The nice folks from Hexbug sent us their newest toy to review- the Hexbug Spider XL. As the “XL” in the name would imply, this remote control spider is 65% larger than the older regular model and is the largest model in the Hexbug family. First off, it comes in a really cool hexagon-shaped box:

Unboxing it, you’ll notice the spider is big- about 6 inches tall. It also only has 6 six legs. Both the spider and remote are in a clear blue plastic so you can see the inner workings. What’s cool about the Spider XL is that is has true 360 degree movement, you use the right control to spin it’s head around to any direction. Check out our video demo and review:

As you can see, whichever direction the LED light on the head is facing, that’s the way it walks. The spider can walk over slim objects that fit under it’s feet but seemed to have a little trouble going up the iPad’s incline. The spider and remote have 2 channels so you can use multiple units at once. It was actually a lot of fun to play with and obviously great for kids. We loved the full range of motion.

What our junior interns (who are well below the recommended 8+ age group on the box) like with this radio control toy is that it’s MUCH easier to control than a wheeled vehicle because they can stop and steer it without it moving. It takes way less coordination and is less likely to bang into things. The only potential negative we have with this is that it’s very noisy, although that probably does appeal to kids. Very cool toy.

Review: HEXBUG Spider XL