Ecovacs has been named the world’s leading home robotics brand in a new Forbes survey unveiled at IFA 2026, a result that lands squarely on Dreame, the rival that has spent the past 12 months telling the Australian market it is the category leader both internationally and locally.

The “2026 Forbes China Home Robotics Enterprise Survey” scored Ecovacs 8.56 out of 10, ahead of every other player in a sector Chinese manufacturers now control outright.

Graham Earnshaw, Chief Content Officer at Forbes China, delivered the findings to an IFA audience that included senior buyers from JB Hi-Fi, Harvey Norman and Bing Lee.

Supply chain the killer advantage

Forbes assessed manufacturers across seven dimensions, among them product portfolio, R&D investment and supply chain.

Ecovacs led five of the seven and was the only company in the survey to score a perfect 10 for supply chain capability, the metric that determines who can actually ship product into Australia at volume and at margin.

That distinction matters.

Retailers have spent two years watching robotics brands promise product and then miss delivery windows, and vertical integration is now the question buyers ask first.

Chinese brands own the shelf

The survey confirms what any walk through the Messe Berlin halls made obvious.

Chinese companies hold the top five positions in the global vacuum category and roughly 50% of the market between them. In window cleaning robots, a segment that barely existed three years ago, five Chinese firms including Ecovacs hold more than 70% of global sales.

The collapse of the incumbents is nearly complete.

iRobot, the company that invented the category, has been acquired by Shenzhen’s Picea Robotics, and the Japanese and American brands that once defined home robotics are now rounding errors in the data.

In Australia the brand is distributed by iXL Home who do little if any marketing of the brand with Tempo the brand that secured the rights to Picea Robotics 3i robotic vacuum product seen as a possible contender to take over distribution according to sources.

Australian retail has noticed.

Executives from all three major chains were seen working the robotics stands at IFA, with one telling ChannelNews the category is “where future margin is” as television and small appliance margins keep grinding down.

The focus argument

Ecovacs chief executive David Qian used the company’s IFA press event to draw a hard line between his strategy and the rest of the field. Where competitors have spread into AI coffee machines, hair dryers and general appliances, Ecovacs is pushing deeper into robotics, with window cleaners, robotic lawn mowers and pool cleaners all headed for the Australian market.

The company claims it can reuse around 80% of its core technology when it enters a new category, a claim that, if accurate, explains both the speed of the rollout and the margin structure behind it. Revenue from new international categories grew 75.1% year on year in the first half of 2026.

Qian is the son of Ecovacs founder and chairman Qian Dongqi, who holds a fortune of US$5.5 billion on the Forbes Real-Time Billionaires List.

Offshore overtakes home market

The financials underline the shift.

Ecovacs brand revenue hit 6.09 billion yuan in the first half, up 26.82%, while stablemate Tineco delivered 4.05 billion yuan, up 10.66%.

More significant for Australian suppliers and retailers, overseas business accounted for 49.0% of total brand revenue in the first half and passed 51% in the second quarter, the first time international sales have outstripped the Chinese domestic market. The company says Australia delivered record growth over the period.

The competitive picture

Forbes China stopped short of declaring a one horse race.

Roborock was singled out for offshore growth and Mova for a product iteration cycle running ahead of market expectations.

What separates the leaders from the stragglers is spend.

Ecovacs and its immediate rivals are pouring money into R&D and marketing at a rate iRobot could not sustain, and the acquisition of the American pioneer by a Shenzhen manufacturer is the clearest evidence yet of how that arms race ends.

The growth at Ecovacs was primarily driven by its two core brands, Ecovacs and Tineco.

Ecovacs Brand Revenue: is up +26.82% .

Tineco Brand Revenue: is up +10.66% .

The first half of 2026 showed a significant strategic shift, with overseas business surpassing domestic revenue for the first time .

International business accounted for 49.0% of total brand revenue in the first half with Australia delivering record growth for the Company.

This figure reached over 51% in the second quarter alone, marking the first time it exceeded domestic revenue according to Qian who was one of the key presenters at the Companies IFA press event.