Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Smart Home
  3. News

Heatbox wants you to ditch the office microwave for its heated lunchbox

Ed Oswald
By
Heatbox: The Self-Heating Lunchbox

This story is part of our continuing coverage of CES 2020, including tech and gadgets from the showroom floor.

Recommended Videos

CES is always full of gimmicky gadgets with little, if any, practical use. However, a nearly final prototype of a heated lunchbox from Netherlands-based Heatbox caught our eye. The battery-powered lunchbox can heat food in about 8 to 12 minutes using just 20 milliliters of water.

Related

While that might seem like a long time compared to the minute or two that it would take to heat your lunch in the office microwave, there are advantages to reheating your food with steam. The microwaving process dries out reheated food quickly, while also robbing the food of some of its nutritional value.

Steam heating helps retain flavor and moisture, making your food taste better. You can select any one of three streaming programs depending on what you’re cooking inside the Heatbox: Small or lighter meals at the lowest setting, average-sized meals at the medium setting, and larger and dense meals work best at the high setting. You can either control the Heatbox through a button on the front of the device or through its companion app, the latter of which can further customize the heating time beyond the standard eight-minute heating time.

The Heatbox charges via USB, and the company says you should be able to heat at least three meals at the lowest setting on a single charge. The water used for the steaming process is separate from your food, so you can fill the Heatbox with the necessary 20ml of water at home without worrying about it leaking or making your meal soggy, the company claims.

One area where some might find the Heatbox a little less convenient is its size and weight. At 9 inches long, 6 inches wide and 3 inches tall and nearly three pounds, while roughly the size of a lunchbox, it might be larger and heavier than most lunch bags that we’re accustomed to. But for what it does, and how well it seems to work (Heatbox can’t bring food onto the CES floor due to show policies), we think that’s a fair tradeoff.

As of right now, the Heatbox team expects the lunchbox to retail for around $200 when it starts shipping in late summer. The company already raised more than $90,000 on Kickstarter last year but is also offering the Heatbox on pre-order from Indiegogo starting at $144.

As with any crowdfunding product, we must warn you of the inherent risks of supporting such projects. Be sure to check out our post on spotting and avoiding crowdfunding scams before you buy.

Follow our live blog for more CES news and announcements.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics
Ed Oswald
Ed Oswald
Contributor
For fifteen years, Ed has written about the latest and greatest in gadgets and technology trends. At Digital Trends, he's…
Instagram wants to be both YouTube and TikTok, but it’s succeeding at neither
instagram igtv tiktok youtube 2020 analysis broken feat

A week ago, Instagram announced it’s taking down the orange IGTV button that was perched on top of its billion-user social networking app. The prominently placed portal to IGTV inside the Facebook-owned app was meant to jumpstart Instagram’s quest to be the new-age YouTube. But two years later, IGTV has seemingly found itself in the middle of an identity crisis.

Originally pitched as a vertical video platform for a mobile-first generation of viewers, IGTV has struggled to produce the same figures Instagram’s other recent ventures like Stories have.

Read more
Wayzn sliding glass door opener can let pets out when you’re not home
open sliding doors remotely with wayzn glass door opener

There are connected accessories for most every entryway in your home. Smart locks unlock both internal and external doors, while smart garage door openers make pulling your car in easier. Until recently, however, sliding glass doors had not connected with the smart home market.
Wayzn used CES 2020 to announce its connected sliding glass door opener, a device that can automatically open and close the sliding glass doors in your home. It’s an ideal solution for letting a pet out to use the bathroom when you're not home or for letting guests in through a back entrance. According to Wayzn, customers will soon be able to purchase a sensor that attaches to their pet's collar. When your four-legged friend approaches the door, it will open automatically to let them take care of business. 
The sliding glass door opener has an elegant design that looks significantly better than a pet door. It uses adhesive pads to attach to either side of the frame, and when you aren’t using the sliding glass door opener, the moving arm can be lifted up and out of the way with ease. It’s also totally DIY, so you won’t need to shell out for professional installation. Wayzn says the sliding glass door opener is compatible with all 5-, 6-, and 8-foot, two-panel sliding glass doors.

The sliding glass door opener has built-in resistance detection that triggers the auto-open function. This means there’s no need to worry about a pet or a small child getting wedged in the door while it's closing.
The door can be opened via a motion sensor, through a smart speaker, or through the Wayzn mobile app. Other features are on the way, including a collar-mounted sensor that tells the door to automatically open when your pet walks up to it. Users can also schedule specific times for the Wayzn to activate and control it from anywhere if guests show up.
If you’re interested, you can sign up to reserve the Wayzn sliding glass door opener now. The initial retail price is $400. While not the most affordable smart home device on the market, it’s less expensive than installing a pet door and more secure than using an insert. The initial release will have limited supplies as the company ramps up production. The Wayzn sliding glass door opener received the CES 2020 Smart Home Division Mark of Excellence for its innovative function and attractive design.

Read more
Qualcomm’s self-driving car made me never want to touch a steering wheel again
Qualcomm's self-driving Lincoln MKZ at CES 2020

Of all the cars I saw at CES 2020, I was most impressed by the Lincoln MKZ I rode in -- and I didn't even get to touch the steering wheel. Matter of fact, I didn't have to: The car itself did all of the steering.

A couple of days earlier at the giant Consumer Electronics Show, Qualcomm announced a new platform for self-driving cars called Snapdragon Ride -- and to showcase its powers, Qualcomm gave me a ride in an MKZ that had been tricked out with all the sensors and chips necessary to use the new platform. The platform, Snapdragon Ride, is a handful of chips and a software stack that can fit into box no bigger than your backpack and can tie all of those systems together: Radar of all ranges (and maybe even high-resolution radar), a CV2X communication system, and front and rear cameras, connected via software that knows where the car is, where it should turn, and what’s happening on the roadway ahead.

Read more