The 5 Big Themes At CES 2016

CES 2016 is upon us – and with it, lots of exciting gadgets to admire, critique and point fingers at. We may all have some personal favourites we’re expecting this January, but there are a few big themes dominating the exhibition this year.

In this post we explore what these are and who will be taking the spot light in each category.

Smart Homes

Our quest for smart living seems to be speeding up. But even though we are already way past the miracle of having the lights turn on automatically as we enter the room, there is still plenty of room to keep moving forward. The talk of the smart home town is integration and connectivity with old and new players in the industry working towards getting everything in our homes not simply talk, but rather communicate.

Apple and Google are the two big names taking a crack at talking some sense into our households in the coming year while Samsung and Intel step up their game. We may not yet be seeing a comprehensive picture of what’s to come, but most of the pieces should already be there.

Wearables

If it ain’t smart…don’t wear it. This may have been the message we kept hearing all through 2015, with major names in tech and fashion coming together for the smart accessory revolution. What happened later is in the eye of the beholder. Some think the time of smart wearables is upon us, while others are still holding on to their mechanical watches. CES 2016 may not be setting the record straight just yet, but we are sure to see some upgrades. Hearables will be the new hot thing to watch out for – turns out, your headphones have the potential of doing way more.

Rideables

Hoverboards may have been the talk of the tech world in 2015, but they were not the only rideables on offer – and the trend promises to continue into 2016. Electric motors are big and most of things on wheels will be getting one. Among them is Arcimoto, showing off its new three-wheeled electric vehicle. Inboard will be showing off a skateboard with electric motors in the wheels. And so on.

Its not just the personal electronic vehicles that will see progress, we expect to see a number of innovations for your automobiles, not just on the entertainment side but also with the vehicles themselves.  While these innovations may not make it to the roads in 2016 they will certainly give a clear indication on what we can expect from the future and how driver-less cars are progressing.

One sad note to CES 2016 is the restriction on hoverboards – exhibitors can show them, but nobody can ride them. Bummer.

Virtual Reality

Dubbed the era of VR, 2016 will have a lot to prove when it comes to wearable and stationary virtual reality gadgets. However, this may not be happening at the CES exactly. The exhibition comes at a strange time, when most of the projects are still in the development stage. With this said, we are still waiting for surprises from Sony, Oculus and HTC. There are also possibilities for new players to jump on board – whether in the headset or content field. “VR-ready” is sure to be a great selling point for most of the new tech in the entertainment industry.

Drones

You don’t need to be a fortune teller to predict that drones will feature heavily at the CES this year. while the likes of DJI may have given there devices a few nice tweaks for the conference expect rivals like Parrot, and newcomers to  announce newer models that are likely to feature much more in the areas of photography & video recording capabilities.

Among other popular CES themes, one can’t avoid mentioning the good familiar phones, tablets, computers and those lush TV Screens that will all be on show at the Las Vegas event. While the ideas are not new, the upgrades and extra features are, and we are sure to see quite a few ground-breaking announcements.