Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera review

Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera: Introduction

Although Husqvarna introduced the first robot lawn mower 30 years ago, it’s stuck with boundary-wire until last year, with the introduction of the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera. Technically, this robot can still be a boundary-wire-only lawn mower, but its EPOS Plug-in lets it go wire-free, using GPS instead.

And, with the Husqvarna Cloud, there’s no need for a separate reference stattion, making this one of the easiest lawn mowers to set up. 

Excellent at cutting borders, the only minor irritation is the poor object detection and avoidance. However, for simplicity and the ability to adapt to even very complicated gardens, there’s nothing better than the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera.

Design and componentsSetup

• Works with or without boundary wire
• Doesn’t need the reference station

There are two versions of this robot for sale, the standard Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera, which has to use boundary wire, and for £399 more, you can get the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera that I have on review, which comes with the EPOS Plug-in for GPS navigation.

The EPOS Plug-in can be bought at any point for £399, so there’s no saving by buying the bundle. I recommend going for the version that you want to use from the start: who wants to lay a load of boundary wire only to not use it after an upgrade?

It is quite an expensive upgrade for the EPOS system, and Husqvarna’s 2026 line-up of lawn mowers (designed for larger gardens, and which cost more) have this technology built in.

And, there’s a difference in the models down to technology: the boundary-wire version can do gardens up to 600m² but the EPOS version with its smarter navigation can do gardens up to 900m².

Before I get into the setup details, I should point out that boundary wire can be combined with the EPOS system. That can make sense for areas with poor coverage, complicated layouts, or for helping the robot navigate through narrow passageways. 

And, there’s a choice to use a reference station or not. If you don’t use a reference station, you have to use the Husqvarna Cloud. With this version, the GPS correction data, which allows the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera to position itself accurately, is transmitted over the internet, so the robot needs full Wi-Fi coverage in the garden (a good excuse to buy the Eero 7 Outdoor), as there’s no cellular option. With the Husqvarna Cloud, positioning is typically better than 5cm.

Alternatively, you can buy the reference station, which then provides more accurate correction data, and improves accuracy to better than 2cm. I’d say that the cloud version will suit most people, but it’s nice to have all of the other options.

I used the Husqvarna Cloud, which made set up easy. I first had to install the base station, by screwing it to the ground, and connecting up power. Once the robot was docked and paired with Wi-Fi and the Automower app, a wizard took me through drawing my first map.

To get a strong GPS signal, the robot needs to drive to an initial reference point, so it needs a couple of meters of free clearance in a straight line from the docking station. Once the robot hits its reference point it then sits there, locking on to satellites.

Then, I had to drive the robot around my garden, locking in the layout and plan. It’s pretty easy to do manually, but there’s no automatic mapping as you get with the Segway Navimow i105E.

Design and components

• Basic display for security
• 440 x 680 x 280mm, 12.2kg
• Dual cutting discs

You’ve got to love Husqvarna’s design, and the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera looks like it means business: sleek, and grey it oozes style and class. Maybe this isn’t the most important aspect, but I’d rather have a nice-looking lawn mower in the garden than a cheap-looking one.

There’s not much on top, bar a Stop button that immediately turns the mower off if it gets into trouble (it will also stop if lifted or flipped over), and a control dial and screen that let me enter the PIN to restart the lawn mower after it had been stopped. There’s basic control over the mower here, and I could pause or restart mowing, too.

Underneath is the business end of the lawn mower, with a main disc providing the regular 22cm cutting width. As with other robot lawn mowers, this one has three razer blades, which can be spun in either direction. You need to keep an eye on these and replace them as they get dull.

There’s also a smaller secondary cutting deck the back of the mower. This is for the EdgeCut system: the robot moves towards a boundary, backs of slightly and then spins around, so it cut right to the border (or close enough), cutting down how much manual grass trimming you need to do.

It works, too, in a fashion: as you’ll find out in the Performance section below, the system needs a bit of a tweak to get it working in all scenarios, but it’s worth it.

Both the robot and the docking station have bright lights on them, that light up the garden. There’s no option to disable the lights in the app, so I used electrical tape to hide them.

Features

• Cutting heights selectable by zone
• Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant support

For most interactions with the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera you’ll want to use the AutoMower app, which is how to all of Husqvarna’s products, including last year’s Husqvarna Automower Aspire R4.

With the new EPOS system, the app is slightly different. Rather than having global settings for how the mower cuts, there are options per zone, accessed via the map. By zoning your garden, you can choose to have different cut heights per zone, say leaving one area more overgrown and one area more like a tennis court or bowling lawn.

