IFA 2026: Hisense AI fridge, Alexa+ controls and V AIOS

Hisense is showing an AI-managed home at IFA 2026, linking refrigerators, ovens, wine storage, dishwashers, laundry appliances, air conditioners and energy controls through its ConnectLife platform. The company’s exhibit, built around the theme “Innovating a Brighter Life,” presents the appliances as a coordinated system rather than a collection of independently connected products.

Hisense is also working with Amazon to bring select air conditioners to Amazon Alexa+ through Amazon’s Smart Home AI Toolkit. The feature is expected to become available in the coming months, but Hisense has not specified which air-conditioner models will support it, how many devices will be included, or whether the integration will require a particular Alexa+ plan.

The company describes a user asking Alexa+ for an outcome rather than naming a series of device settings. Alexa+ will interpret the request, navigate the relevant controls and execute the action on a compatible Hisense air conditioner. The announcement identifies only select air conditioners, while the broader coordination shown at IFA is part of Hisense’s ConnectLife demonstration.

How Hisense’s companion system works

Hisense’s V AIOS framework provides the logic behind the exhibit. The company describes four stages: devices sense what is happening, think about what to do, communicate with users and other devices, and execute tasks by coordinating devices and services. The release does not identify the underlying models, local-versus-cloud processing split, supported protocols, or latency for any of these operations.

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The demonstrations show a specific chain of actions. In the kitchen, the AI Companion Refrigerator recognizes the ingredients it contains and proposes meals based on a user’s preferences. After a recipe is selected, it can synchronize with the AI Companion Oven to support automatic cooking. The AI Companion Wine Cabinet recommends pairings and maintains storage conditions, while the AI Companion Dishwasher recognizes the condition of the dishes and adjusts its cleaning process.

The laundry demonstration is also automatic: the AI Companion Laundry Suite identifies clothing characteristics, chooses appropriate wash and dry cycles, and adjusts the process. Hisense presents that as a “load-and-go” workflow, but the release does not list the clothing categories it can recognize or explain how the system handles mixed loads and exceptions.

In the living space, the AI Companion Air Conditioner responds to indoor conditions and user presence, changing airflow as people move through the room. The AI Companion Energy System adds external inputs—weather and time-of-use electricity pricing—to help optimize household energy use. Hisense says the system can orchestrate devices and services autonomously, but it provides no savings figures, control-policy details or measured reduction in energy consumption.

Recognizing ingredients, clothing and room occupancy involves different sensors and decision rules, yet the public announcement groups them under one V AIOS label. There is enough information to identify the intended workflow, but not enough to evaluate accuracy, failure handling, privacy controls or the amount of computation performed on the appliances themselves.

Product awards and scope

Hisense also used the IFA presentation to highlight products recognized by the event. The Multi Function II Series, described as an all-in-one energy-saving HVAC solution, received a Winner Award. The X-zone Master was named an Honoree. Other recognized products were the U8 Air Master Air Conditioner, W60 3D Kitchen-fit Series and 60cm Integrated Wine Cabinet.

Those awards cover both the appliance hardware and the systems around it, but Hisense did not provide award categories, judging criteria or model-level technical specifications in the announcement. The release also does not state that every award-winning product is part of the Alexa+ integration or the complete AI Companion Suite.

Hisense says it operates in more than 180 countries and cites Omdia data ranking it No. 1 globally in the 100-inch-and-over TV segment for 2023 through the first half of 2026. It also describes itself as the origin of RGB MiniLED and notes its role as an official sponsor of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Those corporate claims accompany the IFA product showcase, but the announcement provides no television launch, pricing or RGB MiniLED specification tied to this event.

The company’s IFA 2026 presentation follows the connected-device strategy visible across the show, including Samsung’s effort to link TVs, Galaxy devices, appliances and monitors through its “Companion to AI Living” strategy. Hisense emphasizes appliance-to-appliance workflows—meal planning through cleanup, automatic laundry settings and occupancy-aware airflow—rather than a single control surface.

For US buyers, availability is the immediate limitation. Hisense has shown the connected workflows at IFA, while the only explicit consumer rollout promise is Alexa+ support for select air conditioners in the coming months. There are no prices, model numbers, supported US regions or shipping dates for the AI Companion products in the supplied announcement, so the exhibit demonstrates a direction for the platform rather than a defined retail lineup.