Facial recognition will be the most desirable technology in the bathroom of the future, according to new research.
A survey of 1,100 consumers conducted by technology company DigitalBridge revealed that, within the next 10 years, 18% of respondents would like to see facial recognition that automatically sets the user’s preferred lighting or water temperature when entering the bathroom.
A further 16% would like to see an in-shower voice device, which allows them to add shampoo, toothpaste and other essentials to their shopping list when they are running low.
While an augmented reality (AR) simulator that shows how a hairstyle could look and provides step-by-step instructions on how to achieve it came third on the list.
With tech transforming the home, almost half of respondents (46%) thought the transformation would be most exciting in the bathroom.
A further 28% said the kitchen was the most ripe for innovation, while just 9% believed the living room would see the most technological change in the future.
Half of people also claimed they would be more likely to shop with a brand that offered them access to technologies such as AR or artificial intelligence (AI). This figure rose to 59% among 25 to 34-year-olds.
When questioned on their current bathroom tech, two-thirds (68%) said they believed their bathroom was outdated, with 42% of these saying it was very outdated.
Only 14% thought their space was of a modern standard and only 6% believed it to be very modern.
David Levine, chief executive of DigitalBridge, said: “As outlandish as some of these innovations may sound, they’re actually not far off being a reality. Breakthroughs in AR and AI are steadily making their way into our homes through devices such as Amazon’s Alexa and software such as Google’s ARCore and Apple’s ARKit. Clearly, consumer appetite for ground-breaking new bathroom products is high, so the race is on for suppliers to innovate quickly, in order to take advantage of this captive audience.”