Best garden vacuums: Cordless, corded and petrol options for clearing fallen leaves

Clearing endless piles of leaves from the lawn and flower beds must be one of the worst gardening jobs.

Collecting leaves with a rake and collecting them manually is tiresome and a pain when you’re trying to pull them away from gravel paths or from plant pots. It also takes an age and like housework, it’s a thankless task as it all needs doing again before you know it.

Thank goodness for the garden vacuum, then. This little beauty sucks up the leaves depositing them into the attached collection bag. The vacuum shreds leaves too, mulching them into little pieces ready for the compost heap. You’ll also find many models have a blower function so you can gather the leaves into a pile before vacuuming them up – easy peasy.

Whether you opt for a corded or cordless model is down to personal preference and the size of your garden. Most vacuums have an average power cable length of 10m, though a few are longer, which will prove useful if you’re lucky enough to have lots of outdoor space. If you have a large outdoor space to clear you may need to use an extension cable.

The advantage of cordless garden vacs is you’re not limited to the length of the cable – though of course, you are limited to the capacity of the battery. Cordless models are generally pricier than their plug-in counterparts and you may have to buy a battery and charger separately, which adds to the overall cost. That said, once you have the battery and charger they should fit other tools from the same