Robots and AI dominate major trade show in Las Vegas

By Liam Hibbert
The Center Square

Make way for the robots.

Artificial intelligence is front and center at the famed Consumer Electronics Show, which took over Las Vegas this week at multiple venues. AI is part of the new technology that was unveiled across a variety of industries and put on display in front of tens of thousands of visitors from more than 150 countries.

The global event, which can act as a benchmark for the coming year’s tech, has indicated an even further lean into AI, with a focus on hardware and health products.

“This year the big trend that we’re seeing is AI moving from the cloud into hardware,” CES spokesperson Katie O’Grady told The Center Square on Thursday. “A big trend right now is robotics. We’re seeing a lot of humanoid robotics, a lot of manufacturing-focused robotics that are powered by AI.”

Robotics have been in the works for years. But proponents at CES 2026 are saying that the time is finally coming where AI and physical robots are beginning to work together. Several companies showed that off, from Boston Dynamics’ humanoid Atlas to LG’s laundry-folding CLOiD robot and one of O’Grady’s favorites – Roborock’s Saros Rover – a stair-climbing automated vacuum cleaner.

“It’s the time now to move from research and development toward the deployment and commercialization of these robots,” said Ignacio Contreras, vice president of marketing at semiconductor chip manufacturer company Qualcomm.

Contreras made those comments while humanoid models were operating on their chips on the stage at the trade show.

“Every single year we’re seeing it get a little bit more tangible,” said O’Grady. “Right now, AI sounds a little bit science fiction-y to folks who aren’t as enmeshed in the tech world, but it is starting to be in more and more of the products that we use every single day.”

“We used to say that every company is a tech company, and now it’s looking more and more like every company is an AI company in some capacity,” O’Grady noted. She added that AI is more present than ever at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show. “ There’s just no way around it.”

Of the many unique ideas emerging in the AI-related world is startup Mangoslab’s Nemonic Dot. The manufacturer says the speech-to-braille label printer allows blind people to easily label their own items, such as medicine or spices, by simply speaking and printing out a transcribed braille-dotted sheet.

The health industry, alongside robotics, was one of the main focuses of this year’s CES. Digital health, as CES called it, is a booming industry.

Wearable medical devices, such as Fitbits, are expected to grow from a roughly $100 billion industry today to $500 billion by 2034, according to Fortune Business Insights. But the changes to the health industry, O’Grady said, are not out of step.

“When you go to the doctor, half of what you interact with is a robot. You go in for an X-ray; there’s a robot in there,” said O’Grady. “Even checking in half the time there’s a robot involved. It’s digital everything.”

The health industry products at CES 2026 are a possible preview of this year’s consumer trends.

Withings’ Smart Scale, which tracks a variety of body measurements from weight to cardiovascular age, was one of the more focused-on products. Also on display was a number of updated wearable devices, including Oura’s latest generation of medical rings, which claimed to be able to more accurately track women’s periods and fertility.

“Having information about your health is incredibly important to being able to make decisions about your health, and seek treatment for your health” said O’Grady. “So I think with wearables and digital health in general, the trend is just more and more information about your body. And then the next step, I think, is using AI to create insights and figure out actions that you can take from that data.”

As has been expressed for products across much of the tech industry, concerns have been brought up over data usage and privacy for medical information gained from wearable tech. Oura was recently involved in its own privacy-related scandal with connections made by online users between the tech company and military contractor Palantir, which has been widely reported as an overblown and misconstrued concern.

Subjects such as AI drew many to this year’s CES. Organizers told The Center Square that they could not confirm attendance data until the end of the four-day event, but said they felt good about this year’s attendance following 2025’s 140,000 visitors.