The 5 Best Mops for Hardwood Floors of 2024, Tested and Reviewed

With an extra-large, dual-zone swivel head that’s easy to maneuver to clean more ground, the Bona Microfiber Floor Mop is our top pick for the best mop for hardwood floors, and is best for large areas. Its microfiber material is durable, easy to sanitize, and keeps your hardwood scratch-free.

Throughout all of our testing, the Bona Microfiber Floor Mop worked best at cleaning fresh spills, dried stains, and oil-based messes on hardwood. In fact, it only took up to 20 seconds to pick up salad dressing and 52 seconds to pick up dried cheese. 

In accordance with Cohoon’s advice, the mop includes two microfiber pads: one to catch pet hair and dry debris on your floor, and the other to pick up wet messes and to use alongside water or Bona’s hardwood floor cleaner (which we have also tested and loved). The pads adhere to the mop head via Velcro, and are easy to pull off and toss in the washing machine in between uses.

All that said, in the lab, we had a hard time getting dust to adhere to the pad. The dust would just get pushed around. You may want to pull out one of our favorite hardwood floor vacuums for a quick pick-up before wet cleaning.

We found this mop to be super lightweight and it easily cleaned under tables, around the legs of tables and chairs, and in other spots that are often tougher to reach with traditional mops without a swivel head. The wide mop head also means you’re able to cover more surface area at once.

_{Weight: 1.4 pounds | Handle Length: 49 inches | How to Clean: Machine washable}

The Swiffer Sweeper is an affordable favorite for wet and dry mopping, and after testing, we can confirm that it definitely lives up to the hype. With a slim frame that’s only 1.14 pounds, this multifunctional mop is great for small living spaces and reaching all the tough spots under tables and around chair and table legs. In our testing, we also found this mop to be the most effective when cleaning smaller messes and fresh spills.

The starter kit features three, pre-moistened wet pads and seven dry pads. And while the kit does start you off with a decent amount, unlike the reusable options in our guide, this mop requires you to buy replacement pads, which adds to the overall cost. We found ourselves using more than one disposable pad when covering larger areas and doing heavy-duty cleanups, too. So, for larger living spaces, we recommend a mop with reusable pads, like our best overall pick, the Bona Microfiber Floor Mop.

Overall, though, the Swiffer Sweeper is an effective option for hardwood, tile, and really any hard flooring. It’s a great “starter” option, too.

_{Weight: 1.14 pounds | Handle Length: 23.03 inches | How to Clean: Dispose of mop pad}

Spray mops eliminate the hassle of carrying a bucket of cleaning solution from room to room, or running through a box of wet mop pads, as is the case with our best value pick. After rigorously testing the best mops, the Swiffer PowerMop is our top pick for a spray mop for hardwood floors. 

The Swiffer PowerMop includes a bottle of scented cleaning solution, two batteries, and, the star of the show, two textured mop pads with scrubbing strips. During testing, the frayed mop head almost instantly cleaned up our floors, wiping away heavy-duty messes, grime, and dust in two to six passes.

We noticed the most challenging stain to lift is maple syrup, taking 60 passes. However, compared to other spray mops we tested, the PowerMop performed the quickest, which we feel is because of the mop’s scrubbing strips. (Notably, these strips are much more gentle than the plastic nubs Cohoon was referring to.)

When it comes to maneuverability, the Swiffer PowerMop is a little heavier and has a wider pad than most mops we’ve tested, but this didn’t affect its cleaning efficiency. Thanks to its 360-degree swivel head, we could easily maneuver around chairs and reach tight corners and spaces. 

_{Weight: 4.62 pounds | Handle Length: 49 inches | How to Clean: Dispose of mop pad}

For those who enjoy the traditional, mop-and-bucket cleaning style, the O-Cedar EasyWring RinseClean Spin Mop is a modern twist on the classic string mop. Instead of mopping your floors with the same dirty mop you keep re-dipping in now-dirty water, this super-absorbent mop features a uniquely designed bucket with a compartment for clean water and rinsing. There is another compartment for dirty water and pedal-powered, hands-free wringing.

Because of its absorbent microfiber head, we found that this spin mop works best on large, heavy-duty spills compared to sticky, dry, and oil-based stains. Although it works great on small, fresh spills, because of its bucket system that takes roughly six minutes to set up, for urgent cleanups, we recommend using a spray mop like the Swiffer PowerMop or a mop with pre-moistened disposable pads, like our best value pick, the Swiffer Dry and Wet Sweeping Starter Kit.

Unlike most rectangular mop heads, this O-Cedar mop has a triangular head that makes it easy to clean hard-to-reach corners. However, there is no swivel head, so it requires more wrist and body movement. On the flip side, the mop head is machine washable like our best overall pick, making it more eco-friendly. It’s an impressive set for deep-cleaning and large living spaces. 

_{Weight: 6.69 pounds | Handle Length: Up to 51 inches | How to Clean: Machine washable}

The best vacuum-mop combos, also known as wet-dry vacuums, cut chore time (and needed storage space) in half, as there’s no need for two, separate appliances. With a cordless design, a 40-minute run time, and a self-cleaning and drying feature, the Airthereal VacTide V2 Wet Dry Vacuum Cleaner is a standout for hardwood floors. This multifunctional cleaning appliance both vacuums and mops your floors at the same time, so there’s no need to adjust settings or click back and forth between cleaning modes.

To test the vacuum-mop’s effectiveness, we made consistent messes (raw egg, milk, cereal, and granola) on different floor types, including hardwood. On auto mode, the messes were mopped and lifted from the floor within 32 seconds. The Airtheral VacTide V2 also has a max mode for stubborn stains and debris, so we can only imagine how much quicker the waste would be cleaned on this setting.

Unlike the traditional mops we tested in this guide, the Airthereal VacTide V2 doesn’t lay completely flat but instead is a slightly-heavy, upright, cordless vacuum. It doesn’t completely go under chair legs, but maneuvers great around and along surfaces. And when it came time to clean and empty the vacuum tank, it was super easy. 

The unique thing about this vacuum-mop duo is that every time you turn it off, it verbally alerts you to empty the dirty water tank, which is removed with a simple push of a button. The mop also includes an extra roller, filter, and cleaning brush for the tank. 

_{Weight: 10.1 pounds | Handle Length: Not listed | How to Clean: Remove and clean tank, and run self-cleaning and drying feature for roller}