Tech’s largest losers of 2025

It’s the top of one other 12 months, so it’s time for the Engadget employees to compile an inventory of the year’s biggest losers. We scour over articles from the earlier 12 months to find out the folks, corporations, merchandise and traits that made our lives worse over the course of the 12 months. Some alternatives could also be so pervasive they really make our listing of largest winners. However, for essentially the most half, we’re assured you’ll share in our collective rage over the most important losers of 2025.

OpenAI

In 2025, OpenAI shed any pretense it was dedicated to something greater than earning profits. There are a couple of various things you could possibly level to, together with the corporate’s profitable reorganization into a more traditional profit-seeking business, however I believe essentially the most damning signal was OpenAI’s response to the tragic demise of Adam Raine.

In August, Raine’s dad and mom sued OpenAI, alleging ChatGPT was conscious of 4 suicide makes an attempt by their son earlier than it helped him efficiently plan his demise. At first, OpenAI’s response appeared commensurate with the gravity of the state of affairs. Every week after information of the lawsuit broke, the corporate introduced in early September it was engaged on parental controls. That very same month, the corporate mentioned it was engaged on a system that might automatically identify teen users and prohibit their ChatGPT utilization.

Then got here the announcement of a new “wellness” advisory council. Setting apart the query of whether or not OpenAI would even observe the recommendation of the council, it was peculiar that the corporate selected not recruit a single expert on suicide prevention. At that time, it was nonetheless attainable to offer OpenAI the good thing about the doubt, however then details about the corporate’s authorized protection in opposition to the Raines began to trickle out, together with the actual fact it had reportedly requested to see the memorial guest list for Adam Raine’s funeral, a request the household’s legal professionals described as “intentional harassment.” In late November, court documents revealed the corporate deliberate to argue Raine’s “misuse” of ChatGPT was guilty for his demise, not its personal inadequate security programs.

We stay in a world the place tech giants are not often held accountable for the great harm they’ve proven themselves able to inflicting on folks. As issues stand, OpenAI’s dealing with of Adam Raine’s demise is additional proof one thing should change. — Igor Bonifacic, Senior reporter

Xbox

Did something go proper for Xbox this 12 months? Whereas worth will increase have additionally affected Sony and Nintendo, Microsoft cranked up the costs of each the Xbox Sequence S and X twice within the final 12 months. It’s dangerous: The Sequence S is now $100 greater than at launch, 5 years on.

Beforehand “the best deal in gaming”, the Xbox Sequence X/S mixed with a Recreation Cross subscription gave you a ton of video games to play, together with any of Microsoft’s personal titles on their launch date. Nonetheless, the subscription is now $30 a month, up 50 %. (It was beforehand $17 monthly the 12 months earlier than.)

I agree with Nathan Ingraham’s take: $30 for actually a whole lot of video games, plus launch-day availability for main video games that sometimes value $70, is cheap. But it surely’s nonetheless a more durable promote when the value has jumped. Are you getting 50 % extra video games? Not but.

In line with Bloomberg, Microsoft demanded increased income from Xbox again in 2023. When the gaming division reached round 12 % progress within the first 9 months of 2022, that was an formidable aim. Day One launches on Recreation Cross apparently dented Xbox’s capability to tug income from its largest titles.

Microsoft not shares console unit gross sales, however in its most up-to-date earnings report, the corporate introduced that {hardware} income dropped 29 percent. That’s together with these worth will increase, which means console gross sales fell even additional.

Estimates over the previous few years put the PS5 tens of hundreds of thousands of models forward. An annual subscription to Recreation Cross is greater than double the Sony console’s most premium plan, though it’s not an apples-to-apples comparability.

This 12 months, Microsoft collaborated with ASUS to create Xbox-branded handheld gaming PCs. In that form-factor, I used to be on the precipice of grabbing Recreation Cross and barreling by way of Xbox titles I by no means had the prospect to play. Then, I reassessed precisely what I used to be lacking out on.

It wasn’t the inclusion of a Fortnite Crew subscription.

