- Tech gift choices for the gadget lover on your holiday shopping list, including the iPhone 16 and Playstation 5 Pro.
Odds are someone on your holiday shopping list is a gadget hound. And there’s a pretty good chance you’re going to indulge them.
Approximately 233 million American adults plan on buying tech products and services this holiday season, according to the Consumer Technology Association. Wearables are topping wish-lists, but old stand-bys like smartphones, televisions, and video game consoles are popular choices too.
Sorting out the hot items from the ones destined to end up in the clearance bin can be tough, though. If you’re looking for a perfect tech gift for a friend or loved one, here are a few can’t miss suggestions.
PlayStation 5 Pro
The launch of this high-end PS5 might seem a bit curious, given that the 2024 holiday season doesn’t have a lot of major game releases. But for avid gamers, this might be the best way to get ready for the months to come. The PS5 Pro ($700) is pricey, but offers a frames-per-second rate significantly higher than its predecessor, meaning ultra smooth imagery in games. It’s also faster, more responsive, and has more internal storage. With big titles like Grand Theft Auto VI, Assassin’s Creed Shadows and Borderlands 4 coming soon, those advantages could become more important.
IPhone 16 Pro Max
Apple’s latest iPhone is the new battery-life king, something that’s becoming more and more important lately—and the top-of-the-line Pro Max version is the easy pick (it starts at $1,199, but cellular companies are offering discounts). You’ll have to work hard to use up your battery life in a single day. The A18 chip powering the phone runs everything from apps to Apple Pay without breaking a sweat. The 48MP ultrawide camera, with its numerous photographic styles, is everything you could hope for. And Apple Intelligence offers a number of useful features, including audio transcription in notes.
Roborock Qrevo Curv
Forget the old warning about never buying a loved-one a vacuum for a holiday gift. The Qrevo Cury ($900) is a stylish vacuum/mop hybrid robot that will free up people’s time and keep your home looking shiny. Whereas some robot vacuums leave debris in their path, Roborock’s latest model resists tangling (a bane of robot vacuums everywhere), leaves a clean path and automatically empties itself of debris, washes and dries the mop pads, and refills its own water tank. It’s a great gift for houses with dogs or other long-haired family members.
AirPods Pro 2
Roughly 48 million Americans have some form of hearing loss, but only a small percentage of those use hearing aids. In some cases, that’s due to pricing. In others, it’s the stigma that’s still attached to the tools. Apple’s AirPods Pro 2 ($249), though, have created a bridge that could prove incredible useful. The conversational boost feature makes it easier to hear people without advertising your hearing troubles, thanks to the ubiquity of AirPods use in society. Even if you hear just fine, the AirPods Pro 2 are worth your time, with top-end sound and noise cancelling, a six-hour battery life, spatial audio and a charging case that has a built in speaker, which makes it easier to locate via Apple’s Find My feature if you misplace your AirPods.
JBL Flip 6
There are a ton of portable Bluetooth speakers on the market, making it a challenge to figure which is best for you. The Flip 6 ($100) has outstanding sound quality and is dust and water resistant, meaning you can take it with you pretty much anywhere. It weighs just over 1 pound and its controls are easy to use—and connecting your phone via Bluetooth takes just seconds. The battery will last up to 12 hours, though you’ll likely get a bit less than that, but not so much less that it’s problematic.