5 tech traits we’ll be watching in 2026

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At this time, we’re wanting ahead to the following 12 months in expertise information. I'm watching 5 traits I believe will outline the 12 months: datacenters will see fast proliferation past the US and China; billionaires will reap billions extra; self-driving automobiles will park themselves in a slew of brand-new locales; AI will discover its area of interest at work; and client tech will take unusual new shapes.

Datacenters blanket the globe Congress Power PermittingFILE - Automobiles drive previous knowledge facilities that home laptop servers and {hardware} required to help trendy web use, reminiscent of synthetic intelligence, in Ashburn, Virginia, July 16, 2023. (AP Picture/Ted Shaffrey, File) {Photograph}: Ted Shaffrey/AP Datacenters unfold thick and quick throughout the US and UK in 2025. In 2026, the multitrillion-dollar challenge of constructing the infrastructure behind synthetic intelligence is poised to broaden throughout the globe.

Look no additional than a narrative revealed within the New York Occasions the day after Christmas, which catalogues the massive investments tech giants have begun pouring into India for a build-out anticipated to happen over the following 5 years. Microsoft dedicated $17.5bn to developing new datacenters in India at an occasion earlier this month. Microsoft’s CEO, Satya Nadella, didn’t even have time to go away the stage throughout that announcement earlier than rival Amazon declared it might spend $35bn by itself datacenters within the nation, in response to the Occasions. Google inked a $15bn partnership for a similar factor with two Indian mega-conglomerates a month prior, and Meta, to not be outdone, is constructing a datacenter close to Google’s deliberate website.

South-east Asia is following India’s lead, with analysts predicting double-digit development within the variety of datacenters and computing capability in Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam. Singapore already has a lot of datacenters relative to its measurement. Australia can be a rising regional hub. What to observe on this area: it’s fairly scorching there for the temperature-sensitive computing services, which suggests they may devour a higher quantity of electrical energy than elsewhere – they already devour an unlimited quantity – for cooling.

Brazil is making a play to be Latin America’s datacenter vacation spot. To this point, it’s working. Like India, although, the facility grid has not modernized to fulfill the large power starvation of digital infrastructure. Demand from datacenters has led to blackouts this 12 months. Latin America as an entire is seeing a rising resistance from environmental activists to the fast development of datacenters, which are sometimes shrouded in authorized secrecy that forestalls native communities from realizing how a lot electrical energy and water they may devour.

Learn extra: Energy battle: will Brazil’s booming datacenter business go away peculiar individuals at the hours of darkness?

Learn extra: Datacenters meet resistance over environmental issues as AI growth spreads in Latin America

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, eager on turning into the dominant gamers in AI within the Center East and diversifying away from oil, struck about $600bn in AI offers with the US throughout Trump’s tour in Could, together with one for the biggest AI campus exterior the US. The offers are mutual, with the US and its tech titans pledging to speculate tens of billions in AI infrastructure in each petrol states.

Europe’s datacenter market is rising. The continent boasts a strong and mature datacenter market, however it has not fostered the identical quantity of development or attracted equal funding as has the US and China with regards to AI. Europe’s computing capability is more likely to develop subsequent 12 months, however maybe not as quick as different areas talked about right here.

Learn extra: ‘It’s hell for us right here’: Mumbai households undergo as datacenters maintain town hooked on coal

A cautionary lesson from China, although, is that simply because a datacenter will get constructed doesn’t imply it will get used. The nation spent a lot of 2023 and 2024 speeding to construct a brand new armada of datacenters. About 150 new datacenters completed development and commenced operations in 2024, in response to the state-affiliated China Communications Trade Affiliation Information Heart Committee. Now a good portion of them are sitting unused, struggling to safe clients and new funding, in response to each Reuters and the MIT Know-how Evaluate. Native Chinese language retailers cited by the MIT Tech Evaluate report that as much as 80% of China’s new computing capability can’t discover consumers. What's going to the remainder of the world do if it likewise turns into saturated?

The worldwide arrival of self-driving automobiles A Rivian automotive at an organization showcase in Palo Alto, California, on 11 December 2025. {Photograph}: Carlos Barría/Reuters In November, I wrote in regards to the race between the US and China within the autonomous car business, which is able to see self-driving automobiles seem in main metropolises all through the world in 2026:

We're on the verge of the worldwide arrival of self-driving automobiles. Subsequent 12 months, main companies from each the US and China will deploy their robotaxis to metropolises all over the world, in main expansions of their current operations. These corporations are posturing within the press like male birds combating for a similar mate; the dance units the stage for the worldwide competitors to come back.

On the US facet, there’s Waymo, Google’s driverless enterprise. The corporate has invested billions of {dollars} in Waymo previously 15 years. The corporate opened its robotaxi service to the general public in June 2024 in San Francisco after years of testing and has been rolling it out steadily since. Now automobiles are very seen in most of Los Angeles, and they are going to be in Washington DC, New York Metropolis and London subsequent 12 months.

Baidu’s Apollo Go let its taxis unfastened in Dubai and Abu Dhabi this 12 months. The wheels of WeRide, one other Chinese language autonomous car firm, have likewise touched down within the United Arab Emirates and Singapore. All the important gamers within the Chinese language market are increasing in Europe. Automobiles made by the agency Momenta and deployed by Uber are slated to start out driving in Germany in 2026. WeRide, Baidu and Pony AI even have plans to start robotaxi service in numerous European locales within the close to future. Many extra persons are about to see self-driving automobiles in the midst of their day by day lives.

