LAS VEGAS — CES®, produced by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA)®, mirrored the technology landscape with a bustling show floor, innovative products on display, insightful keynotes and impactful connection-building, as the mega-show took over Las Vegas Jan. 7-10, 2025.
By the Numbers
In a pre-show press conference, Gary Shapiro, CEO of CTA, shared that this year’s CES would be bigger than the last couple years. This year the show spanned 12 different venues, clocking in at an impressive more than 2.5 million square feet.
With more than 4,000 exhibitors and 58% of the total registrants being at senior level, according to pre-show numbers, this year’s CES was truly a convening point for the world’s most influential brands and voices in technology.
“As you go around the world and look at other shows, you should always ask the show organizer if the show, when they give you any number, is independently audited,” Shapiro said. “We are a non-profit organization, we have a duty of honesty to the industry, so we tell the truth no matter what the numbers are, good or bad. We’ll release some preliminary estimates at the end of the show, and then in March or April we’ll have an independent audit.”
International Participation
CTA reported pre-show that more than 300 companies on the Fortune 500 would be in attendance, and 166 countries, territories and regions were represented at this year’s event, solidifying its status as a premier global event.
“We anticipate about 40% of our attendance to is going to come from outside the United States. Truly, if you walk this show, for particularly certain areas, it’s very diverse to see companies from countries from all different parts of the world, companies from China, from Asia, from Korea, from Japan, Ukraine, even Israel. It’s very diverse on the show [floor]. We’re anticipating about 160 countries represented at CES this year, so it truly is a global meeting,” said John T. Kelley, Vice President and Show Director, CES, at CTA.
Some international pavilions this year included France, the EU, Netherlands, Ukraine, Israel, Belgium and Poland.
“Last year, I believe, we had our first Indian pavilion on the show floor… It was really exciting to see some of the smaller Indian enterprises showing up at CES for the first time. And that’s, I think, what CES provides, an opportunity for companies, large and small, to really showcase their technologies and products and solutions to the entire world. And so, we hope that the Indian story continues to grow at CES,” Kelley said.
It also attracted thousands of media and content creators, who help to spread the word about the show and the innovations introduced by the exhibitors at the show.
“We’re going into newer and newer categories,” Shapiro said. “If you haven’t been to the show in a while, when you walk through the different halls, you’ll see companies you’ve never seen before, because the innovators around the world are coming here, and because every company is now a technology company, and you have to deal with other companies. … We’ll have over 50,000 people from outside the United States. Nothing else in the United States, including sporting events, ever gets 50,000 people from outside the United States.”
Diving Into Innovation
CES 2025 had various new features and tracks, including a quantum track, called Quantum Means Business, focused on the commercial applications of this emerging technology. The track is sponsored by the show’s new partner, Quantum World Congress.
This year also introduced a track about the energy transition, as more technology companies across all verticals are dedicated to finding more sustainable solutions and improving operations.
“What we’re focusing on for CES 2025 is more of the commercial applications of quantum and what is possible with quantum computing as it relates to various industries like transportation and biotech and some of the bigger applications. I do think in the future, one day, we’ll talk about consumer applications, but at CES 2025, it’ll be more commercial, and we’re really looking forward to the partnership with the Quantum World Congress,” said Kinsey Fabrizio, President of CTA.
Programming for the event included more than 1,000 speakers across 300 conference sessions, and some powerhouse keynote speakers. Ed Bastian, CEO of Delta Air Lines, gave his keynote at Sphere celebrating Delta’s 100th anniversary with partnership announcements and future-forward plans for the airline, marking the first time the trade show utilized the venue for a keynote, according to Shapiro. The keynote was a star-studded event with special appearances from Viola Davis, Tom Brady and various founders and leaders of iconic brands. It closed on a high-energy note with a performance from Grammy-winner Lenny Kravitz.
The mega-show also utilized the Michelob ULTRA Arena for NVIDIA’s CEO, Jensen Huang’s, keynote.
Mr. Yuki Kusumi, Group CEO of Panasonic Holdings Corporation, kicked off the show floor opening on Jan. 7, with his keynote. Other keynoters included Jennifer Witz, CEO of SiriusXM, with audichuck Founder and Host of Crime Junkie Ashley Flowers; Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X Corp; Martin Lundstedt, President and CEO of Volvo Group; Julie Sweet, Chair and CEO of Accenture and Tekedra N. Mawakana, Co-CEO of Waymo.
Related. How the CES® Tech Talk Podcast Enhances the Iconic Event
This year’s Innovation Awards also broke records, with more than 3,400 submissions for the 2025 program.
“Something that’s noteworthy is we had a record-breaking number of CES Innovation Award submissions in 2025, which was a 50% jump in the AI category alone, and just great submissions overall,” Fabrizio said.
The Innovation Showcase was held in the Venetian during this year’s show.
CTA’s 2025 Industry Forecast
At the event CTA’s Brian Comiskey, Senior Director, Innovation and Trends, and Melissa Harrison, Vice President of Marketing and Communications, also shared some insights from its Tomorrow’s Tech 2025 forecast, which centered around the themes of Shifting Demographics and Purchasing Patterns, Digital Coexistence, Human Security, Community and Longevity.
The forecast also revealed that the U.S. tech market is expected to reach $537 billion in total industry retail revenue in 2025, up from $520 billion in 2024.
Here are some key takeaways:
Shifting Demographics and Purchasing Patterns
- Gen Z is the largest global generation, accounting for 32% of the population, and makes up 27% of the OECD workforce
- 60% of Gen Z are early adopters of technology in the U.S.
- Gen Z is 2.5x likely to purchase good with sustainability values
Digital Coexistence
- Modern enterprises will invest in chips, sensors and data infrastructure to enhance cybersecurity, cloud storage/computing, and AI and robotics to fill in the growing productivity gap
- Frontiers for the AI Innovation in the Digital Coexistence are AI Agents, Digital Twins, Humanoid Robots
- The perceptions of AI are not a “hype-cycle,” and the Consumer AI Upgrade Cycle will include products like smartphones, laptops, TVs, smart glasses and vehicles
Human Security
- The world is in the third phase of an energy transition toward low/no carbon fuels and energies
- Infrastructure, grid resiliency and experimentation will lead the way in advancing this transition
- The food supply chain can be bolstered by technologies like automation, technology that increases yield and conservation
Community
- There is plenty of innovation in mobility, including electrification, connectivity, autonomy and industrials
- An electrified ecosystem consists of vehicles, battery tech, infrastructure and micromobility, all of which was on display at CES 2025
- Autonomy is a sector to watch with new tools and vehicles coming to market and in development
- Smart Home technologies like TV command centers, health integration, energy management and AI personalization are growing and combining technology and comfort for consumers
- Video, audio and gaming are beginning to blur as all three are needed to reach consumer where they’re at in their daily lives
Longevity
- 80% of U.S. consumers consider smart home tech to be “age tech”
- 52% of U.S. consumers own at least one of the top ten perceived age tech products
- Technology isn’t going to just help people live longer, it’s going to help them live better, with technologies like GLP-1s, precision medicine and remote care leading the way
- Better living will be driven by tech and tools that address mental health, accessibility and beauty
Comiskey and Harrison closed out the presentation by sharing that innovation is becoming more human-centric than ever before, and if the 2020s are the intelligence decade, then the 2030s will be the quantum decade.
