Choosing a window cleaner tool takes five minutes once you know which of three camps you are buying into. There is the battery window vacuum, the squeegee-and-washer pairing, and the pole that gets you to first-floor glass without a ladder. Every pick below was on sale in the UK in August 2026, with prices taken from Screwfix shelf listings rather than a shifting marketplace. Specs come from the manufacturer data sheets.
Prices and specs at a glance
| Tool | Price (August 2026) | Type | Key numbers | Suits |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kärcher WV 6 Plus | £79.99 | Window vacuum | 100 min run, 150 ml tank, 280 mm and 170 mm nozzles, 0.8 kg | A whole house, done in one go |
| Kärcher WV 1 | £29.99 | Window vacuum | 25 min run, 100 ml tank, 250 mm nozzle, 0.51 kg | Flats and small bays |
| Titan TTS1070VAC | £29.99 | Window vacuum | 30 min run, 100 ml tank, 280 mm width | Shower screens and condensation |
| Unger ErgoTec Advanced 3-in-1 | £52.99 | Squeegee kit | Microfibre washer, squeegee, 12 litre bucket | Conservatories and patio doors |
| Window Cleaning Kit 7 Pcs | £29.99 | Squeegee kit | 15 litre bucket, three squeegees, two T-bars, cloth | A first proper kit on a budget |
| Unger S-Channel Squeegee 35cm | £6.99 | Squeegee | 350 mm channel with rubber fitted | Learning the technique cheaply |
| Unger Telescopic Pole 3.75m | £34.99 | Extension pole | Three 1.25 m sections, stainless aluminium | First floor glass from the ground |
Key takeaways
- Spend £79.99 on the Kärcher WV 6 Plus for whole house cleaning. Its 100-minute battery and 150 ml tank outlast every rival here.
- Spend £6.99 on a squeegee first if you have never done this before. The technique matters more than the kit.
- A window vacuum has no washing head, so it removes water but never loosens dirt on its own.
- Budget another £34.99 for a pole if anything sits above arm height.
What a window cleaning tool actually has to do
Cleaning glass is three jobs, not one. You wet the pane, you scrub the film off, then you take the water away before it dries. Miss the middle job, and you smear dirt around rather than lifting it.
This is where most shoppers go wrong. A window vacuum is brilliant at the third job and does nothing at all about the second, since there is no brush or pad on it. Kärcher sells the WV 6 Plus with a spray bottle and microfibre cloth for exactly that reason.
So the honest answer is that you need two things: something wet and slightly abrasive, then something that removes the water in one pass.
Seven window cleaner tool picks, priced and compared
Kärcher WV 6 Plus, £79.99
Buy this one if you want the job over quickly. Kärcher rates it at 100 minutes per charge, roughly 300 square metres of glass. Its 150 ml dirty water tank is half again bigger than the smaller models. Two nozzles ship in the box, 280 mm for picture windows and 170 mm for Georgian bars and small panes. It weighs 0.8 kg with the battery in.
- Pros: longest run time here, LED battery readout, narrow nozzle included, quiet at 53 dB.
- Cons: 170 minutes to recharge, and you still need a washer or cloth to scrub.
Kärcher WV 1, £29.99
Same idea, less of it. You get 25 minutes of run time, a 100 ml tank and a 250 mm nozzle, at 0.51 kg. Kärcher quotes about 70 square metres per charge, which covers a two-bedroom flat with room to spare.
- Pros: lightest tool in this list, genuinely one-handed, good on shower screens.
- Cons: one nozzle only, and the tank needs emptying part way through a big session.
Titan TTS1070VAC, £29.99
Screwfix’s own brand undercuts Kärcher on width, giving you the full 280 mm blade for £29.99 alongside a 100 ml tank. Run time is the compromise at 30 minutes. Cheap cordless gear lives or dies on its cell quality, which is the same trap covered in our look at which cordless vacuums disappoint on battery life.
- Pros: widest blade at the lowest price, easy to replace if it dies.
- Cons: half an hour per charge, and no spray bottle or concentrate supplied.
Unger ErgoTec Advanced 3-in-1, £52.99
Trade kit for people with a lot of glass. You get a microfibre power washer, a channel squeegee and a 12-litre bucket that stores both. Unger’s poles thread straight onto the handles, so it grows with you.
- Pros: proper rubber that lasts, bucket sized for a washer sleeve, pole compatible.
- Cons: the priciest manual option, and overkill for six flat windows.
Window Cleaning Kit 7 Pcs, £29.99
Made by Charles Bentley and sold unbranded. Seven pieces: a 15-litre bucket, three stainless steel squeegees in ascending widths, two T-bars with fur sleeves and a microfibre cloth. Nothing here is refined, and for a first kit that hardly matters.
- Pros: three blade widths for the price of one Unger squeegee, big bucket included.
- Cons: replacement rubber is harder to source than Unger’s.
Unger S-Channel Squeegee 35cm, £6.99
Seven pounds. That is the entire cost of finding out whether you enjoy this. Its 350 mm channel arrives with rubber fitted and handles a standard casement in two strokes. Buy it, a bucket you already own and a drop of washing up liquid, then decide about anything else afterwards.
- Pros: cheapest way in, professional channel, rubber sold separately in packs.
- Cons: no washer, no handle extension, no bucket.
