The next time someone tells you innovation is dead, point them to the darlings of CES 2025—robot vacuums that can pick up your socks, sprout legs, and check out that suspicious noise coming from the other room.
Armed and fastidious: Roborock and Dreame unveiled robovacs that come with a pincer so that they can pick up and move small objects—such as socks and washcloths—and drop them in a bin to clear a path for vacuuming. Roborock says its max capacity is 300 grams (a little more than half a pound), while Dreame says its arm can lift up to 500 grams (a little more than a pound), which means it can pick up something as heavy as a shoe.
A leg up on competition: Dreame’s robovac also has “legs” for climbing that can propel itself onto surfaces up to two inches high, perfect for small elevation changes between rooms, but not long enough that you have to worry about the robovac appearing upstairs in your bedroom at 2am wondering why you can’t put your socks in the hamper yourself.
One robovac can fight crime: And not just crimes of laziness—Samsung’s Jet Bot Combo AI robot vacuum can detect intruders when you’re not scheduled to be home. Samsung told Wired that if another Samsung smart appliance detects unrecognized movement, that washing machine or refrigerator can send the robovac to take a picture of a potential burglar who won’t want to tell anyone in jail how he got caught.—DL
This report was originally published by Morning Brew.