I Really Don’t Want an AI Pot to Turn My Plant Into a Tamagotchi From Hell

Every few weeks Johnny Cash, Freddie Mercury and Jack Black all get a drink of fertilized water at my house. They’re all plants, by the way, and they’re all very thirsty.

My wife and I have filled our home with big plants, small plants, purple plants, white plants and a few fuzzy plants, too. With all that in mind, I need you to understand that the LeafyPod from CES 2025 petrified me when I saw it. The thought of this AI-powered plant pot filled me with dread akin to that of working at a pizza restaurant during the Super Bowl. 

Read more: Some of the Wild New Products We Saw at CES 2025

The LeafyPod is an AI-powered planter that can give your plants an actual voice via a mobile app so they can ask for more water, sunlight and other things in order to stay healthy. It basically turns your plant into a Tamagotchi.

Now imagine you have about 20 plants that are all in these pots, all notifying you that they need more water. Suddenly they’re telling you that they need more sunlight. Soon they will let you know the temperature is a little chilly for their liking. That’s up to 60 notifications, not to mention any future notifications you’ll get. The thought of being flooded by those alerts makes me queasy, and that’s just with a fraction of the current plant collection in my home.

What if you don’t have enough of something to give your plant, like light? Some people don’t have any unobstructed south or west-facing windows that can let sunlight stream in. With LeafyPod, there’s a voice attached to that plant, and it’s pleading for more light like it’s a hungry child. Imagine the plant begging you for something you can’t give it. I don’t even know this plant, and I feel horrible for it.

These pots, which intend to help keep your plants alive, also don’t have a way to tell you if your leafy, green friend is afflicted by some sort of fungus or bug infestation that’s stunting growth. You might be able to spot fungi, but some insects are so small and devastating, like thrips, that you can watch your plant deteriorate before you suspect any creepy crawlers.

While technology can enhance our lives, this pot feels to me like an unnecessary nightmare compared to low-tech alternatives, chiefly planters with a self-watering pot and a water gauge. These pots come with a water reservoir and a meter to show you how full the water is. When the meter says the reservoir is empty, you give the plant some water. We have dozens of plants in self-watering pots and they make taking care of these plants easy. 

As for light, we have many plants in unobstructed windows, but my wife also uses a Mother growlight. The light is wide enough to cover a large portion of our plants, and it costs a little more than one of these AI-powered pots. 

And this might be sacrilege, but all of our plants are in ambient conditions — regular conditions you’d find in any home. We don’t run de/humidifiers and we don’t have specialty cabinets. We just have plants in our house out in the open, and they’re fine. I’m sure these AI-powered pots would tell us certain plants need more humidity, but you wouldn’t guess it by the way these specimens are growing. 

The possibility of constant notifications from this pot alone sounds like a minor form of torture to me, and the inclusion of AI and expensive technology into this pot feels misguided when low-tech options that give you the same results exist. 

If you are even considering this pot because you don’t think you can’t take care of a plant: Try a ZZ plant. Someone I know — who is definitely not me — didn’t water one or give it much light for a few months and it was fine.

For more from CES 2025, watch a robot vacuum pick up some socks, here’s a bottle cap that can make sparkling water anywhere and a smart ring that can detect AFib from your finger.

Watch this: CES 2025: New Laptops, Gaming PCs from Asus, Dell, Lenovo and HP

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