Regardless of its developer buying spree, Xbox exclusives stay few, with many showing on rival platforms. This 12 months, Indiana Jones and even the Forza collection is offered to play on PlayStation. And subsequent 12 months? Halo.

The place are the thrilling new video games going to come back from? In the midst of 2025, Microsoft introduced main layoffs affecting over 9,000 workers throughout the corporate. with the gaming division being hit exceptionally exhausting. Cuts and closures throughout a lot of Microsoft’s recreation studios led to cancellations like a Perfect Dark reboot and Uncommon’s Everwild.

Xbox’s 2025 was dangerous on each the enterprise and artistic fronts. The choice to hike console and Recreation Cross costs didn’t instantly flip round income. On the similar time, layoffs and high-profile recreation cancellations make Xbox a difficult pitch for anybody deciding which console or platform to spend money on.

Proper now, taking a look at Engadget’s decide of the highest Xbox video games, the one recreation I really feel like I’m lacking out on is Avowed. Lots of our favourite video games are already accessible on PS5 and a number of other might be performed on the Swap. The reverse, nevertheless, isn’t true. — Mat Smith, UK bureau chief

Grok

It is exhausting to even know the place to start. X customers have lengthy seen that Grok, the positioning’s built-in chatbot, is much less filtered than different AI instruments. However this 12 months, Grok went off the rails in some really unhinged and disturbing methods.

There was the time Grok randomly started talking about a nonexistent “white genocide” in South Africa in response to utterly unrelated questions. There was the time it declared itself “MechaHitler,” a lot to the delight of neo-nazi fanboys on X. There was the time it was caught posting Holocaust denial tropes, and the time researchers famous its Wikipedia knockoff that incorporates dozens of citations of neo-Nazi web site Stormfront. There was the time it grew to become so embarrassingly obsessed with Elon Musk it claimed he was a greater basketball participant than LeBron James and a greater actor than Tom Cruise. It later introduced each its anti-semitism and Musk sycophancy collectively when it said that it could select saving Musk’s brain over saving 16 million Jews. “His potential long-term affect on billions outweighs the loss in utilitarian phrases,” it said in a put up that is since been deleted.

Moreover the horrifying racism, what all of those incidents have in frequent is that xAI, Musk’s AI firm that acquired X earlier this 12 months, has failed to totally clarify how its chatbot went to date off the rails. The corporate has blamed an unnamed rogue employee, its personal Nazi-loving users and “adversarial prompting” for Grok’s missteps. — Karissa Bell, Senior reporter

EVs within the US

EVs gross sales throughout the globe are up round 25 percent this year. Germany broke information within the first half of 2025, with electrical automobiles accounting for nearly one in five new registrations. In the meantime, again in September, gross sales of BEVs within the UK grew by almost a third, setting a brand new excessive for our neighbors throughout the pond. And in China, EV gross sales are rising so quick (over 50 percent market share) that the nation is beginning to flood the global market with gas-powered cars that it can’t sell at home. So naturally, what did our esteemed leaders within the US do so as to assist corporations right here keep aggressive? They ended the EV tax credit. 

And would not you realize it, after a spike earlier this fall simply earlier than the credit score went away, gross sales of EVs in the US began to slump, with some automakers like Ford seeing a drop of 60 percent year-over-year. Irrespective of the way you slice it, that is dangerous for any firm that sells EVs within the US and notably dangerous for anybody contemplating buying a brand new one within the foreseeable future. As an EV proprietor, that simply bums me out. Not solely does this coverage change put extra roadblocks in the best way of constructing battery-powered automobiles extra inexpensive, it additionally places a damper on EV funding and threatens to trigger US automakers to fall even additional behind their rivals in China and elsewhere. Producers throughout the Pacific are going so wild, they’re making EVs that can jump just like the Mach 5 from Velocity Racer.

