If there were an unofficial slogan for the Consumer Electronics Show this year, it would be Evolutionary, not revolutionary. Let's be honest, groundbreakers were in short supply at CES this year. There was no news out of Vegas that blew our socks off. Not that this is a terrible thing.
The good just got better. Drones are still commanding the air space. Cars continue to work hard on driving themselves. Virtual reality keeps on climbing. Our homes are getting smarter and smarter. Televisions are reaching the apex of perfection. Technology continues to become more personal as self quantification is still all the rage. And at the core of our world, our namesake even, the mighty PC still looms large, albeit slightly smaller and sleeker than the year before.
With yards and yards of convention center space, thousands of products, plenty of opinionated analysts and editors at CES, it wasn't exactly a breeze to finalize our top picks, but we fought it out to bring you this list of 18 standouts. Many of these products, we believe, will be key in shaping the tech landscape for the next 12 months. And some of them might not even make it to market. A good number of our Best of CES 2015 winners were top performers in our lab last year, while some vanished into the ether. You can take a look at how our 2015 picks fared, but for now, here are the most interesting, innovative, and important things we saw at CES 2016. –Wendy Sheehan Donnell