Stay connected with ZDNET by adding us as one of your trusted sources on Google, ensuring you never miss the latest insights, analyses, and groundbreaking discoveries shaping the world of technology. Today, we invite you to explore the ZDNET “Breakthrough” Awards for 2025 — an annual celebration that has swiftly become one of our most anticipated traditions. This initiative highlights the most forward-thinking, inventive, and transformative pieces of technology that have passed across the desks of our editorial team throughout the year.
Over the course of the last twelve months, our editors have immersed themselves in an unrelenting exploration of cutting-edge innovation. We devoted extensive hours evaluating the practical benefits and emerging relevance of foldable smartphones, devices that once seemed like futuristic novelties but have now taken center stage in the evolution of mobile experiences. We also spent weeks living and working through the immersive perspectives offered by next-generation smart glasses and virtual reality headsets, venturing deep into the uncharted territory of blended physical-digital realities. Furthermore, our team benchmarked an unprecedented range of robots — from those equipped with advanced contextual awareness and creative ideation capabilities powered by artificial intelligence, to domestic companions capable of managing an entire suite of cleaning tasks, seamlessly transitioning from sweeping to vacuuming and mopping with minimal human intervention.
In a rapidly maturing yet perpetually transformative technological landscape, distinguishing a genuine “breakthrough” has become increasingly challenging. The purpose of the ZDNET “Breakthrough” Awards is not merely to celebrate raw performance — such as a faster processor or a more premium hardware design — but to honor the products that redefine conversations, set entirely new standards for innovation, and offer compelling glimpses into the technologies that will influence our daily lives and industries for the remainder of this decade.
Without further preamble, we present — in no particular order — the five trailblazing recipients of the 2025 ZDNET Breakthrough Awards.
1. **Huawei Mate XT Ultimate: The first tri-foldable of many**
As Samsung’s highly anticipated Galaxy Z TriFold continued to dominate tech headlines toward the end of the year, another contender quietly yet decisively made its mark. The Huawei Mate XT Ultimate, launched globally in February 2025, emerged as the foldable phone that redefined expectations. At Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, our team observed firsthand the unprecedented excitement surrounding Huawei’s unveiling. Journalists, analysts, and eager technology enthusiasts flooded the company’s booth, all determined to experience the device that promised to revolutionize mobile form factors.
Departing from conventional foldable designs that hinge only along a single axis, Huawei’s engineering team introduced dual inward-folding mechanisms, enabling the device to transform from a practical 6.4-inch smartphone display into an expansive, tablet-like 10.2-inch screen. This metamorphosis not only enhances productivity and multimedia enjoyment but also preserves portability, allowing the device to slip effortlessly into a pocket or bag compartment. Though the absence of Google services remains a recognized limitation, the Mate XT Ultimate compensates with an exceptionally refined hardware suite and polished performance features. As our editor Prakhar Khanna eloquently summarized, this phone sets a new standard for tri-foldable devices, establishing them as credible advancements rather than experimental curiosities — a bold declaration of what mobile computing can become.
2. **Roborock Saros Z70: Literally a helping hand**
Robotic vacuums have become essential fixtures in countless households, automating one of the least glamorous yet most necessary daily tasks. Yet, 2025 witnessed Roborock pushing beyond the boundaries of what these home assistants can achieve. With the introduction of the Saros Z70, the company invested in the visionary idea of robots not only cleaning floors but also physically interacting with small obstructions in their environment. The Saros Z70’s OmniGrip mechanical arm exemplifies this innovation, capable of recognizing and picking up lightweight household items — from stray socks and crumpled tissues to misplaced sandals — provided they weigh less than 300 grams. During our comprehensive tests, the intelligent arm performed with a commendable success rate, though mastering the precise automation behaviors demanded some user adjustment and calibration.
Further elevating its capabilities, the Saros Z70 integrates a built-in camera system that allows owners to remotely operate it from their smartphones. This functionality transforms cleaning into an interactive experience reminiscent of controlling a robotic claw machine, merging entertainment with utility. According to our smart home expert Maria Diaz, the Saros Z70 represents the next evolutionary leap for domestic robotics — a tangible, multipurpose household assistant that hints at a future where home automation becomes both adaptive and genuinely helpful.
