Here’s the smart home tech I hope to see at CES 2025

The Consumer Electronics Show, known as CES, is the premier annual event for consumer brands unveiling new products. The sheer size of the event taking over Las Vegas January 5th to 10this difficult to understand, as is that Width of the products represented there. Smart home technology is such a big part of the pie that this year it has its own section of the event at The Venetian.

In a sense, when we talk about what we hope to see at CES, we are actually saying what we hope to see at CES next year, because most of the things at CES aren’t quite ready for the mass market yet. While I’ve gotten a first look at what many companies will be releasing for CES in 2025, there are still a few types of products that I really hope to see more of.

More types of sensors for better automation

Sensors are an important part of a smart home toolboxserves as a trigger for various actions. Their usefulness depends on two factors: that they work reliably and that the automation software offers enough flexibility in use. There is still a lot of room for improvement in both factors.

There are many brands that offer sensors with poor reliability – especially those that measure water and temperature. So, in general, I would like to see more big brands in this space releasing basic sensors (motion, light, occupancy, temperature and water) that you can trust.

Aside from improving what we already have, there are some newer areas that smart sensors would like to explore. Given the explosion of smart lights we’re expecting at CES, I’d like to see better and more sensitive light sensors that can detect a color change – I dream of being able to run automation where my robot mop is triggered by a sensor detecting that For example, the white tiles are no longer white due to dirt. I would also like to have sensors that compare indoor and outdoor air quality and show in more detail where air problems are coming from, as well as weight sensors that can run automations based on weight change – for example a sensor for food and water dishes that tell me how much my dog ​​ate and drank today.

We already know that Aqara is the most trusted name in sensors rumored publish a new one Presence sensor. As exciting as this is, I’d like to see more sensors from them – ones that push into new areas of imaging, like I mentioned above.

Important improvements in vacuum and mowing robots, please

This year I played with countless vacuum cleaners, several lawn mowers and even a few personal robots like this Enabot. I assume that this year, as in previous years, we will see great progress in robot vacuum cleaners. I expect the suction power to be absurdly high and the robots to develop completely new capabilities. We had one Stair climbing robot So I expect we’ll see more robots with this kind of dexterity in the last year. Switchbot started playing with the idea of ​​a robot empty as a household butler transporting water from the source to humidifiers, and I expect this idea to continue to expand. If the robot can move water, what else can it move for you?

What I would like to see with robot vacuum cleaners is consistency in high-end models – by now they should all have a compartment for cleaning fluid on board the charging station, and they should all have the option to be controlled via remote control in the charging station app .

I would like to see robotic vacuum cleaner assistants disappear completely: they are unhelpful, uncultured, and just another unwanted voice in my house. Instead, I would like to see robot vacuum cleaners be better integrated into existing voice assistants.

I would also like to see robot vacuums take on baseboards. I’m sure this seems small, but brands obsess over how close their robots get to the wall and yet ignore the baseboards, which remain dirty and ignored. Narwal has started to address this problem, albeit in the simplest way possible, by attaching a muff to the robot that sweeps the baseboard, but that’s not enough.

I expect we’ll see a lot of robotic lawnmowers this year, which is exciting. I predict this Yarbo and MowratorMost lawnmowers will also do “more,” including picking up and throwing out leaves. What I’m hoping for is more stability in mid-sized models, with stronger wheels that can easily handle slopes and hills, but with a tighter turning radius that won’t tear up your lawn. I would like to see a fleet of small robot lawnmowers that are perfect for small lawns and can be sold at tiny prices. I wouldn’t want more lawn prints that allow motifs to be mowed into the lawn. Although it sounded exciting, in practice it turned out to be pretty silly.

Will we finally get our personal robots this year?

Remember ballfrom Samsung? I would like this to be the year that real personal robots make it to the consumer market in a real way. So far I’m not impressed with the ones I’ve tried. I have an Enabot that is supposed to follow my dog, but so far it keeps running into my washing machine. Personal robots don’t have to do everything yet, but I really believe that these robots could provide emotional support and light physical assistance with household chores or technical tasks. But in order for this to succeed, a brand must (please) already bring a good product onto the market.

Better smart lighting throughout your home

In the last year, smart home technology has deeply infiltrated the world New construction and renovation market. It’s not enough to have a smart bulb or a lamp on a smart outlet, now everything from recessed lights to closet lights to permanent outdoor lights are smart. I hope the renovation market continues to grow, which benefits tenants.

I’ve noticed a massive uptick in entertainment lighting in the last year – floor lamps that can be any color, bendable foam lights that resemble Neon lightseven light curtains. After falling in love with my glow Nanoleaf Lights, I would like to see more exploration of LED smart lights inside the house and offices that look like they’re for adults, not just kids. There’s really no reason anymore that the lighting in your home can only be set to white, and when all of your lights can work together and create changing color schemes, your whole house becomes one big light therapy factory.

Where else can smart locks go?

Every time I think the smart locks have all been figured out, something new comes out that improves things yet again. The first facial recognition locks came out this year, then the handprint lock, and now it looks like it’s Eufy will announce it a lock with palm recognition. It feels like Star Trek.

My biggest wish for smart locks is that they work better when retrofitting older homes, which arguably need the most security. There are still many types of older locks that offer few or no smart lock upgrade options. I’d also like to see some smart locks that look like many of our homes: stately and sophisticated rather than cold and modern.

Better and safer smart cameras

This year, smart cameras picked up a few trends: Continuous recording 24/7which is more informative than the clips we were used to. We also saw an explosion Off-grid cameras which worked well and only required solar power. The downside to these cameras is the amount of data they consume since they are not connected to WiFi.

I would like to see better compression of this video on off-grid cameras to make them more usable. I would also like to see the cameras become smaller and less visible. At the moment I’m only interested in PTZ (Point, Tilt, Zoom) cameras and wonder why anyone would buy anything else, so I would also like to see fewer static angle cameras. Ultimately, I hope to see better security around these cameras and real ways to secure the feeds.

Standards, hubs and automation

I don’t actually want to, but I expect that many brands will try to relaunch their hubs as multi-hubs – that is, as platforms that not only control that brand’s devices, but also allow them to integrate and interact with them All your devices allow devices from different brands.

Most people use Google, Apple or Amazon for this. Personally, I would prefer brands to focus on exceptional integration with existing large multi-hubs. Of course I would like to see it Object– the connection standard that was supposed to revolutionize the smart home by doing away with all your smart hubs and apps so you only needed one – used as a connection method in all new devices. The material took a long time to introduce, but I still believe in its potential.

I would also like automation to be easier with our assistants and multi-hubs. While AI has started to play a role (Google recently added Gemini as a possibility). automation help, but I found it cumbersome), the automation remains pretty monotonous for most users. It’s often said, “If this happens, do that.” It’s difficult to run multi-step automations or dependent automations with more than one condition. I would like to see this change.