Cutting heights are managed by the motorised system, so there’s no need to physically touch the robot. There’s a slider to adjust cutting height between 0.75 inches and 2.25 inches. As I write this, there’s no option to set the height in metric, as you could with the older mowers; it’s a bug that Husvarna knows about. Just so you know, the cutting heights work out to around 20mm to 60mm.

With the EPOS system, there’s no option for Target Height, either. This is one of the highlights of Husqvarna’s other products. At the start of a season, you set the target height, and the robot starts on the highest level and slowly reduces over a couple of weeks to avoid lopping too much off fresh grass. Again, it should be a feature that comes back with an app update.

New to the EPOS model are cutting patterns. The default is random cut, but you can use the map to angle Parallel, Checkboard and Triangle cutting paterns. With Parallel, the robot can use its wheels to flatten the grass and create stripes.

Otherwise, there are some global options. Spiral Cutting lets the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera spin when it detects thicker grass. Weather Timer lets the mower adjust its timers based on how fast the grass is growing. And EdgeCut lets the robot mow as close to the edge as is possible.

Do watch out for the schedule, as this comes pre-programmed to have the robot move out and keep mowing 24 hours a day, seven days a week, popping back to the charger to recharge.

It’s best to tweak this schedule to suit your garden, allowing each scheduled block enough time for the robot to cover the entire garden with any necessary charge cycles in the middle: the mower can go for around 50 minutes and then it takes 40 minutes to recharge.

New to the app is the Schedule Tool, which will recommend a schedule based on the size of your lawn. It makes it easier to automate the lawnmower, but I’d still like it to be a bit smarter: the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera knows how big an area it has to cover, so a schedule should include a start time, with the robot finishing when it calculates it has covered everywhere.

If you don’t want to use the schedule, the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera can be set to go to a target area and mow for a choice of 30 or 90 minutes, or three, six or 12 hours, returning to the dock and parking when its done.

Performance

• Excellent grass cutting
• May need map adjustments for EdgeCut

Big, chunky wheels and powerful motors let the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera deal with bumpy and uneven ground and slopes up to 30%. It even dealt with the divots in my lawn caused by my cats digging holes. Other robots will get stuck and spin their wheels digging a hole, but the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera detects it is stuck and then gently moves and turns until it frees itself, never getting stuck.

Cutting performance is very good, with the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera able to move all around my garden, snipping small bits of grass on each pass. I found general coverage good, with no obvious clumps of missed grass around the lawn.

I did struggle with the EdgeCut feature at first. Every time the lawn mower got close to a border it would stop a few centimetres away, and spin round, leaving quite a border behind. I assumed that this was down to the GPS system not quite being accurate enough, so I edited the map and extended the border to account for this: going further on hard borders, such as decking and the patio, and not quite as far on plant borders.

It took a few goes to get this right, but once the map was perfect, the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera would move up to border, spin and cut pretty much to the edge. That’s brilliant and really did save me time with a grass trimmer.

Obstacle avoidance isn’t so impressive, as this lawn mower doesn’t have a camera or an ultrasonic sensor. In fact, it bumped into my leg a couple of times and would crash into the garden chairs’ legs each time. Sure, the bumping is gentle and won’t cause damage, but if you’ve got a lawn packed with furniture or kids that leave things out, the Segway Navimow i105E is smarter at spotting and avoiding issues.

Final thoughts

The easiest robot lawn mower that I’ve ever set up, the Husqvarna AutoMower 305E Nera can work without the reference station. However, the option to add a reference station and/or boundary wire means that this is the most flexible robot lawn mower, able to work in gardens with very complicated layouts.

Its cutting performance is exceptional, and it works right to the edge of the garden, which no other lawn mower can do. And, it can deal with rough terrain easily. It’s a little expensive and its obstacle avoidance behind the competition, but for flexibility and power there’s nothing better.

How we test

When we publish our reviews, you can rest assured that they are the result of “living with” long term tests.

Robot lawnmowers usually live within an ecosystem, or a range of products that – supposedly – all work in harmony. And they are designed to offer a range of different cleaning options. Therefore, it’s impossible to use a robo mower for a week and deliver a verdict.

Because we’re testing smart home kit all day, everyday, we know what matters and how a particular smart cleaning machine compares to alternatives that you might also be considering.

Our reviews are comprehensive, objective and fair and, of course, we are never paid directly to review a device.