3. **Samsung Micro RGB TV: A color-perfect future**
The year 2025 also brought monumental advancements to the television market, particularly in the realm of color fidelity and backlighting. Among the most striking innovations was Samsung’s Micro RGB TV, a device that redefines how visual precision and luminosity can coexist. Unlike traditional LED panels, Samsung utilized micro-scale RGB LEDs measuring under 100 micrometers each, enabling this display to achieve full coverage of the demanding BT.2020 color standard. The result is a level of color reproduction and image depth previously unattainable in non-OLED displays.
When our editors experienced the vast 115-inch Samsung Micro RGB TV in person, we were astonished by its refined contrast ratios, vibrant saturation, and remarkable brightness consistency. Interestingly, despite the “MicroRGB” name, this model does not employ Samsung’s proprietary self-emissive MicroLED technology. Instead, it masterfully leverages advanced LCD architecture illuminated by these micro RGB backlights. The outcome feels paradoxical: at once a triumphant conclusion to the longstanding era of backlit LCDs, and an exciting prologue to what the future of mini LED and MicroLED displays might hold. This television demonstrates that, even as one chapter closes in display innovation, another begins with dazzling promise.
4. **Meta Ray-Ban Display: The next frontier of smart glasses**
Building upon the popularity of previous Ray-Ban–branded wearables, Meta took an audacious leap forward this year with the introduction of the Ray-Ban Display, revealed during the company’s Connect event. While preserving core features that users already appreciated — such as hands-free photo and video capture — Meta’s latest model introduces a transparent waveguide, full-color display capable of overlaying digital information seamlessly onto the user’s field of view. This addition transforms the glasses into powerful multimodal AI wearables and gestures toward a post-smartphone reality, where contextual data becomes ambient rather than obtrusive.
Through integration with an EMG neural wristband, wearers can interact with the projected interface using intuitive hand gestures. During our tests, team members required only minutes to understand and adapt to this novel method of control. Once mastered, the Ray-Ban Display enabled effortless access to real-time captions during conversation, instant Meta AI responses, and incoming notifications — all without lifting a phone. Offered at a competitive price of $799, demand surged immediately after launch, with reservation slots booked months in advance. Now the question remains: how will other technology giants — including Google, Samsung, and possibly Apple — respond in 2026 to this emerging new standard for wearable computing?
5. **Antigravity A1: A drone that never misses a shot**
The Antigravity A1, developed under the creative wing of Insta360, represents a daring synthesis of aerial photography and portability. Officially unveiled during the summer of 2025, this drone impressed ZDNET’s Cesar Cadenas with its astounding ability to record immersive 360-degree 8K footage. The aircraft’s lightweight design — tipping the scales at just 249 grams — cleverly positions it below the U.S. recreational flight registration threshold, allowing casual fliers and travel videographers alike to take to the skies without bureaucratic friction.
The A1’s user experience is meticulously refined thanks to its Grip Controller and Vision Goggles system. The latter employs micro-OLED displays to provide an extraordinarily sharp, first-person aerial perspective, complemented by exceptionally low-latency video streaming that preserves immersion and precision even during complex maneuvers. As Cadenas reflected, although its $1,599 price tag places it in the premium category, the A1’s sheer ease of use, stability, and visual quality make it an outstanding option for both novice pilots and seasoned creators. Put simply, this drone ensures that not a single decisive moment slips through the lens.
Together, these five breakthrough technologies illustrate how innovation thrives across every corner of the technology industry — from pocketable folding tablets to intelligent home assistants, next-generation displays, sensory wearables, and cinematic flying cameras. ZDNET’s 2025 Breakthrough Award winners not only elevate the benchmarks of design and functionality but also redefine what humans can expect from the intersection of creativity, engineering, and imagination in the digital age.
Sourse: https://www.zdnet.com/article/zdnet-breakthrough-awards-2025/
