As any cat owner will tell you, robot litter boxis far from the best part of having a feline companion. For those who truly can't stand the task, a litter robot can be a great solution, and one brand has been at the forefront of the self-cleaning litter box game. whisker.
Since 1999, Whisker has been creating new iterations of the original litter robot. That means more than 20 years of product innovation in the robotic litter box space. While it's Litter-Robot 3 has been the brand's highest-rated and most popular self-cleaning litter box for several years (we named it the best self-cleaning choice in 2021), Whisker has been hard at work on its latest innovation, the Litter-Robot 4, which officially launched on May 10.
The latest Litter-Robot was designed with community feedback in mind, all in an effort to improve on all the pain points of the previous model; in particular, it's noisier, smaller, and less smelly. While I was skeptical of litter robots in general, the lure of a world where I didn't have to scoop the litter box multiple times a day was too strong to resist. What follows is everything you need to know about the Litter-Robot 4, based on several weeks of testing with my two cats, Lilah and Ernie.
For those of you who are new to robot cat litter box, here's how the gadget actually works Once your cat enters the litter box, the gadget identifies which cat (it can track up to four different cats) has entered, and how long they've been in there. After your cat has done its business and left the litter box, a timer kicks in to make sure the litter has had enough time to clump. You can choose the time of this timer through the included app, depending on you and your cat's preferences (though Whisker recommends about 7 minutes).
Once the timer is up, the litter box begins a 2.5-minute cleaning cycle. The spherical parts rotate and separate waste from clean litter through a patented sieving process. The litter pieces are placed in the waste drawer at the bottom of the litter box, which is completely closed. The sphere then rotates back to its original position, leaving a clean litter bed. Once the waste drawer is full, you simply slide the drawer out and toss the contents into the trash.
When Lilah and Ernie first saw the litter box, they were immediately hooked, sniffing the machine and carefully placing their paws on the steps leading to the sphere or litter bin. However, it took me some time to coax them inside. I placed food on the steps and put some in the orb so the cats would walk up and into the litter. It only took my cats a day to master this method, although we made sure to keep a close eye on them in the beginning. (They seemed a little confused after the first few cleaning cycles, which is to be expected.) After about a week, they started to get used to it, and now, after a few weeks, they ignore it completely.
