Samsung’s Ballie Robot Is the Gadget That Never Arrives Another CES is nearly upon us, another year of flashy gadgets from giants and startups alike. The open secret of CES is that many showcased products never actually hit store shelves, though this fate usually befalls concepts from smaller companies, not giants like Samsung. Yet here we are, nearly six years since Samsung first introduced its Ballie personal robot, and consumers still cannot buy one. For those who may not recall, Ballie is an adorable circular robot designed to putter around your home, equipped with a projector to display information on floors or walls. It is essentially a mobile virtual assistant. Samsung first revealed this tiny robot at CES 2020, but it was presented more as a prototype than a purchasable product. Then the global pandemic shifted priorities, and the weird ball-shaped robot faded from public conversation. However, Samsung triumphantly brought Ballie back at CES 2024, unveiling a larger, more refined version and declaring it would go on sale that very year. That did not happen. Undeterred, Ballie was back at CES again in 2025. Samsung renewed its promise, stating a launch was set for 2025, and even issued a press release in April confirming it was on track for a summer launch in Korea and the United States. As far as anyone can tell, that was the last official update. With CES looming once more, the pattern suggests Samsung may roll Ballie out again, attempting to sell the dream of a cute robotic companion that understands you. I watched Ballie in a carefully controlled demo at CES 2024, and I was not overwhelmed by its purported usefulness. It was difficult to see a substantial market for it. This extended and public gestation period likely indicates Samsung has data confirming a lack of market urgency. If this product was projected to sell exceptionally well, it likely would have been rushed to market. This situation is reminiscent of another famous Samsung product vaporware, the Galaxy Home smart speaker. It was announced when Apple and Google were challenging Sonos and Amazon with their own voice-activated home speakers. The first rumor emerged in 2017, with an official reveal in August 2018. My immediate reaction was that the product made little sense, primarily because it relied on the inferior Bixby assistant while better alternatives existed. Samsung seemingly agreed. After years of vague commitments, the company simply stopped discussing the full-sized Galaxy Home. Interestingly, a Galaxy Home Mini was briefly released in South Korea as a pre-order bonus for the Galaxy S20, but it was never a standard retail product. The larger Galaxy Home never materialized at all. Ballie is not quite in the same abandonware category as the Galaxy Home, at least not yet. It has only been about eight months since Samsung’s last launch promise. The company has also promoted Ballie more publicly, making a quiet cancellation harder. Perhaps we will see a newly revamped Ballie with more features next month. Or perhaps we will just get another vague promise for a 2026 release. After two consecutive years of failed launch promises, I will not believe Ballie is a real product until I can actually enter my credit card details to pre-order it. And even then, I would hesitate. Ballie needs to demonstrate it is far more than just a cute rolling robot before it deserves anyone’s money. For now, it remains the perpetually upcoming gadget, a CES promise forever stuck in the future.
