Jimmy JV51 Review

Pros

• Soft roller head is perfect for cleaning hardwood, tile, vinyl, and other indoor hard surfaces
• Comes with a nice selection of handheld attachments
• Washable dust bin and floor cleaning head

Cons

• Poor cleaning performance for carpeted floors, especially high pile carpets
• No brushroll-style floor cleaning head

Rather watch than read? We’ve got our full Jimmy JV51 video review here:

Jimmy Design

The design of the Jimmy JV51 feels pretty similar to other cordless stick vacuums.

What does it look like?

This vacuum uses a combination of glossy white and bright red accents to form the body of this vacuum.

Similar to the Dyson V-Series stick vacuums, the Jimmy also has the ability convert between a cordless stick vacuum and a portable upright vacuum.

How much power does it have?

This cordless stick vacuum has a 100,000 rpm motor with 125 AW suction power.

RELATED – Need more power? Check out the Dyson V10 which offers 140 AW of suction power.

2-in-1 Design

The Jimmy has popular 2-in-1 design that allows this vacuum to run as a cordless stick vacuum or as a handheld.

• In handheld mode, you can attach a small assortment of variable attachments including – mini-motorized brushroll, soft dusting brush, or a combination tool (that doubles as a narrow dusting brush or crevice tool.)
• In stick vacuum mode, you can attached the extension wand with the roller cleaning head. This assembly is the only option for cleaning floors.

The Cleaning Head

The cleaning head of the Jimmy JV51 is a bit of a double-edged sword.

On one hand, the soft roller is really great for cleaning hardwood or tile floors since it can gently sweep debris into the cleaning path without flinging it all over the floor.

But the disadvantage of the soft roller head is its inability to agitate carpet fibers enough to clean deep into carpets.

How does it work?

The dustbin and motor are located as a part of the in-hand portion of this vacuum. The extension wand is the long rigid wand that connects the in-hand portion to the floor cleaning head.

When used as a handheld, the floor cleaning head and extension wand can be detached and you can connect the handheld attachment directly to the in-hand vacuum.

Size & Dimensions

The Jimmy JV51 cordless stick vacuum is an average sized cordless stick vacuum. The full specs and dimensions are listed below:

Accessories & Parts

Accessories can play an important role in the overall usability of any given vacuum, but this can be especially true for 2-in-1 vacuum models, like the Jimmy JV51.

What’s in the box?

The Jimmy JV51 comes with:

• Rigid extension wand
• Soft roller floor cleaning head
• Combination tool (crevice and dusting)
• Dusting brush
• Mini-motorized brushroll
• Wall charger

This vacuum comes with three main attachments to use in handheld mode:

Cleaning Tests

The following vacuum cleaner tests are designed to show how the Jimmy performs on different surfaces, picking up a variety of debris types.

We test on three different floor types, including hardwood floors, low pile carpet, and high pile carpet.

Hardwood Floor Cleaning

In terms of performance, it feels like cleaning hardwoods is what the Jimmy JV51 is designed to do.

The soft roller head was exceptional and the cleaning performance cleaned nearly 100% of all debris types during our test. It’s hard to ask for much better performance than what the Jimmy was able to produce.

Low Carpet Cleaning

The carpet tests are where we stated to see some signs of struggle. While cereal and rice were still flawless, the kitty litter and sugar performance did begin to dip.

For cleaning carpets, it really seemed to be a disservice that the JV51 doesn’t have a traditional brushroll. The soft roller cleaning head just does not have the ability to agitate carpet fibers enough to effectively clean these areas.

High Carpet Cleaning

Cleaning high pile carpet continued to show similar results compared to what we saw for low pile carpets. Still flawless performance for cleaning cereal and rice and less impressive performance for kitty litter and sugar.

More than simply “less impressive”, I may go as far as to call these results a complete failure in it’s ability to clean up these finer debris types.

Again, I’d say that the lack of a traditional brushroll cleaning head has a lot to do with the poor performance on this test. If the Jimmy JV51 were to release an attached brushroll cleaning head, the test results would likely improve.

Setup & Usability

Setting up the Jimmy JV51 is pretty straightforward. This cordless stick vacuum doesn’t have any wifi connectivity or fancy tech-savvy controls.

It’s simply “just a vacuum cleaner” so setting up is as simple as:

1. Unbox the vacuum.
2. Plug in for a charge.
3. Attach desired tools (extension wand and soft roller head for floor cleaning or smaller tool for handheld cleaning).
4. Start cleaning.

All of the tools quickly attach or detach so it is easy to rearrange the assembly of this vacuum based on the cleaning job.

Is the Jimmy easy to maneuver?

I would say that the maneuverability of the Jimmy JV51 is pretty good, but not the best that we’ve seen.

The turning radius does allow for tight turns, but it’s difficult to get the wand to lower much more than what is shown below.

When cleaning in a straight line, the flexibility is better and the Jimmy can lay nearly flat, making it easy to squeeze under furniture or into tight spaces.

The JV51’s cleaning head is small enough that it’s able to squeeze under many time spaces.

Maintenance

Overall maintenance of the Jimmy JV51 is pretty reasonable for what you’d expect on almost any cordless stick vacuum.

Some of the most important maintenance tasks include:

• Emptying the dust bin.
• Checking, cleaning, and replacing the filter as necessary.
• Replacing the battery as necessary.

Washable Parts

One feature that is nice for maintenance is the washable dust cup and washable floor cleaning head. Both of these parts can be fully detached and cleaned with water.

NOTE: Be sure to allow 24 hours for these parts to fully dry before reinstalling.

Is the Jimmy a good value?

So we’ve looked at the design, features, cleaning performance, and other specs… considering all of these items in relation to price, is the Jimmy JV51 a good value?

Overall, I would say that this vacuum is a decent value for what you get, but it’s certainly not the best.

Based on suction alone, the Jimmy coming in at 125 AW would be equal to the Dyson V8, but I would consider the Dyson V8 to be a better built (and better performing) vacuum.

The 2-in-1 design, washable dust cup, and handheld attachments are nice additions, but the cleaning performance on carpets was just not impressive.

I think the value really comes down to where and how you’re using it.

If you’re mostly cleaning on hard surfaces like hardwood and tile, the JV51 is a great vacuum and great value.

If you have to deal with carpets, then the value takes a significant hit as the Jimmy struggles too much in these areas (especially on high pile carpet).

Jimmy JV51 Specifications

Should You Buy the Jimmy JV51?

I would recommend the Jimmy JV51 if you’re looking for the following features in a cordless stick vacuum:

• Good performance on hardwoods and other hard surfaces: The soft roller cleaning head is perfect for cleaning hardwood, tile, vinyl, and other hard indoor floors. It dominated our cleaning tests on hardwood floors.
• You don’t have many carpets – the JV51 struggled on our carpet cleaning tests, but especially on high pile carpets. If you have high carpets I would strongly advise against the JV51. If you have mostly hard surfaces and some low carpets it’s still a fine pick.
• 2-in-1 design: If you’re looking for a cordless vacuum that easily swaps between a stick vacuum and handheld vacuum, the Jimmy JV51 is a nice option. It comes with 1 roller cleaning head and three handheld attachments for a variety of cleaning jobs.
• Washable parts: Both the dust bin and sort roller cleaning head are washable which can be nice for regular maintenance and to keep your Jimmy looking new.

To learn more or to buy the Jimmy JV51 stick vacuum, check it out here.

Updates

• June 16, 2019 – We previously indicated that the Jimmy JV51 was manufactured by Xiaomi. This was incorrect and we fixed our mistake. We also corrected AW, which we originally said was 115, but it’s actually 125 AW.