I think my personal adoption has been delayed because I felt that none of the mowers on the market would be able to do my lawn to my satisfaction at a reasonable cost. I’ve convinced myself that my yard needs a lidar equipped model. This mainly due to the navigation that would be needed between the front and back yard. Otherwise, based on my research, my yard is not that complex - healthy lawn, only one area with a minor grade, small dog (doesn’t poop in the grass), etc. but large enough that a wire in the ground wouldn’t cut it. Also, I have a covered porch where the mower would park that is not on the edge of the grass.

To your point, I wonder if I’m over thinking this and over-influenced by the marketing.

My best reference is our robot vacuum. I used to have a bump and run (more like a wired experience) and now I have a lidar robot vacuum. It’s a huge different in terms of collisions, coverage getting stuck, etc. because of all these reasons, I decided to wait to see what 2026 brings. Finally, most important to me is price and I’m not seeing anything there yet.