CES 2019 opened January 8 and delivered on almost every technology trend that had been building for years. 8K TVs arrived as real, purchasable products — Samsung launched its Q900 series with actual retail pricing, and LG, Sony, and Sharp followed. The resolution argument was mostly moot given the lack of 8K content, but the display quality improvements were genuine even at 4K upscaling, and the enthusiast market responded.
5G was the word on every carrier and chipmaker’s lips. Qualcomm announced its first commercial 5G Snapdragon modem deployments, AT&T and Verizon detailed their early rollout plans, and the entire mobile industry positioned 2019 as the year 5G would go from spec sheet to street. They were right — if a year or so early for mass adoption.
Foldable phones crashed the party. Samsung and Huawei both previewed foldable form factors that generated enormous buzz and significant scepticism in equal measure. The technology felt exciting but fragile, and both companies would face screen durability issues in the months that followed. But the category was real, and the imagination it sparked was genuine.
LG also made waves with its OLED rollable TV prototype — a screen that retracted into a soundbar base. It wouldn’t ship until 2020, but no product at CES 2019 generated more pure awe. ces.tech