We’ve lined a variety of merchandise, units and companies throughout 12 completely different classes for this yr’s Tom’s Guide Awards. However, we’ve saved the very best for final and our Hero Awards acknowledge the very best of the very best from the most recent improvements to cutting-edge design and spectacular sustainability efforts.
The winners of this yr’s Hero Awards stood out to our workforce right here at Tom’s Guide for altering the course of the world of expertise as a complete, breaking floor with new improvements and going the additional mile relating to making the units we use on a regular basis extra sustainable.
Join us in celebrating the achievements of all of this yr’s Hero Awards winners and the lasting impression these corporations and their merchandise could have on the way forward for expertise.
Best new product
Gemini Live
AI is in all places today, and Google’s Gemini is completely dominating the house proper now. While the AI software program has a number of options to boast, Gemini Live has shortly stood out as one in every of its finest.
Google describes it as a extra pure strategy to chat to Gemini. Open up the Gemini app and you can begin a video chat with it, displaying Gemini your environment and chatting away to the AI bot.
It’s not simply video, share paperwork, photographs and recordsdata with Gemini and dwell chat with the bot because it identifies what it’s taking a look at.
This characteristic has been marketed closely by Samsung, and for good motive. It turns your smartphone into an all-knowing chatbot with eyes. It can translate menus, clarify paperwork, educate you easy methods to change a tire and establish what sort of laptop computer you could have.
Sure, this sort of characteristic isn’t fully distinctive, opponents like OpenAI have their very own model, however Gemini stands out as essentially the most intuitive, understanding context and situational consciousness much better than anybody else.
Innovation award
Asus ROG Flow Z13
The Asus ROG Flow Z13 began its life this yr in controversial trend — being introduced with no devoted graphics card. Instead, you’re getting an AMD Ryzen AI Max APU with…built-in graphics? Asus promised me it was highly effective, however I used to be suspicious.
Fast ahead just a few months later to launch, and I can safely verify that Strix Halo is the actual deal — I’m completely blown away by what this 2-in-1 can do within the gaming house. I’m speaking about Cyberpunk 2077 with topped out settings at over 90 frames per second, and even Black Myth: Wukong at 92 FPS.
And all of this in what’s basically a pill!? And a rattling good trying one at that with a brilliant, colourful and buttery clean 180Hz Mini-LED show, a slim and modern design, and a battery life that frankly embarrasses different excessive efficiency laptops?
I’ve been ready for this second for years — the place gaming notebooks will be ultraportable with out compromising efficiency. And now, it’s occurred.
Best firm award
Anthropic
Thanks to its mission-driven method to constructing secure and reliable AI, Anthropic deserves the award for Best Company. Founded in 2021 by a workforce of former OpenAI researchers, the corporate has shortly risen to prominence with its Claude AI fashions, most notably Claude Sonnet 4 and Claude Opus 4, which have surpassed opponents in productiveness duties like writing, summarization and even code technology, main in SWE-Bench benchmarks.
With large backing from Amazon and Google and $4 billion in income to indicate for it, Anthropic’s Claude is shortly changing into probably the most influential AI platforms within the business.
But what actually units Anthropic aside is its concentrate on AI security, transparency and mannequin explainability, qualities which can be more and more vital as AI instruments transfer into our day by day lives.
In a fast-moving business the place hype typically outpaces impression, Anthropic’s regular, safety-first technique is incomes real-world belief, and that’s why it’s our prime choose.
Sustainability in tech
Framework Laptop 12
I’ve been reviewing laptops for many years, and the Framework Laptop 12 is essentially the most accessible, sustainable and upgradable 2-in-1 I’ve ever seen.
Sure, it could actually’t match the class and energy of costlier laptops, however the truth that you possibly can crack it open and begin swapping out components your self makes the Framework Laptop 12 essentially the most sustainable laptop computer I’ve used all yr. And because the cute, chunky 2-in-1 is available in 5 colour schemes (together with bubblegum and sage) it may very well be an enormous hit with children, college students and households.
That’s nice for sustainability as a result of like all Framework laptops, the Framework Laptop 12 is designed to be straightforward to study because of embedded QR codes contained in the laptop computer which take you proper to Framework’s step-by-step guides. If the Framework Laptop 12 proves standard with households and faculties it might assist a complete technology really feel extra comfy modifying and tinkering with their units, and that may very well be an enormous win for the way forward for sustainability.
Best product design
Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7
This is it. Samsung has accomplished what we didn’t assume attainable. Make a foldable cellphone that’s simply as modern as an everyday slab smartphone.
The Galaxy Z Fold 7 is a revelation in design. Measuring 8.9 mm when folded and 4.2mm when unfolded, this system is barely barely thicker than the Galaxy S25 Ultra and even lighter.
This is because of a redesigned Armor FlexHinge with an enhanced water droplet design. As a results of this and different enhancements, the Z Fold 7 is 48% thinner than the unique Galaxy Z Fold and 26% thinner than final yr’s Fold 6.
Even with this large leap in portability, the Z Fold 7 boasts a good bigger 8-inch essential show. Plus, there’s a brand new multi-rail construction that reduces the visibility of the crease. And there’s an even bigger 6.5-inch display up entrance, too.
Yes, Samsung ditched S Pen assist to attain this thinner design. And you don’t get mud resistance. But general, the Galaxy Z Fold 7 is the very best foldable I’ve ever held and used. And it’s simply the very best designed gadget of the yr.
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