Maria Diaz/ZDNET
Follow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google.
IFA is Europe’s largest consumer electronics show, and this year is no different. IFA 2025 features some of the most eye-catching innovations ever, so much so that it’s hard to narrow down the list of amazing products.
However, at a time when the tech world is saturated with artificial intelligence (AI) adoption, I found the fact that the best products I’ve seen don’t hinge on AI. As I walk through the halls of Messe Berlin, these are the best products I’ve seen and the ones I’m definitely going to watch.
1. Philips Hue MotionAware via Bridge Pro
Maria Diaz/ZDNET
One of the coolest things I’ve seen at IFA is Philips Hue giving existing smart lights the ability to become motion detectors for your smart home. Philips Hue just announced the new Hue Bridge Pro, a new smart hub for its Hue smart lights that has a five times faster processor and can handle up to 150 Philips Hue lights in your home.
Also: Philips Hue Bridge Pro just made it easy to add motion sensing to your old smart lights
The new Bridge Pro also supports up to four MotionAware setups, so you can set a group of Hue lights to work together as a motion detector. Seeing this in action, I was impressed at how a group of Philips Hue lights can be set up together, along with the Bridge Pro, to detect motion by recognizing changes in the wireless signals around them.
This kind of technology sounds futuristic, yet Philips Hue managed to not only make it happen but also make it available for the vast majority of its existing smart lights, excluding the first-generation and portable lights.
2. Rokid Smart Glasses
Maria Diaz/ZDNET
The Rokid Glasses are shaping up to be one of Meta’s biggest competitors in the smart glasses market. Rokid’s latest glasses combine augmented reality (AR) with AI, with the capacity of showing you data and letting you interact with an AI assistant. As an AI wearable, the glasses support real-time translation in 89 languages, object recognition, navigation, transcription, and more.
Also: 5 Meta Ray-Ban upgrades that have me seriously excited for September 17
These glasses are also surprisingly lightweight and thinner than other models, weighing only 1.7 ounces, which makes them a compelling option for all-day wear. Even at this weight, the Rokid Glasses have a built-in 12MP camera for taking first-person photos and videos and integrated audio to interact with the GPT-5-powered AI assistant or simply listen to your favorite music.
The glasses are available on Kickstarter and have surpassed the $1 million milestone for pledges. Rokid plans to sell the Rokid Glasses for $599.
3. Ecovacs X11 Omnicyclone
Maria Diaz/ZDNET
Aside from being the longest-lasting robot vacuum and mop, the Ecovacs X11 Omnicyclone is also the first mainstream premium robot to feature automatic cleaning without a replaceable dust bag. This robot vacuum can wash and dry its mop roller at the dock and automatically empty its dustbin when full.
The biggest innovation about this is that it empties the dustbin into a plastic dust canister at the dock instead of relying on dust bags. This means that you’ll never have to buy another dustbag for this robot vacuum, and can instead simply empty out the dust canister when full after a few weeks.
Also: Roborock’s new weed-killing robot mowers will save your back (and time)
Combining a large 6,400mAh battery and GaN technology at the dock, the X11 Deebot can quickly recharge each time it goes to the dock to wash its mop pad, refill its clean water tank, and empty its dustbin, gaining up to 6% of charge in only three minutes. This PowerBoost technology lets the robot clean a whopping 10,700 square feet without stopping due to low battery, making it a reliable solution to clean large areas.
Maria Diaz/ZDNET
The robot is also one of the smartest I’ve ever seen. Its voice assistant can interact with the user to answer setup questions, review troubleshooting guides, and handle complex commands.
Thanks to the improved TruEdge 3.0 technology, the mop roller can also reach the edge of floors alongside walls or under cabinets.
4. Olight Ostation 2
Maria Diaz/ZDNET
I was impressed with the Ostation battery charger at CES earlier this year, but Olight just upped the ante with the Ostation 2, which automatically charges both AA and AAA batteries.
My family goes through more batteries than I’d like to publicly admit, so I’ve been looking at rechargeable battery stations to make the switch to a more eco-friendly solution. The biggest problem with these is that they typically only charge one kind of battery, either AA or AAA, so you’d have to buy separate stations to get both types of batteries recharged.
Also: I tried to destroy this $45 power bank (including driving over it with a tractor) – it refused to break
The Ostation 2 solves this with a charging dock that can handle both AA and AAA rechargeable batteries, capable of holding 12 of each. You don’t even have to worry about lining up the battery just right — simply drop it into one of the slots and the Ostation 2 will recharge it and release it into a sorted tray once done. This station protects rechargeable batteries from overcharging by releasing the connection once the battery is full.
