Whether you attended CES 2025 or not, a few features about this massive tech showcase event distinguished themselves to folks watching and taking in the flood of tech-savvy info dumps streaming out from Las Vegas. But several trends stood out this year’s CES, from our point of view.
AI is not going anywhere, and its use will keep expanding
If artificial intelligence (AI) was big at last year’s CES, then at this year’s show, tech companies doubled down. Whether AI was essential or not, AI was seemingly baked into most new product reveals and showcases. That means, as consumers, we can expect to see AI in most new feature bullet points for new tech products shown at CES that are rolled out this year. eMarketer sums up some of the more unusual entries into AI-powered products, such as bird feeder, a pet collar, and a spice dispenser.
For gamers, of course, some of these innovations revealed at CES will have meaningful impact. For example, NVIDIA showed off their soon-to-be-released GeForce RTX 50 series GPUs (based on AI data center-class Blackwell architecture) with AI-enhanced features, such as neural shaders, geometry and lighting Not to be outdone, semiconductor giant and NVIDIA competitor, AMD, announced Ryzen AI Max chips, which are aimed at top-end gaming-class laptops. These chips are expected to feature up to 128GB of unified memory, and on the AI side, a neural processing unit (NPU) that can achieve a 50 TOPS (trillions of operations per second) benchmark.
Among all the hardware and software examples at CES we could share, one that was pretty unique was an attention-getting demo by hardware company, Razer — namely, Project AVA, a gaming and esports AI coach. At CES 2025, it was a concept, but the company is taking sign-ups for Project AVA beta testing.
Many social media posts reflected this awareness how AI has quickly been integral to many of the products shown at CES 2025:
Wrapping up CES 2025 and it’s clear one thing: AI is everywhere.
From Nvidia’s cutting-edge AI software and powerful new gaming chips to Google’s innovative generative AI features for TV apps, this year’s CES showcased how artificial intelligence is transforming every corner of… pic.twitter.com/wlIWjlSXH2
— Eldon Conceicao (@eldon_conceicao) January 10, 2025
Influencer and content creator impact growing
With CES making arguably its biggest post-COVID era impact this year, influencers and content creators, such as Twitch streamers and YouTubers, are making a bigger splash this year in the media and journalism mix. The changing mix is not by accident either. According to a PR Week post:
“It’s just slightly shifting,” she (Cecile Missildine, EVP and head of EMEA for Archetyp) explains. “It’s amazing the number of journalists, and some clients are amazed with the quality and quantity of media, and the additional layer [of influencers].”
CES itself has played no small part in attracting influencers and content creators. The organizers launched a dedicated “creator space” for this week’s event, with prime real estate in the Central Hall Lobby of the Las Vegas Convention Center and sponsorship by Sony.
Of course, social media overflowed with clips, snapshots and takes on the new creator space offered, including from CES organizers themselves.
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NEW: CES has a dedicated creator space for 2025, which aligns with the trend of mainstream tech events embracing content creators. While mainstream media is still important, having a large following opens doors to opportunities once reserved for traditional outlets. pic.twitter.com/mPhvklIeV8
— Rich DeMuro (@richontech) January 7, 2025
With the larger, more diverse media mix at CES 2025, content creators and influencers have been changing how companies, marketers, and events themselves are reaching out and soliciting attention. This fast-changing mix, reflected at CES 2025, also affects what constitutes editorial, sponsorships, partnerships, and advertising. With CES having led the way, it’ll be interesting to see if other events may follow the lead CES has taken.
Big-tech event experiences evolve
With a return to pre-COVID energy comes a return of big keynote and other high-visibility events, including keynotes. Perhaps the most impactful example wasn’t NVIDIA’s keynote by CEO Jensen Huang (although many gamers and cutting-edge techies may disagree). Almost every event and reveal at CES 2025 was outshone by Delta Air Line’s keynote at the Las Vegas Sphere, a massive spherical venue with state-of-the-art audio-visual capabilities.
‘An airline company? A game-changing keynote? How is that even possible?’ you might be thinking.
But, according to attendees who posted about it, Delta stole the show by using the Sphere’s 360 degree immersion plus deeply personal storytelling, made possible by the venue to tell their story in a meaningful and powerful way. Celebrities, such as Viola Davis, Tom Brady and Lenny Kravitz (who had a stage concert), swag giveaways to Delta SkyMiles members, and much more. Numerous attendees, even cynical long-timers, seemed impressed by this carefully crafted presentation. Take a look at this CNET story as an example of the impression the keynote left. Or social media posts like:
@Delta had the best CES 2025 keynote at @SphereVegas hands down—featuring special guests @violadavis , @TomBrady , and @LennyKravitz . 🙌 #CES #CES2025 #LasVegas #TheSphere #delta pic.twitter.com/WGH4EMX7pj
— Mashable (@mashable) January 11, 2025
It’s likely that event planners and marketers will take notes from this keynote this year, as they use creative venues, technologies, and storytelling, plus perks and incentives to make as much of an impact as Delta Air Line’s keynote apparently had.
Many of these impactful technologies, trends, and experiences will surely make their way into CES 2026 planning, but we’ll have to wait until January 2026 to see!
