LIGIANT S30 Pro: My 6-Year-Old Can Mow With It
A 9-inch mower that weighs less than a bag of dog food. I put my 10-year-old and my 6-year-old on it, and then took it up the hill in my back yard.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RU1YnOvfj_o
THE VERDICT
If you have a small yard, tight corners, or a kid whose chore this is going to be, this is the mower. It's light enough that my 6-year-old could push it and quiet enough at 73 decibels that the neighbours won't file a complaint. The 9-inch deck is the whole point and the whole limitation: it goes where a 16-inch mower can't, and it will take you a while to do a big lawn. The one genuine annoyance is that the tilt safety can cut out on a slope.
Every mower review is written by an adult pushing a mower. This LIGIANT S30 Pro review has a different test: I handed it to my 10-year-old, and then to my 6-year-old, because mowing the lawn is my son Tommy's chore and the machine I already own is too much mower for him to turn around.
That's the honest use case for a 9-inch mower, and it's not the one the box talks about.
The test that actually matters: can a kid use it?
Yes. Both of them.
My 10-year-old got on it first and had no trouble at all. Then my 6-year-old had a go, and he could push it and steer it too. That's the entire argument for this machine. My other mower is heavy enough that the boys can't turn it around at the end of a row, which means it isn't really their chore, which means it's mine.
It's easy enough for a 10-year-old to use. And it turned out it was easy enough for the 6-year-old too.
It weighs about 13lb with the battery in. For reference, LIGIANT list the bare machine at 9.26lb, so the battery is most of the difference. Either way it's closer to a vacuum cleaner than to a lawn mower.
The hill, and the one thing that annoyed me
My front yard is flat, so I took it round the back where there's a slope and a proper little hill. It handled both fine and was genuinely easy to push up the incline, which is not what I expected from something this light.
But this is where the safety system gets in the way. The mower has a tilt sensor, and it only runs between 10 and 75 degrees. Outside that range it stops itself. On a hill you can catch that cutoff and have the motor shut off on you mid-row.
I want to be fair about this: it's a safety feature doing its job, and I'd rather have it than not on a machine a six-year-old is pushing. But it's the one finicky thing about the mower, and if your lawn is mostly slope you'll meet it.
How the safety start works
1. Press the safety lock button in.
2. Pull the switch bar back while holding it.
3. The mower needs to be sitting between 45 and 75 degrees to start at all.
4. Once running, the working range is 10 to 75 degrees; outside that it auto-stops.
Two deliberate actions to start, which is exactly right for a machine you're handing to a child.
LIGIANT S30 Pro specs
Cutting width 220mm (just under 9in)
Power 400W
Motor 6,000 RPM brushless, with overload protection
Cutting heights 30mm, 40mm, 50mm (about 1in, 1.5in, 2in)
Weight about 13lb with battery (9.26lb bare)
Noise about 73 decibels
Safe tilt range 10 to 75 degrees
Battery LIGIANT proprietary, slides into the deck
Storage stands upright
Runtime up to 50 minutes, per LIGIANT (I didn't time this one)
Note on that last row: the runtime figure is LIGIANT's, not mine. I didn't run a timed battery test on this mower, so I'm not going to pretend the number is measured. Treat it as a claim.
Assembly and cutting height
Assembly is about five minutes. The connector rod takes a washer and a screw to make it rigid, the handle sections click on with plastic wings and fold down, and the battery slides into its compartment until it clicks. That's it.
The height lever is on the side and gives you three positions. I used the middle one, 40mm or about an inch and a half, for the test. Drop to 30mm if you like it short, go to 50mm if the lawn has got away from you.
What I liked
✦ Light enough that my kids can actually do the chore. That's not a spec, that's the reason to buy it.
✦ 9 inches wide means it gets under and around lawn furniture where a 14 to 16 inch mower simply can't.
✦ 73 decibels. If you have neighbours who mind noise, this is a real advantage over anything petrol.
✦ Brushless motor with built-in overload protection, which is more than my gas mower offers.
✦ Stores upright and takes up almost no space in a garage or shed.
✦ Two-step safety start. Sensible for a machine kids will use.
What I didn't
✦ The tilt safety can cut out on a hill. It's the mower doing what it's designed to do, but it's the thing that will irritate you on a slope.
✦ A 9-inch deck is a 9-inch deck. Tight spaces are its whole reason to exist; a big open lawn will take a lot of passes.
✦ The battery is proprietary. You're in LIGIANT's ecosystem, not sharing packs with tools you already own.
Should you buy the LIGIANT S30 Pro?
Buy it if your lawn is small or your kid is mowing it
Small yard, tight corners, lawn furniture to work around, or a child you'd like to hand the chore to: this is the mower, and I don't know of a better argument for it than a six-year-old pushing it around unaided.
Skip it if you've got real acreage or a steep yard
Under half an acre of open lawn and you'll want a wider deck; my RYOBI 40V does that job. And if your yard is mostly hill, the tilt cutoff will find you.