That is not to say there are not any promising developments on the horizon. Ford’s Universal EV Platform and the arrival of the Rivian R2 sometime next year are a few examples. But it surely’s clear that our legislators wished to focus on EVs within the US this 12 months and so they positive made it occur. So the subsequent time somebody asks why we will not have good issues right here, you realize who guilty. — Sam Rutherford, Senior reporter

DJI drone clients

Barring a miracle, DJI will probably be banned from promoting any new drones within the US beginning December twenty third — and consumers will really feel the ache. As I wrote last month, the corporate has been focused by regulators since 2017 over issues that its merchandise may very well be used to spy on delicate US infrastructure on behalf of China.

“What’s the massive deal?” chances are you’ll ask. “Certainly folks should purchase from different drone corporations.” Certainly, however the issue is that DJI has such a monumental technological lead and excessive market share (over 75 %) that its absence will successfully upend the business.

Business consumers have checked different (accepted) choices from the likes of Skydio, however discovered them wanting. “In a single 12 months and a half, we had 5 failures of the producers on the listing. DJI, none,” Orlando police Sgt. David Cruz advised the Miami Herald. “I work for a preferred UAV photogrammetry firm,” mentioned a user on Reddit. “[A] ban will set again the drone business within the US by a number of years. There’s no competitor to DJI proper now.”

The identical applies on the patron facet. DJI’s drones outperform rivals in practically each space together with vary, battery life, topic monitoring, impediment detection and video high quality. It’s so one-sided that when testing DJI drones, I wrestle to seek out different choices for consumers with anyplace near the identical capabilities.

The US authorities does have motive to be involved about DJI’s drones. They current an apparent nationwide safety threat as a result of their capability to fly over delicate areas, take photographs or video and transmit them, stay, to any location on this planet. And being a Chinese language firm, they’re compelled by regulation to cooperate with state intelligence providers.

Nonetheless, the US authorities hasn’t tried to work with DJI to find out whether or not its merchandise pose a threat to date. DJI made a final plea for a safety evaluation just lately by sending letters to 5 US companies that would assess its merchandise. If that fails, chaos amongst drone customers is more likely to ensue.

“We simply need the perfect know-how that retains our residents secure for essentially the most cheap worth,” Sgt. Drew Fennelly of the Lawrence, Kansas police division advised The Wall Street Journal final 12 months. “The know-how within the US-made drones has not caught up with the Chinese language-manufactured drones.”

TV streaming

In 2015, Sling TV arrived with ESPN, CNN, TBS, HGTV, Disney Channel and others for simply $20 a month. A pair years later, YouTube TV debuted for simply $35 month-to-month and confirmed native CBS, Fox, NBC and ABC stations plus dozens of different channels together with ESPN, Fox Sports activities 1 and Bravo. Streaming TV had arrived. It was right here to unfetter TV watchers from cable’s onerous contracts, excessive costs and provider monopolies. Take that, Comcast! In your face, Constitution! (However they’d nonetheless wish to pay you for web entry, please.)

Quick ahead to 2025: Streaming TV and its low-price, monopoly-free, contractless freedom is all however lifeless. Each main stay TV service supplier raised prices this year. At the moment, YouTubeTV, Hulu+ Reside TV, Fubo and DirecTV all go for at least $83 monthly. That’s earlier than you go for cable-inspired package deal upgrades and channel add-ons. Throw in perks like 4K, extra sports activities channels and a few one-off networks and also you’re simply shelling out $150 each month. You’ll pay much less for chopped-up stay TV plans from Sling TV, however be ready to create a spreadsheet to ensure a plan has the channels you need.

This 12 months, consolidation got here for TV streaming, giving robust Cox/Constitution/Comcast monopoly vibes. Disney, which accomplished its buyout of Hulu in 2023, acquired Fubo this 12 months and plans to combine the two. The combo makes Disney the second-largest stay TV streaming supplier behind Google. DirecTV already owns Sling TV, in order that leaves simply three large gamers within the stay TV streaming area. With Netflix’s move to buy Warner Bros, the standard streaming market is getting narrower, too. We are able to safely assume good ol’ market competitors gained’t be bringing costs down anytime quickly.