Unger Telescopic Pole 3.75m, £34.99
Three 1.25 m sections of stainless aluminium that lock out to 3.75 m. Add your own height and reach, and most first-floor casements on a standard semi come within range from the patio.
- Pros: keeps you off ladders, fits Unger squeegees and washers directly.
- Cons: control gets vague at full extension, and it is useless on its own.
Window vacuum or squeegee: which one wins?
For most UK homes, a squeegee cleans better, and a window vacuum makes less mess. A squeegee lifts the film in one wet stroke and dries as it goes. Vacuums need you to wash first, then suck the dirty water into a tank instead of onto the sill or the carpet.
Condensation changes the answer completely. On a January morning with water running down every pane, a vacuum clears a bedroom window in seconds, and a squeegee only moves the problem downwards. Buy both if the budget stretches. Around £37 gets you the Titan vacuum and the Unger squeegee together.
Getting to the upstairs glass safely
Here is the limit nobody mentions in a roundup: a window vacuum cannot go above the height of your arm. There is no pole attachment, so the top of a bay window on the first floor is out of reach, whatever you spend.
A 3.75 m telescopic pole with a washer on one end and a squeegee on the other solves it from ground level. Awkward roof-level panes are a different problem again. Shape decides what is possible, so read up on the main types of dormer windows if you have them above your bedrooms.
If it still cannot be reached from the ground, pay somebody. Ladder work on a wet drive is not worth £30.
Hard water, white spots and pure water kits
Much of southern and eastern England sits on chalk and limestone, so tap water carries dissolved minerals. Let that water dry on glass and it leaves white spots, which is why a rinse with the hose makes windows worse rather than better.
Professional window cleaners get around it with pure water. A resin filter strips the minerals out of mains water. That water goes up a pole to a brush, and the glass dries with nothing left behind to mark it. A TDS meter checks the filter is still working.
Unger sells a home version, the Rinse n Go AK158, at £303.99 through Screwfix. You get the resin filter, a 20 m hose, a two-section pole reaching about 3 m, the brush and a TDS meter. Outdoor tap pressure runs it, so no electricity is needed. That is a serious spend for a semi, and it is the only way to skip drying entirely.
One caveat on old glass. Leaded and coloured panels flex in their cames, so a stiff squeegee on a pole is the wrong tool entirely. Soft cloth, warm water, patience.
Does buying beat paying a window cleaner?
Run the payback maths before you spend. UK trade price guides put a typical domestic visit at £25 to £40 for most homes, with terraced houses at the lower end and detached properties above it. Most rounds run every four to eight weeks.
Take the £79.99 Kärcher and pair it with the £6.99 squeegee, so £86.98 all in. At £30 a visit, that is three visits, meaning you break even inside four months on a six-week round. The £36.98 Titan and squeegee combination pays for itself after the second clean.
Consumables are the line everyone forgets. Replacement Unger rubber runs £22.99 for a ten pack of 350 mm blades. Glass cleaner concentrate is £11.99 a litre. Both last a household several years. Call it a few pounds a year against £200 to £400 of labour.
Time is the catch, not money. A window cleaner does a semi in 30 to 45 minutes because they do it every day.
Frames, sills and the dirt behind the glass
Clean glass makes everything around it look worse. Once the panes are clear, you notice the black speckling in the sealant and the grime in the drainage slots along the bottom of a uPVC frame.
Do the frames first, always, or the runoff lands on glass you have finished. A damp cloth and washing up liquid handle most of it. Anything black and spreading is a damp problem, not a dirt problem, and our guide to getting rid of mould around the home deals with it properly.
Then there is the haze no tool touches. If a pane looks foggy from both sides and cleaning changes nothing, the seal between the panes has failed, and moisture is sitting inside the unit. That is a replacement job, and what new windows cost in the UK is the next number to look at.
Our verdict
Our pick is the Kärcher WV 6 Plus at £79.99, bought alongside the £6.99 Unger squeegee. That pairing covers both halves of the job, clears a three-bedroom house on one charge, and repays itself in about three skipped visits from a cleaner.
On a tight budget, the Titan TTS1070VAC at £29.99 gives you the same 280 mm blade width for a third of the money. Thirty minutes covers one floor at a time.
Have a conservatory or a lot of tall glass? Order the Unger ErgoTec Advanced 3-in-1 kit at £52.99, and the 3.75 m pole at £34.99 instead, and skip the battery gear completely. Check the current price at Screwfix before you buy, since window cleaning kits move in and out of promotion through the spring.
Window cleaner tool FAQs
A window vacuum paired with a cheap squeegee. The squeegee loosens and lifts the dirt film; the vacuum takes the water off without drips on the sill. Around £37 buys both at the budget end, or £87 for the Kärcher WV 6 Plus and an Unger squeegee together.
Three usual culprits. Too much detergent in the water. A cloth washed with fabric softener. Or direct sun drying the pane before you lift the water off. Work on a dull day and use one drop of washing up liquid in a full bucket.
Yes, in tiny amounts. Professionals use a squirt of it as a lubricant so the rubber glides. Anything more and you are left polishing suds off dry glass.
Scouring pads, bleach, and paper towels that shed lint. Steel wool marks the coating on modern low emissivity glazing, and that damage does not polish out.
