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The smartphone era has led to the era of consumer electronics convergence. Tons of devices we've come to rely on—small cameras, calculators, flashlights, music players, etc.—have appeared on our phones. In entertainment, there has been a similar shift to the uniqueness of the small screen. In 2025, users collectively watched more than 4 billion minutes of TikTok content on their phones every day. However, large screens are here to stay. This year's list includes a pair of new TV technologies designed to be enjoyed from feet, not inches, away from your face. Smart headphones use magnetic fluid to let you hear familiar music with fresh sound. And while it may be too easy to start a podcast, the standard microphone has received a very useful upgrade that makes creating high-quality content even more accessible.
(Editor's note: This is an excerpt from Popular Science's 38th Annual “Best of New” Awards. Be sure to read complete list of the 50 greatest innovations of 2025.)
Winner of the Grand Prix in the field of entertainment
Micro RGB TV from Samsung: a TV that creates colors in a completely different way
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Photos of Samsung's Micro RGB TV don't do it justice. When I saw it in person earlier this year, I was shocked by the vibrant colors and vibrancy it offers. Even compared to conventional OLED displays (which are known for their color reproduction), it provides a noticeably more vibrant viewing experience. Each sub-100 micron RGB emitter is located directly behind the panel and is independently actuated, allowing the device to reproduce an unusually wide color gamut while maintaining extremely high brightness and contrast on a 115-inch 4K screen. True Micro LED technology remains exclusive to commercial installations, but Micro RGB provides an extremely similar experience without the need for complex professional installation. A screen this size that can still display deep blacks and very rich colors in a bright room changes the look of home theater—if you can afford it—and sets the expectation for what premium displays should do over the next decade.
Fluid Driver from Technics: Headphones that tune the driver using fluid rather than just magnets.
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Headphones Technics EAH-AZ100 use a dynamic driver with magnetic fluid—an oil-like fluid filled with magnetic particles—between the voice coil and diaphragm. Instead of simply cooling the driver, the fluid dampens and centers its movement, reducing distortion and stabilizing travel, especially at low frequencies. This is important because most headphone updates lately involve digital signal processing and software tricks. Here the converter itself receives an update. Extending clean bass to a claimed 3Hz while maintaining mid- and high-frequency detail shows that there's still some power to spare in single-driver designs, and hints that stranger physical materials may be on the way in everyday audio gear.
Atmos FlexConnect from Dolby: Room-aware surround sound that starts with your TV
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Even the fanciest home audio system won't sound good if it's not set up correctly. Dolby Atmos FlexConnect uses your TV as a hub that listens to wireless speakers, determines where they are in the room, and then automatically assigns channels and levels instead of forcing you to find symmetrical placement and manual calibration. The system determines the capabilities and position of each speaker, then distributes height, surround sound, and Atmos dialogue information between the TV's own speakers and any paired satellites. The 2025 TCL QD-Mini LED TVs and matching Z100 speakers are the first to ship with it, making Atmos-style setups closer to plug-and-listen rather than learn-to-be-the-installer. It's still a closed ecosystem for now, but it points to surround sound systems that adapt to cluttered apartments and real furniture, rather than requiring a perfect showroom.
Shure MV7i Two-Channel Microphone: A podcast microphone with a built-in audio interface.
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If you watch podcasts, streamers, or just about any interview content online, you've seen the Shure MV7 microphone. It's an industry standard and now operates as a standalone podcast studio. Connect it to your computer via USB-C and you get a microphone plus a rear-panel XLR/¼-inch combo input for a second mic or instrument, with both channels appearing separately in Shure's MOTIV Mix software or on your digital audio workstation. This allows a solo creator to record host and guest, or voice and guitar, without lugging around an additional interface box, power supply, and cables. Two-channel recording directly from a single tabletop microphone lowers the barrier to creating better shows and music in smaller spaces and shows how much traditional studio equipment can come together in one unit.
LG's G5 Evo: an OLED TV that's perfect for bright rooms
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The LG G5 Evo OLED overcomes one of the biggest limitations of this type of digital display: overall brightness. A new tandem RGB OLED stack, updated light-emitting structure, and brightness enhancer deliver peak HDR brightness of over 2,000 nits while maintaining near-perfect black levels that OLED attractive in the first place. Combined with the α11 AI Gen2 processor and 4K support up to 165Hz, the panel can handle both bright daytime viewing and high frame rate gaming without resorting to blurry LCD tricks. This is a reminder that OLED is still evolving as a technology, and that in the next few years
PopSci Gift Guide for 2025
