The Coolest New Tech and Gadgets of 2020

One decade ago, 4G was the hot new thing, TVs were ugly, and everyone's cell phones slid open. Just imagine what the next ten years will bring. If we really live up to our innovation potential, it'll be a slew of technologies that successfully yank humanity away from the precarious edge it is teetering upon. You know, the one where we're about to plunge into irreversible global disaster, AI super-surveillance, and digital inequality. A dark outcome, to be sure! Let's reign in the doom and gloom for a second though—we know; easier said than done—and focus on the now.

Over the past year, startups and massive corporations alike have kept up the tempo of new releases. Despite the pandemic, there are new gadgets to ooh and ahh and damnnn over, from the outlandish to the high-concept to the downright handy. Here are 27 of the most interesting we've seen and used (with some overlap with Esquire's 2020 Gadget Awards). Best case scenario, they are the kinds of gadgets that will make our lives more efficient, safer, and more entertaining in some neat way or another, and look cool in our homes while doing it. Worst case scenario, reading this article will for a few minutes quell the boredom of being perpetually stuck at home with only your Alexa and an outdated gaming console that is decidedly not a PS5 for company, watching everything outside go from bad to worse.

Cool new technology reminds us that even as 2020 closes out, we humans can't help but invent, grow, and change. It's something bright worth keeping in mind.