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 Perhaps you like the idea of controlling your home appliances with your voice, but aren't super keen on a data center processing recordings of you. Fair enough. The trade-off for most smart home conveniences is relinquishing at least some of your privacy. Today at CES, I saw a line of voice-controlled home appliances from Emerson Smart that adjust power and setting via voice commands. But commands are recognized on the devices themselves, not carried through Wi-Fi and processed elsewhere.
The huge array of smart plugs, fans, heaters and even air fryers require no app for setup and don't need access to Wi-Fi. Instead, I said, "hey Emerson, lights on" or "hey fan, turn on low" and the devices in the demo space acted accordingly. A few of the devices combine the mic with a speaker and can respond when a command is received.
A bit of built-in programing on the air fryers allow them to understand commands for 100 cooking presets, so saying things like, "reheat this pizza" or "cook these frozen french fries" will set the correct mode, time and temp. Of course you can also just say, "cook at 350 degrees for 10 minutes" and it'll comply. Most of the commands for the other items are pretty simple but allow you to do things like set a timer, turn on oscillation and set intensity speeds.
Selection of available commands for Emerson Smart devices.
Amy Skorheim for Engadget
Some of the devices allow for a small amount of prog
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Have you ever wanted to save approximately three seconds and two mouse clicks when shopping online? Microsoft has something special just for you. The company just introduced something called Copilot Checkout at the NRF 2026 retail conference. This is exactly what it sounds like. It's a shopping assistant embedded within Copilot.
The feature is rolling out now in the US and integrates with PayPal, Shopify, Stripe and Etsy. It lets people complete purchases directly inside of Copilot without having to withstand the grueling experience of being redirected to a retailer's website. Participating partners include Urban Outfitters, Anthropologie and Ashley Furniture.
The retailers remain the actual merchant of record, so they'll still get customer data and all of that jazz. Microsoft controls the interface.
We don't know what kind of safeguards are in place to prevent the AI from hallucinating its way into buying you a giant bounce house when you wanted to order some Bounce dryer sheets. Engadget has reached out to Microsoft to inquire about these safeguards and how exactly the money is handled.
This is a pretty big moment for AI shopping. OpenAI introduced a shopping assistant several months ago that
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