused in the kitchen, but actually the rotor brush was a lot quieter on the carpet. However, the brush made it a lot more effort to move on the carpet than it had been on a hard floor. I tried switching back to hard floor mode, which did make it easier to manoeuvre, but didn’t actually pick much up. Then I tried carpet mode with the suction adjuster opened – first all the way open, then halfway open. This did make a difference – the cleaner still picked up and was a bit easier to push – but it didn’t do quite as good a job cleaning the carpet.

   But – and it’s a big but – I was amazed at how good a job it did cleaning the carpet with suction on full. Maybe the carpet was dirtier than usual after four days without a cleaner, but after using the Shark it actually looked almost as if it had been professionally cleaned. In fact, I don’t think the carpet had looked so good ever since we got the dog (she’s five), even though it was cleaned every day. The Shark was just that good. So I’m not going to complain about it being harder to manoeuvre on carpet, because the powered brushes and the great suction is obviously what makes it so good.

   The extra tools are all easy to use and effective. One good feature is that you can either attach them to the end of the wand or on the handle, The upholstery tool is effective, but the pet hair removal tool is really good. Our dog likes to sit on the tuffet and look out of the window, so the fabric tends to get that no one else wants to sit on it; two minutes with the pet hair removal tool and it was clean as a whistle. The only thing I think we are not likely to use is the hard floor attachment. This is apparently designed for dusting laminate floors that aren’t very dirty. Having tried the normal cleaner on hard floor setting I think I’d just use that.

   I haven’t yet tried cleaning the stairs with it, but the lift-away feature works really well and I can see it being very useful – essentially you remove the power unit and hose from the wheeled base so you can clean hard to reach areas. It’s easy to do and easy to put back – and it’s nice and light too. The dust collector is easy to remove and empty too, with just that problem of it being a bit small.

   Overall, it looks like a great vacuum cleaner. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone elderly or who had difficulty using a vacuum cleaner because it is a bit hard to push on carpet. That isn’t to say it’s heavy though; it’s actually fairly light for an upright vacuum cleaner. For anyone else, and especially families with pets, I would say this would be perfect. As long as you empty it every time you use it.

   Pros:
   Great cleaner on hard floors and carpets
   Easy to use
   Long cable
   Fairly light
   Pretty quiet
   Lift-away feature great for stairs
   Very effective accessories

   Cons
   Dust collector very small
   A bit hard to push on carpet

   Added 3 November 2016:
   In this review I mentioned Shark’s 5 year guarantee. In the paperwork for the cleaner it says “up to five years” but only describes a three year guarantee for this particular model. This could be considered somewhat misleading. That being said, I am still happy with the product. And I have now used it to clean the stairs – it was great.

   Added 1 October 2018
   It broke! The rotor brush started cutting out, essentially making it useless for cleaning carpet (it still worked on hard floors). Called the free number on the instructions and Shark sent out a new floor nozzle which arrived the next day. Now it’s like a new cleaner again. Really good service, I would not hesitate to buy from Shark again.

2. 

   Rated 5 out of 5

   Scampo – May 17, 2025

   We’ve been using the Shark cleaner for a good while now so I thought I would update the review. We still find it the best vacuum we’ve owned. Compared with the Sebo upright we now use upstairs it is, in every significant way, far superior. Whether it will outlast the Sebo is, I suppose unlikely since the latter is made for commercial use., but the trade off is a far heavier and more difficult to manoeuvre vacuum cleaner. The Shark is simply more practical than the Sebo: lighter, as powerful in terms of suction and cleaning, more manoeuvrable, in “lift-off” mode unsurpassed in every way. The Shark is, to put it in a nutshell, a delight. If you are looking for the best designed modern vacuum, then you really ought to have this at the top of your list. We’ve just bought a dusting brush attachment from Amazon for it (not made by Shark), and that, too, is an excellent accessory.

   Original Review:

   We use a Sebo upright to clean our downstairs rooms and an AEG cylinder vac upstairs. More and more though, we’ve been carrying the Sebo up the stairs in preference to the AEG. We find the upright so much easier to use – pushing rather than pulling is more intuitive and can see where we are going in without worrying what’s going on behind us. But the Sebo is that it is quite heavy and its design means when it is used with attachments, the hose is far too short and stiff, and it causes the whole machine to topple over easily. It can be a pain to use.

   Enter the new Shark 680, which we saw on offer at Amazon. We checked out the reviews and we decided to take the plunge. This vacuum gets so many five star reviews that we wondered if they could possibly all be genuine. There are a few critical reviews also, so when it arrived (the very next day from Amazon) we were looking forward to seeing just how good it was or whether the few negative reviews were the honest ones.

   We needn’t have worried. The Shark has just been given both “Which” and “Good Housekeeping” “Best Buy” awards and we soon discovered, with very good reason. The Shark has turned out to be wonderful for us – truly wonderful. It offers the very best of both worlds: upright and cylinder in one unique lightweight design. As an upright it is much more easily manoeuvrable and far lighter than our Sebo – yet is equally, if not even more, powerful, sucking up the dirt and leaving the carpets looking groomed to perfection. Then, for us what seems like a little magic happens. At the click of a button, the cleaner converts from an upright into a cylinder vac, one that is far easier to use than our AEG. This makes the Shark supremely easy for cleaning stairs, curtains, cobwebs, general dusting or for cleaning upholstery and so forth. It is unlike any other vacuum we’ve owned and can only be described as superb. We are so thrilled with it.