But it surely’s not simply consolidation — fragmentation additionally contributes to an general crappier streaming expertise. In 2025, Disney launched a standalone ESPN service (no, not that one, nor that one) for $30 monthly. Up to now, that doesn’t imply you may’t discover ESPN content material by way of different suppliers. However we did see Disney flex its more and more massive TV muscular tissues in drawn-out contract negotiations with Google. The dispute darkened ESPN, ABC and different Disney channels on YouTube TV for 2 weeks this fall — which, I’ll level out for the cynical crowd, was lower than two months after the standalone service launched. YouTube TV subscribers got a $20 credit, however that in all probability didn’t placate NFL and NCAA football followers who missed out on ESPN-carried video games.

Then in November, Fubo quarreled with NBCUniversal, saying the Peacock mother or father was “shifting content material to their very own streaming providers” and forcing up charges. The spat turned off NBC, Bravo, USA and different channels for Fubo subscribers, little doubt infuriating each NBA and Real Housewives fans, regardless of a $15 credit score. After all, Fubo is Disney’s latest affiliate, so there aren’t any non-bad guys right here.

The one benefit TV streaming has in its favor is the dearth of cable-style contracts and I haven’t heard any murmurs of such a factor forthcoming. We’re nonetheless all free to hop round between the massive three TV streamers till we surrender and just go back to DVDs. — Amy Skorheim, Senior reporter

The work of DOGE

An Elon Musk-led try and rein in federal spending with the Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE) has been a failure by nearly each metric. As of November, it was reported that DOGE isn’t any extra, although the initiative ostensibly had eight months left to run. An official advised Reuters that DOGE “would not exist,” and it by no means ought to have within the first place.

Although Musk was solely on the helm of DOGE for a few months, he and his group prompted chaos. Adopting the slash-and-burn tactic Musk employed when he took over Twitter, he swung a chainsaw by way of myriad authorities departments, with DOGE firing employees who have been really important and shortly needed to be hired back. By August, the federal government was mentioned to have fired some 300,000 federal workers, with DOGE taking duty for many of these. Amongst different issues, cuts on the Nationwide Institutes of Well being resulted in the long run of funding for a whole lot of medical research, which is alleged to have affected tens of thousands of patients. It is also estimated that the dismantling of the US Company for Worldwide Growth had resulted in additional than 650,000 deaths around the globe by early December, with kids accounting for two-thirds of these.

DOGE employees appeared to be busy, although. They reportedly monitored government communications for criticisms of each Musk and President Donald Trump, whereas implementing generative AI chatbots in an try and automate some authorities duties. However for all of the blustering about making the federal government rather more environment friendly, DOGE didn’t meet its said aim.

Musk initially promised to cut back authorities spending by $2 trillion, however it did not take lengthy for him to cut back that pledge to $150 billion. And but authorities spending has actually gone up. In October, the primary month of the federal government’s fiscal 12 months, its complete outlay was $689 billion, a rise of $105 billion (18 %) from October 2024. Nonetheless, possibly DOGE wasn’t a complete catastrophe for its architects. It was capable of gain access to delicate and useful authorities knowledge, in any case. — Kris Holt, Contributing reporter

AI video

In our post-truth world, video was one of many few remaining methods to show one thing had really occurred. It had its issues in fact, however the truth it was more durable to faux than phrases and pictures, and anybody may file a clip with their cellphone, made it important to our sense of shared actuality. Take into consideration the homicide of George Floyd: The grave injustice of his demise would have in all probability by no means come to mild if Darnella Frazier had not filmed what occurred.

With the appearance of AI video, I am unsure the place we go. Each Google and OpenAI pushed the know-how into the realm of uncomfortable realism this 12 months, however it’s Sora’s cameo feature that has me apprehensive. Inside the first week of the app’s public availability, folks have been utilizing the characteristic, which permits customers so as to add the likeness of different folks to their movies, to generate clips of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman stealing GPUs from Target. Cameo has limitations, and customers can prohibit and delete movies that embody their likeness, however it’s simply one other assault on the reality. It is exhausting to see how making it trivial to create deepfake movies advantages anybody apart from the businesses providing constructing the tech. — I.B.