Learn extra: The race begins to make the world’s finest self-driving automobiles

Billionaires are most likely going to get richer Sam Altman of OpenAI testifies earlier than a Senate committee on 8 Could 2025. {Photograph}: José Luis Magaña/AP Ten of tech’s most well-fixed executives added an eye-popping $550bn to their fortunes in 2025, in response to the Monetary Occasions. That astronomical development reveals no indicators of stopping subsequent 12 months, notably with two looming preliminary public choices: OpenAI and SpaceX, valued at $830bn and $800bn, respectively, although each these figures could rise to $1tn.

SpaceX’s buying and selling launch will add tens of billions to the web price of its CEO and co-founder, Elon Musk, who already instructions a fortune of about $600bn, in response to Forbes. OpenAI’s debut on the inventory market is a bit murkier: Sam Altman has stated he doesn't personal a stake within the newly for-profit model of the ChatGPT maker, so its IPO could make its backers like Microsoft and its personal workers, who personal a major chunk of the inventory, fairly wealthy whereas Altman reaps a modest revenue.

Musk can be positioned to reap an unlimited wage from his work at Tesla. He's now the beneficiary of two pay packages, one, price $56bn, reinstated by a company court docket in Delaware, and the opposite, price a whopping $1tn, voted on by Tesla shareholders.

The exception to my prediction of billionaires’ ballooning fortunes could also be Larry Ellison. The super-wealthy Trump backer briefly dethroned Musk because the richest man on the planet in September as hopes of the success of his enterprise software program agency, Oracle, ran increased than they ever had. His coziness with Trump and Oracle’s involvement within the AI growth appeared like twin rocket boosters that might ship his fortune to the moon.

Only a few months later, although, Oracle is bearing the brunt of buyers’ fears of an AI bubble. Wall Avenue scrutinizes the corporate’s future commitments and the mammoth quantity of danger it has taken on to finance them. Oracle’s earnings knocked $80bn off its market capitalization.

AI does – and doesn’t – rework work Illustration: Rita Liu/The Guardian AI has reworked productiveness in some niches. Coding, for instance, seems extraordinarily totally different than it did simply 5 years in the past. Customer support representatives are being changed by hated chatbots left and proper. AI has not changed worker-level productiveness in most industries, although. An MIT research that discovered 95% of corporations’ AI pilot packages failed to offer a return on funding nonetheless looms giant. Though AI is just not prepared for worker-replacement prime time, companies are refraining from hiring, ready for the expertise’s potential to reach, which signifies that in the present day’s jobs are being affected by bosses’ conception of the longer term. For instance, Hollywood, in a dire monetary stoop already, is popping to AI as a approach to full productions extra cheaply. Newspaper readers have rejected AI-generated writing, seeing it as inaccurate and unreliable. Authorized professionals have but to work out the place generative AI ought to determine into their subject: chatbots cite fictitious circumstances, however summarizing prolonged and dense paperwork is an utility that does save an excessive amount of time. Subsequent 12 months might even see generative AI discover extra niches the place it's genuinely helpful.

Keep tuned for extra on the topic: the Guardian will start publishing a year-long collection on AI and the way forward for work in early 2026.

Can I curiosity you in a brand new gadget? Shopper {hardware} will get bizarre new type elements {Photograph}: Jozef Polc/Alamy For years now, the smartphone has been the piece of expertise that mattered most to most individuals, maybe the one one in every of any significance in any respect. That gadget has appeared largely the identical for the higher a part of a decade, an enormous black display with some buttons on the facet. The previous few years have seen the debut of a number of totally different type elements, nonetheless – principally folding gadgets, alongside just a few new gadgets meant to provide AI a bodily type. In 2026, these traits will most likely speed up, fueled by Apple’s doable launch of a folding cellphone and the hunt for a tool that may channel AI’s capabilities.

Apple’s folding cellphone has been rumored for half a 12 months at the least with out eliciting a denial from Cupertino. A brand new type issue for the smartphone will come to a big and devoted viewers. Prime Androids have sported folding screens for years now, together with a brand new Samsung that folds twice, however Apple’s viewers is a captive one, locked into its software program ecosystem.

Tech corporations are feverishly engaged on a brand new AI gadget, determined to be the primary to unlock the attraction of ChatGPT IRL. OpenAI spent about $6.5bn in 2025 on iPhone architect Jony Ive’s startup, which had few, if any, merchandise to talk of; the approaching 12 months might even see its first product. The Humane pin with its shiny founders and the Pal necklace with its stunty subway advertising each made splashes however by no means caught on. Humane has already shuttered. Good glasses current a promising avenue for bringing generative and responsive AI into individuals’s on a regular basis lives, and these gadgets are already standard. In 2026, good glasses appear more likely to proliferate and advance, dominated by Meta. Generative or responsive AI will most likely additionally come to extra locations you don't want it. Samsung already added its Bixby assistant to its fridges means again in 2024, in spite of everything. You could end up with a wise cover in a lodge in 2026.