THE NEW YORK TIMES: The technology that will invade our lives in 2026

Near the start of each year, I look at what’s new in consumer technology to give a heads-up on which innovations could actually affect your day-to-day life amid the many fads you can ignore.

In the past, many trends showed up on this list repeatedly, like the smart home, fitness tech and electric cars, because the tech took time to mature. (Not everything pans out; while those last two examples became hot, smart home technology still has some rough edges.)

Now, it’s undeniable that generative artificial intelligence, the technology driving chatbots, is rapidly changing how many people use their devices and browse the web.

The AI boom is also driving tech companies to experiment with selling new gadgets that may succeed the smartphone.

And the largely positive consumer sentiment toward self-driving cars has helped Google’s Waymo robot taxis gain traction in major cities, setting up those services to significantly expand this year, including to freeways.

Here are the trends to watch this year.

1. We’ll finally be talking to our computers

For the past 15 years, Apple, Google and Amazon made a big bet that their Siri, Google Assistant and Alexa voice assistants would persuade people to regularly talk to their computers to get things done.

This vision hasn’t exactly panned out. People mostly use voice assistants for a few basic tasks, like checking the weather, playing songs and setting kitchen timers. It’s especially rare to see people talk to voice assistants in public.

But we may finally see a shift in consumer behavior with the surging popularity of AI chatbots like OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini and Anthropic’s Claude.

Lots of people are already conversing with the bots through text. So it’s reasonable to predict that as AI voices begin to sound humanlike, more people will start to talk to their computers, even in public, said Lucas Hansen, a founder of CivAI, a nonprofit that educates people about AI’s capabilities and consequences.

“More and more people are talking to AI, not just as a search engine but as a conversational partner,” he said. “If you can put in your headphones and talk to it just like you’re having a phone call, then it’s less obvious to random people walking by that you’re talking with an AI.”

The robot voices of popular chatbots like ChatGPT and Gemini still sound somewhat fake, and the companies are still working to make them sound more natural.

But Sesame AI, a startup, has been making great strides in developing an AI voice companion with humanlike inflections. This development could make AI more fun to interact with, but also more problematic for those with mental health issues, like people who have had paranoid delusions and even died by suicide after conversing with chatbots, Mr Hansen said.

2. The search continues for a successor to the smartphone

Similar to laptop churn, annual smartphone upgrades have become routine. (Faster, with more battery life and a better camera!)

Although phones are not going away, the acceleration of AI has created an opportunity for tech companies to experiment with devices they hope will be the next mainstream personal computing device, and some companies are betting hard on smart glasses.

Ray-Ban Meta glasses, which people use to take photos and listen to music, have been a modest hit, with millions of sales to date. Now, Meta is doubling down.

Late last year, the company started selling the Meta Ray-Ban Display, which includes a digital display to show data and apps in the corner of a wearer’s eye.

Other tech companies, including Google and the startup Pickle, have unveiled similar glasses with screens.

If this sounds familiar, that’s because it is. Google famously tried to sell Google Glass, a headset with a transparent display and camera, more than a decade ago.

The device was a spectacular flop in large part because it was ugly, gimmicky and creepy to people who didn’t enjoy being surveilled.

This time, tech companies are hoping the chatty AI companions built into their glasses can make the devices more appealing.

Apple is still betting that the next big thing after the phone is a new-and-improved phone.

This year, the company plans to release its first iPhone with a screen that can be unfolded like a book to increase its size to resemble a smaller iPad, according to a person briefed on the product, who was not authorised to speak about the product publicly.

Competitors like Google and Samsung have sold foldable phones for years, but the devices have remained a niche, in part because of their high price (upward of $1,800) and issues with durability.

An Apple spokesperson declined to comment.

3. AI is changing how we browse the web

AI is transforming the web, whether we like it or not. When we do a Google search, an AI-generated response is usually the first thing we see. Meta’s AI chatbot is built into Instagram and WhatsApp, with no option to turn it off.

Companies including OpenAI and the Browser Co. have also released web browsers with built-in AI assistants that answer our questions about the websites we are perusing.

In Windows, Microsoft now includes an AI assistant, Copilot, that answers users’ questions. AI has become nearly unavoidable.

(The New York Times has sued OpenAI and Microsoft, claiming copyright infringement of news content related to AI systems. The companies have denied those claims.)

To set itself apart, Mozilla, the maker of the Firefox web browser, has taken a less aggressive approach with AI.

Last year, it added AI tools to Firefox for summarising articles and getting help from an assistant, but, instead of turning on the features by default, it said users had a choice to opt in.

Nonetheless, expect the AI-ification of the web to continue this year.

Google has said it is planning to embed its AI technology into its apps we rely on every day, such as Gmail, for summarising emails and composing responses.

Google this year is also expected to expand AI Mode, its new search engine that lets people talk to an AI assistant to get answers to their questions, with new tools for shopping online and booking restaurant tables.

4. Self-driving taxis are becoming widespread

In a sure sign that robot taxis are here to stay, Waymo, Google’s self-driving taxi service, is pressing forward with a major expansion despite a citywide meltdown in San Francisco.

Last month, after a power outage in San Francisco caused Waymos to block intersections and get stuck in traffic, the company suspended services for one day.

The incident raised questions about how the cars could pose safety risks in emergency situations such as earthquakes and blackouts.

Waymo said that the disabled traffic lights had caused delays in the cars’ response times, which contributed to congestion, and that it would learn from the incident.

Some city officials defended the service, noting that robot taxis are still generally safer than human drivers. The overall sentiment toward self-driving taxis remains positive.

“From a safety perspective, they follow the rules,” said Carolina Milanesi, a consumer technology analyst for Creative Strategies, a research firm. “A lot of the negativity that was there in the beginning has gone away.”

Late last year, Waymo, which operates 2,500 vehicles in the San Francisco Bay Area, Phoenix, Los Angeles, Atlanta and Austin, Texas, started allowing some riders to take the robot taxis on freeways, including to airports.

Zoox, Amazon’s self-driving taxi service, also started offering rides in San Francisco, and Tesla has been testing its vehicles in the city. And this week, Uber unveiled its new robot taxi, which it plans to roll out this year.

In other words, if you haven’t ridden in a self-driving car yet, this year may finally be the time.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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