CES 2026 Offers an Early Look at What’s Next in Tech

While the show still spans everything from automotive tech to health innovations, for fans of audio, visual, home cinema and connected living, CES remains one of the most useful early looks at where the industry is heading in the year ahead.

The scale alone helps explain why. CES 2025 attracted more than 140,000 attendees from over 150 countries, with around 4,500 exhibitors spanning display technology, audio, control systems, silicon and smart-home platforms. That breadth is expected to carry into 2026, with the show also marking the first full outing for the renovated Las Vegas Convention Centre, following its US$600 million upgrade. Spread across 13 official venues and more than 232,000 square metres, CES remains less a single show floor and more a city-wide snapshot of where consumer technology is placing its bets.

Those bets start early. Samsung will kick things off on Sunday, January 4, with “The First Look,” outlining its device and customer-experience roadmap, before a packed Monday, January 5, of press conferences. LG will present its latest thinking around everyday living and display technology, Intel will unveil its Core Ultra Series 3 processors, Sony Honda Mobility will offer a closer look at its first production-bound EV, and AMD CEO Lisa Su will outline the company’s next silicon push. NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang is also scheduled to take the stage with a keynote focused on how NVIDIA’s platforms are shaping innovation across multiple industries.

The relevance of CES is rarely about the headlines alone. It’s found in the details how TVs are evolving, how sound technology is adapting to modern spaces, and how software and integration increasingly shape the experience.

TV technology is once again expected to dominate early CES coverage. Sony, Samsung, LG, TCL and others are likely to focus on brighter panels, improved colour accuracy and more refined HDR performance. Sony’s recent developments around RGB-based backlighting point to new approaches to brightness and colour volume, while Samsung is widely tipped to showcase further development of HDR10+ as a competitive counterpoint to Dolby Vision’s latest iteration.

Audio at CES follows a different cadence. While high-end two-channel audio is now better served by specialist hi-fi shows such as the Florida International Audio Expo, CES remains an important place for introducing soundbars, wireless speakers, spatial audio features and personal listening devices. Updates around Dolby Atmos soundbar platforms, tighter TV integration and more adaptive room processing are all expected themes. As in previous years, some of the more interesting audio discoveries are likely to surface quietly in hotel suites and pre-show demos rather than on the main exhibition floors.

CES also continues to highlight the growing convergence between audio-visual technology and the wider smart-home ecosystem. Voice control, software-led automation, presence sensing, and increasingly capable home hubs are playing a larger role in how AV systems are specified, controlled and experienced. For integrators and installers, the show offers an early indication of how control platforms and connected ecosystems are likely to evolve.

CES 2026 officially runs from January 6–9, with press conferences beginning several days earlier. Not everything shown will reach the market, but the event remains one of the first meaningful indicators of the industry’s priorities for the year ahead and how audio and visual experiences continue to evolve alongside changing homes, spaces and expectations.

StereoNET will be keeping a close eye on the announcements and technologies that matter most to audio, home cinema and integrated AV. Stay tuned as the picture becomes clearer.