CES 2025 officially kicks off in Las Vegas on Tuesday morning, running through the end of the day on January 10. The “official” dates are specific to when the Las Vegas Convention Center floor is open to attendees, and ultimately negate the show’s true duration. A two-day press day kicks off on Sunday with several smaller events leading up to a flurry of press conferences on January 6.
Press conference
We’ll be watching the following with a close eye here are TechCrunch:
AMD: (Monday at 11am PT/2pm ET) AMD has its work cut out for it at CES 2025. Competitor Nvidia has sucked the oxygen out of every room it has charm, as the chipmaker remains at the forefront of the AI boom. So how will AMD compete with the reported Nvidia RTX 5000 announcement? The company should show off its next-generation GPU. As part of an ongoing rebranding, the RDNA 4 cards may come as either the RX 8000 or RX 9000 series.
Toyota: (Monday at 4pm PT/7pm ET) We expect chairman Akio Toyoda to visit Woven City, the carmaker’s “living laboratory.” Our automotive editor Kirsten Korosec adds: “Details are scarce on what exactly will be revealed. TechCrunch, which was at the initial announcement in 2020, will be watching to see how startups will be incorporated into the Woven City and whether Toyota followed through on its plans to build a fully connected ecosystem powered by fuel cells with hydrogen.
Samsung: (Monday at 5pm PT/8pm ET) Samsung’s CES presser is always an odd duck. The Korean electronics giant generally keeps its dust dry when it comes to consumer electronics. After all, it is expected to introduce its latest flagship phone – the Galaxy S25 – at the end of January. CES 2025 will continue the company’s tradition of televisions and appliances. There are also odds and ends like consumer bots that will most likely never see the light of day. Samsung has adopted the tagline “AI for everyone: Every day, everywhere” for the presentation.
Nvidia: (Monday at 6:30pm PT/9:30pm ET) Nvidia will undoubtedly have the biggest CES 2025. After all, the company has almost everything bigger these days. The chip giant has a $3.4+ trillion market cap, largely due to its fundamental position in the ongoing AI boom. Companies like OpenAI and Meta have been buying Nvidia processors by the load, and that’s unlikely to change in the new year. Founder and CEO Jensen Huang will help kick off CES 2025 “with his trademark leather jacket and unwavering vision,” according to Nvidia.
Next day’s keynotes include Twitter/X CEO Linda Yaccarino at 1:30pm PT and Delta CEO Ed Bastian at 5:00pm PT. The latter, in particular, will take place at the jam band hot spot, Sphere. Both will be available to stream on the official CES YouTube page.
trends
The hot topic of the show will almost certainly be the only thing anyone in tech seems to be talking about these days: AI. This is nothing new for CES, of course. The category has been at the forefront for years, with the 2024 show offering some of the earliest AI-powered consumer devices.
The Rabbit R1 was, perhaps, the standout from last year’s show. The handset generated a lot of buzz at the event, though as with other AI gadgets like Humane’s AI pin, the product failed to live up to any expectations.
However, the topic will not be limited to this product. This year, every product that it doesn’t mention of AI in some form will be in a small minority. As mentioned above, Nvidia and AMD will go head to head on the chip front. Nvidia will be a particular focus, as the chipmaker sets the pace for AI in 2025, including the release of the highly anticipated GeForce RTX 50 GPU. The company will also touch on other key categories, including robotics and transportation .
Artificial intelligence will grace everything from cars to refrigerators this year. Some apps will be really useful, but many – if not most – will be a solution in search of a problem. This is always an important thing to keep in mind at an event like CES. It’s a big show; Last year it hosted 4,300 companies and nearly 140,000 participants. There is a lot of noise, and many AI “apps” exist to try to rise above it.
Over the past decade, CES has grown into one of the best auto shows of the year. That’s largely driven by automakers’ bids to become cutting-edge pioneers: Where better to show it off than the biggest consumer tech show of the year? The 2021 addition of the Las Vegas Convention Center’s new West Hall has facilitated that expansion.
Questions remain about whether CES can maintain its status as a major auto show. Anecdotally, fewer big names seem to be participating in a meaningful way, including US manufacturers like Ford. This is likely, in part, due to the return of the North American International Auto Show to Detroit after a year off. This event is set to start on January 10th, overlapping with CES.
That doesn’t mean there won’t be big headlines from Vegas next week. In addition to Toyota’s participation, Sony’s press conference should once again feature Afeela, the company’s collaboration with Honda. Firms like Hyundai — which now owns Boston Dynamics — are likely to show its focus on humanoids and other robotics.
Robotics has increasingly become a focal point for CES in recent years. I foresee most transportation companies discussing this topic, from production to eVTOL. The auto industry has been at the cutting edge of automated manufacturing for years, a fact accelerated by various employment and supply chain crises since the pandemic. eVTOLs, meanwhile, scored a major FAA victory late last year.
CES continues to be a major launch pad for computer monitors. In fact, Samsung, ASUS and MSI announced the addition of the “world’s first” 27-inch 4K OLED monitors with 240Hz refresh rate. Smart devices always get a lot of love at shows. LG has already revealed a bunch of news on this front. Samsung should follow suit in its press conferences on Monday.
After a prolonged lull, I foresee a new wave of smart home devices. Between interoperability through the Matter standard, the explosion of generational AI platforms, and a second wind for smart assistants from Google, Amazon, and Apple, companies will show how these devices can excel where their predecessors failed.
After the last advertising cycle, augmented reality still has a lot to prove. The Vision Pro hasn’t taken off as Apple had hoped, and competitors are struggling to compete with the Meta’s ability to subsidize the Quest’s cost. Big names in the space like HTC and Magic Leap have focused primarily on enterprise applications. Chipmakers like Qualcomm, however, are still very much focused on making a splash.
