Key takeaways from the CES 2026 show floor, from real-world physical AI to edge-first computing.
The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is the biggest technology events of the year. Every January, Las Vegas becomes a place where the technology industry shows what it’s building next, from headline keynotes to hands-on demos showcasing the latest technology products.
What stood out at CES 2026 was just how tangible and real AI had become. Across the show floor, AI was no longer limited to generating content or being present in the cloud. Instead, it appeared inside robots navigating physical spaces, vehicles making decisions locally, PCs running AI workloads on-device, and wearables interpreting sensor data in real-time.
Another element that made this CES different from the previous years was how consistently physical AI and edge AI showed up across multiple categories and booths. However, across automotive, robotics, PCs, XR wearables, and smart home devices, there was the same underlying requirement: AI needs to run locally, efficiently, and reliably.
This is why many of the technologies that attendees were noticing, touching and experiencing at CES 2026 were built on the Arm compute platform.