IFA REVIEW
30 IFIFA 2025: The future is now…
A 2025: The future is now… AI stole the show at IFA 2025, powering everything from sleep trackers to
coffee machines and even pet collars. The world’s biggest tech stage proved that the smart future isn’t coming… it’s already here. Dan Todaro reports.
F
ast forward a year, and IFA 2025 hosted over 1,900 exhibitors and welcomed 220,000 visitors from 140 countries, beating last year’s 215,000 attendance.
IFA Berlin is the world’s leading event for home and consumer technologies and celebrates over a century of innovation. Since 1924, IFA Berlin has been the leading global platform where technology leaders, innovators and industry experts come together to showcase groundbreaking products and shape the future of consumer electronics.
The event takes place every year in September in Berlin and rings the starting bell for announcement after announcement from pretty much every CE brand on the planet. IFA is the only trade show in the world where B2B and B2C meet in one place. Here, exhibitors, trade visitors and end consumers can exchange ideas and information. This direct contact between suppliers and users provides valuable feedback, discussion and business opportunities.
Looking at the CE industry as a whole, something that’ll hopefully make you smile is that CE Global Revenues are up 4.6 per cent in the first half of 2025, reaching $403 billion (£300 billion). However, the trend is that Value is outpacing Volume growth, with China realising growth of 24 per cent. Whilst 2026 is predicted as the CE ‘upgrade’ year, 2025 has seen growth in specific areas such as computing due to Windows 10 support being discontinued.
AI in every direction In terms of trends at IFA, unsurprisingly, AI innovation was everywhere this year. To be honest, on this occasion, things did become a little bit embarrassing, especially the term ‘Bespoke AI’, because isn’t AI always bespoke? Aside from AI, one of the overriding themes seemed to be ‘sleep’ and the management of your sleep in the context of health and wellbeing through connected devices. This took many forms, whether through a smart ring, earbuds, watch or even air conditioners, with one brand claiming that it could “make
or break the restorative quality of your sleep”. The global sleep tech devices market size was worth $24.02 billion (£17.9 billion) in 2025 and projected to touch $117.92 billion (£87.7 billion) by 2034, exhibiting a CAGR of 19.27 per cent over that period. It’s definitely a trend to keep an eye on as I suspect it will begin to creep into multiple categories and feature in many of the CE brands’ ranges, examples of which include: Coffee Machines: Your coffee machine will sync with your sleep tracker. It won’t just be on a timer; it will start brewing when your watch detects you’re in your lightest phase of sleep, nearest your desired wake-up time, ensuring the coffee is perfectly fresh the moment your alarm (or sunrise light) goes off. Climate Control: Beyond the air conditioner, we’ll see smart thermostats, purifiers, and humidifiers with dedicated ‘Sleep Modes’. These won’t just maintain a temperature, but will actively adjust it based on your sleep stages (e.g. slightly dropping the temperature to facilitate deep sleep), and purifying the air on a quieter cycle during the night.
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