Heated tumble-drying is not the only way to dry your clothes. Before you buy a combo, think about whether you could be comfortable with a compact washing machine and a great drying rack. You’ll save hundreds of dollars, and you probably won’t lose much time relative to a combo.
We dismissed our other compact, ventless, 120-volt finalists: The Haier HLC1700AXW, Midea USFC70DS12DSH, Summit SPWD2201SS, EdgeStar CWD1550S, and Magic Chef MCSCWD20W3 (again, the last three of which appear to be the same machine with a different label). We also dismissed the Deco DC4400CV, the convertible vented-ventless model (also sold under the Equator or Pinnacle brands). As Shanet warned, you may not be able to find replacement parts from these brands after a few years. They tend to have mediocre user ratings and limited availability compared with our pick, too.
The LG Signature LUWM101HWA costs nearly $2,900, by far the most expensive combo unit and much more expensive than almost any separate washer and dryer. But this 2.8-cubic-foot, ventless, 120-volt, 24-inch model has arguably the best specs of any washer-dryer combo: It uses a heat-pump rather than a condenser for its ventless drying, which speeds up the drying process a bit and saves some energy. The spin cycle can also crank at 1,600 RPM, the fastest we’ve ever heard of in any washer, which should also help cut down on drying times. The LG Signature is not a particularly popular product, but some owner reviews have trickled out. Reviewers who compare the LG Signature with other combo units seem happy that it works noticeably (though not dramatically) faster; reviewers who thought they’d be able to seamlessly replace separate washer and dryer units seem disappointed.
Kuper, the cleaning expert and RV-dweller, told us the Splendide WD2100XC might be your best choice if your home rolls or floats. We didn’t consider it for our main pick because it’s a vented model, but that doesn’t seem to be a problem in RVs or on boats. The marketing materials specifically note that the Splendide is built with “heavy-duty springs and shock absorbers” for RV travel.
LG used to make a full-size, ventless, 120-volt all-in-one combo, the WM3997HWA, but it’s now discontinued. It has a 4.3-cubic-foot drum, an accelerated wash cycle, and 700 decent user ratings, averaging four stars out of five. Our stance is that you should get a combo only if you have no other choice, and if you can fit a full-size model in your home, you can probably fit two compact models, which will let you do more laundry faster, and will probably be more reliable. But if you’re the exception to our assumption, and think that the WM3997HWA is your best bet, we think it’s probably an okay bet—it has a lot in common with the smaller WM3488HW.
Marathon Laundry (a startup founded by a former Apple software engineer) announced its first product, an all-in-one combo in January 2016 and began shipping some units in May 2017. Most of the press coverage and the company’s marketing materials focused on how smart the machine would be, but we were mostly interested because it’s a 240-volt model, so the dryer should’ve been relatively fast compared with other all-in-one models. But it’s hard to find much information on Marathon Laundry anymore. The company’s website is still up, and according to LinkedIn it still has some employees. But its Facebook page was taken down sometime between summer 2017 (last time we looked) and October 2018 (when we’re writing this update). The company is barely active on Twitter. It also does not list a phone number on its website and did not reply to an email from Wirecutter asking about its status. It doesn’t have any stock of its machines, so if you wanted to buy one, you’d have to wait for the next production run, and that date is not publicly available either. It’s hard to find reviews of how well the company’s product works, but this story from May 2018 is not favorable, detailing how the dryer barely functioned and the customer service was obstinate. Another comment on that page tells a similar story about the poor customer service.
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