THESE As the gadget-filled spectacle that CES draws to a close, there’s a lot to anticipate and just as much to leave us completely perplexed.
We’ve already talked about the worst finds in the repairability and durability categories during our Worst of CES 2025. Now, we’re turning our eyes to all the weird things occupying the nooks and crannies of the Vegas show floor and making us wonder who decided to devote the time and salary of a team of engineers to such projects.
There’s a lot of weirdness to discover at CES every year, and we’ve narrowed it down to these six items.
Let a robot cool your coffee
Tired of waiting for your hot drink to cool down? Japanese startup Yukai Engineering has the solution: a $25 robot that cools cups for you.
He’s not just a little glorified fan: the Nekojita FuFu includes several algorithmically differentiated blowing modes intended to mimic the different ways a human might blow on a drink to cool it, such as “Look at that!” “, described by the sector as a gradual increase in force “as if [the bot] is captivated by the appearance of food,” or “The Princess,” which involves a series of “elegant, slow, steady increases in strength.”
The startup claims the silicon-coated robot can cool a hot beverage from 88 degrees Celsius to 71 degrees or 66 degrees in three or five minutes, respectively. Without a robot, these same drinks would be at 80 or 77 degrees Celsius in the same three to five minute time frame. Luddites might consider simply brewing tea at your desired temperature to start.
What a great use of all that circuitry and plastic.
Speaking of cat-themed stuff that won’t get used…
Korean tech giant LG came to CES with a lot of stuff and packed away in its ‘Inspire & Innovate’ exposure was a sophisticated cat bed called the “AeroCat Tower” that includes a built-in air purifier.
The imposing scoop-shaped cat bed would have includes sensors that track a cat’s health and weight while it sleeps, and through integration with LG’s ThinQ suite of smart home products, it will deliver all of this information to a smartphone.
But let’s be real: it will make noise, it will get scratched, and the cat will probably prefer the box it came in. No pricing or availability details have been shared for this device that may remain unused.
A robot vacuum cleaner that rewards lazy people even more
It’s one thing to let a robot vacuum the floors for you, but when a manufacturer adds a five-axis mechanical arm to pick up objects in its path, you know humans have reached new heights of laziness.
This is the height of singleness – Click to enlarge
THE Saros Z70 does a lot of things typical of a robot vacuum, but the outfit stands out with a robotic arm capable of lifting up to 300 grams – enough to move small objects out of its way.
The Roborock designer claims that the Z70 is able to recognize a limited number of objects at the moment – including dirty socks, crumpled tissues, shoes and towels – and can move them “to” their intended location, with the intention to train it on other objects later.
People at the show, however, said the Z70 wouldn’t do this in a hurry: it would have It takes about a minute for the arm to move an object out of the robot vacuum’s path, so you should probably stick to not being a total redneck.
L’Oréal invents a machine to sell you more skin serum
There’s something a little cynical about developing a machine that’s supposed to tell you exactly what skin products you need to stop the look of aging when you’re a company that makes those products, but we are there.
L’Oréal, in partnership with the Korean startup NanoEnTek, went to CES to present the Cellular Bioprintinga “lab-on-a-chip” device that provides personalized skin analysis “using advanced proteomics” using nothing more than an adhesive strip placed on the face, removed and inserted into the tabletop box.
Of course, since L’Oreal sells countless anti-aging skin serums, Cell BioPrint is naturally able to test skin samples to determine which ingredients the facial dermis will respond best to in order to sell more products. The beauty giant apparently told CES visitors that it was meant to be used repeatedly, of course, because the products that skin responds to best could vary over time.
No details on pricing or availability were available, with L’Oréal only saying that it plans to test the device later this year in Asia.
Who needs comfortable typing when AI can make things more complicated?
Sometimes CES technology is just plain stupid; other times it’s too engineered to become absurd, as is the case with the Automatic keyboard.
Doesn’t that look cozy? – Click to enlarge
Larger than some laptops, this two-piece mechanical keyboard uses “AI machine vision” to detect when a user wants to switch between the keyboard halves and a hidden trackpad/mouse tray and number pad, all so that You can avoid having to move your hands the bare minimum distance to reach a mouse or trackpad.
Autokeybo also includes an integrated Linux machine, but that still doesn’t excuse the fact that there is now a forearm-sized piece of metal between the user and their keyboard that could end up causing more frustration that it does not relieve when the machine vision The system ends up confusing small movements with the desire to change active parts.
When I work from my home office, I use a split keyboard and make life easier by inserting a trackpad between the two halves. Problem solved, without the need to spend the $700 that the Autokeybo would cost each time it was released.
Talk about a shock to the taste buds
Japanese beer maker Kirin is concerned that people are making their food too dirty. So he developed a $125 electric spoon that tricks the tongue into thinking food is saltier than it actually is.
First available last year, but only sold briefly via lottery, the Kirin electric salt spoon has been presented at CES to show off before Kirin hopes to distribute it more widely, because let’s face it – most of us like salt a little too much.
Being able to be switched between four different salinity modes, the spoon would be able to improve the perception of salty tastes up to 1.5 times compared to the amount of salt in a dish.
This is not without risk, however: since the device uses a slight electrical current to modify the flavor, Kirin recommended [PDF, machine translated] Those who wear medical implants like pacemakers, or who use ECG and other devices, should avoid using them. ®
