AI gadgets of 2025: Black Mirror meets reality

When I recently wrote about the most noteworthy AI gadgets of 2024, I couldn’t help but wonder if the tech industry was nearing the limit of what’s possible with AI. But just a few weeks into 2025, the answer is already a resounding “no”—there is no limit in sight.

Indeed, what we can achieve with AI seems unbounded, as the recent CES 2025 event in Las Vegas proved. New AI products were unveiled, showcasing astonishing features and making unbelievable promises, practically taken out of a Black Mirror episode.

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2024, a year of AI breakthroughs and backlash

2024 is drawing to a close, marking itself as one of the most influential and significant years in Artificial Intelligence (AI) history. Let’s take a moment to recap the changes that have defined this year, when AI transcended from a buzzword to become a product in itself.

We’ve dealt with failed gadgets, like the Humane Ai Pin. This wearable integrated a camera, a projector and a speaker into a magnetic pin. The gadget replicated some smartphone functionalities, and its sleek design offered a certain wow factor. But it did it all in the worst ways possible, forgetting usability and affordability.

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AI: the good, bad, ugly and everything in between

ChatGPT gained mainstream popularity in 2023 and changed how Big Tech companies approached artificial intelligence (AI). This marked a major turning point in the AI Wars, a race between leading tech companies to develop the most advanced AI technology.

While AI has been studied and developed for decades, Large Language Models (LLMs) have managed to capture the consumer market’s imagination. Conversational and generative AI finally feels human-like, especially now that models are being trained using massive datasets.

Mainstream media has struggled to explain what LLMs are and what they can actually do, often focusing on the most alarming aspects of these AI models’ capabilities. Will AI eliminate our jobs? Will AI cause the end of the world? Will AI abuse your personal data?

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The future of tech: a symphony of devices

Close your eyes and imagine it’s the year 2035. You’re working on a new and exciting project. You gathered information and conducted interviews with experts in your topic. You start a draft with some informal notes. You play some music to set the mood, and get to write your first paragraph. But what device did you picture using in this creative process?

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Apple Vision Pro: the next big thing in tech?

Apple’s new Vision Pro headset is a major step forward for augmented reality, but it’s full of limitations. It allows users to interact with apps in the real world, but it’s bulky, and it uses a tethered connection to a battery pack. As I was watching the presentation, I couldn’t stop thinking that Apple is being held hostage by its own five-year-old business plan.

Apple Vision Pro as shown at the WWDC 2023 event

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I give up on foldable phones

Six months. That’s the time I have enjoyed (and disliked) my first foldable smartphone. I’m going back to the slab form factor. I feel disappointed and even defeated; I truly tried to make it work, but the issues I detected one month after buying the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 eventually became a dealbreaker for me.

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Why foldable phones are not the next big thing

When I started using the new Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 —my first foldable device—, I was convinced that folding phones were going to be the next big thing. I thought that over the next few years most people would end up with a foldable smartphone. Now, a bit over a month into using one myself, I’m not so sure anymore.

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The afterlife of an electric vehicle’s battery

The electrification of the car industry is still in its baby years, and yet we should already be thinking of what will happen in a few years, when millions of electric vehicles (EVs) start getting retired.

In 2021, EV sales more than doubled to 6.6 million, representing close to 9% of the global car market and more than tripling their market share from two years earlier [1]. Assuming that the average lifespan of an EV battery pack is 10 to 15 years, we will soon start seeing the first electric cars getting retired.

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Unboxing the metaverse

Facebook is now Meta and the Facebook app is now part of the metaverse. Mark Zuckerberg introduced a rebranding of the parent company that owns properties like Instagram, WhatsApp or Oculus, and at the same time introduced the world to their vision of the future, the metaverse.

Regardless of whether or not you saw Meta’s presentation video, you might be wondering what the metaverse actually is. Is it a mix of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) devices and apps? Is it a development platform where content creators can create VR/AR experiences? Is it an actual virtual place where users can go online to meet other like-minded people?

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I cannot wait for the 2027 iPhone

Another year, another iPhone with minimal changes. Virtually identical to the 2017 design except for the flat edges, the iPhone 12 that Apple recently announced doesn’t surprise. It pleases, but it doesn’t dazzle. 5G and a series of back magnets, named MagSafe, complete the highlights of a device that will sell well, but that won’t do anything to push the envelope.

Is there anything else Apple can do with the iPhone of the future? Of course: a high-frequency display, more and better cameras, eliminate “the notch”, resuscitate Touch ID… all iterative improvements. Fun for some, boring for most.

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