Objects
That
Think

Hardware has always been the materialisation of an era's ambitions. The transistor radio made information portable. The smartphone collapsed an entire decade's worth of separate devices into a single glass rectangle. What comes next is stranger, more intimate, and more consequential than any previous generation of objects.

Foldable and rollable displays have crossed from prototype to product. Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold series demonstrated that crease-free, durable polymer screens are achievable at consumer scale. LG's rollable OLED panels — which extend and retract mechanically — point toward surfaces that can be any size depending on context. The form factor of the device is becoming dynamic rather than fixed.

Neural interfaces represent perhaps the most significant frontier in consumer hardware. Neuralink, Synchron, and a cohort of research institutions are developing brain-computer interfaces capable of translating neural signals into digital commands. In 2024, Neuralink's first human patient demonstrated the ability to control a computer cursor using thought alone. The therapeutic applications — for paralysis, locked-in syndrome, and severe motor disabilities — are immediate and compelling. The consumer applications, however, raise questions that have no easy answers about privacy, agency, and the boundary between self and system.

Spatial computing arrived commercially with Apple's Vision Pro. Mixed reality headsets overlay digital content onto physical space, creating environments where a spreadsheet can occupy the same room as a window view, and a colleague's holographic presence can participate in a meeting from another continent. The ergonomic and social friction remains considerable, but the underlying technology — eye-tracking, hand gesture recognition, spatial audio — is mature enough to support genuine productivity.

Wearable health monitoring has moved beyond step counting. The latest generation of smartwatches measures blood oxygen saturation, detects atrial fibrillation with clinical-grade accuracy, and generates electrocardiograms on demand. Research devices can track continuous blood glucose without a needle. Sweat analysis wearables monitor electrolytes and cortisol levels in real time. The wrist has become a diagnostic instrument.

Energy is the constraint underlying all of this. Battery chemistry has improved incrementally, but solid-state batteries — which promise dramatically higher energy density and faster charging — are approaching commercial viability. Wireless power transfer at meaningful distances, long a laboratory curiosity, is being deployed in select commercial contexts. The dream of devices that never need plugging in is closer than it has ever been.