Korean firms sweep CES 2026 Innovation Awards

Samsung Electronics' product that won CES 2026 Innovation Awards / Courtesy of Samsung Electronics

Korean firms once again swept the highly-coveted CES Innovation Awards for the event’s 2026 edition, with top tech companies winning over dozens of awards respectively.

The Consumer Technology Association, the CES organizer, on Wednesday (local time) announced the winners of CES 2026 Innovation Awards. To recognize the most innovative products and services in the previous year, the CTA presents the awards before the world’s largest consumer electronics show to kick off in January.

Samsung Electronics said it has won a total of 27 awards including the three Best of Innovation awards. Twelve awards were from the company’s video display business, four from home appliance, three from mobile device, seven from semiconductor and one from automotive parts unit Harman.

In the visual display category, the company won two Best of Innovation awards and received 10 Innovation Awards for new products and services, including its 2026 lineup of TVs and monitors. In the mobile segment, the new Galaxy XR extended reality device and the Galaxy Z Fold7 also earned the honors.

LG Signature OLED T TV / Courtesy of LG Electronics

LG Electronics won a total of 18 awards, including two Best of Innovation honors. The company was recognized not only for its hardware products such as TVs, monitors and robot vacuum cleaners, but also for its non-hardware areas, including its webOS platform.

Particularly, the world’s first transparent wireless TV, the LG Signature OLED T, won the Best of Innovation award, marking the fourth consecutive year that LG’s OLED TVs have received the top honor.

Also, its webOS TV platform has won two awards for its cybersecurity and artificial intelligence (AI) functions.

LG Innotek received the award for the second consecutive year for its vehicle lighting solution. The company’s Ultra Thin Pixel Lighting Module, which will make its debut at CES 2026, won the honor for its breakthrough reductions in thickness, size and weight, allowing greater design freedom for carmakers.

LG Innotek said it seeks to begin mass production of the module in the second half of 2027.

LG Innotek's Ultra Thin Pixel Lighting Module / Courtesy of LG Innotek

Battery maker LG Energy Solution was named as an honoree for the award for its integrated battery life management solution, “Better.Re.” The software collects data on users’ driving, charging and parking habits, assesses 16 key battery aging factors and provides personalized behavioral guidance via a dedicated app.

This marks the first time a battery company has earned this recognition through software technology, LG Energy Solution said.

LG Energy Solution's "Better.Re" / Courtesy of LG Energy Solution

Battery maker Samsung SDI also won two awards, including one Best of Innovation honor. The company’s ultra-high-output SDI 25U-Power battery won the top honor for doubling its output while maintaining the weight. Its No Thermal Propagation technology won the innovation award for preventing heat from spreading to nearby cells when a certain battery cell experience a malfunction.

Leveraging its proprietary thermal propagation prediction program, Samsung SDI enhances overall safety by optimizing the materials placed between cells and using gas vents to channel gases through designated pathways.

Samsung SDI's 25U-Power battery and advanced safety technology, No Thermal Propagation / Courtesy of Samsung SDI

Along with Samsung and LG affiliates, Doosan Robotics won Best of Innovation and honoree with its Scan & Go robot, for AI and robot engineering, Daesang Wellife was named as an honoree with its Diabetes Pro, healthcare app. Navifra, an autonomous mobile robot (AMR) software firm, won the innovation award with NaviDock, the world’s plug-and-play type vision docking system for AMRs.