Something familiar, only softer. At CES 2026, IKEA took its runaway hit—the chubby, doughnut-shaped Varmblixt lamp designed with Sabine Marcelis—and made it smart. The new version keeps the playful silhouette that went viral in 2023 but trades the glossy finish for matte white glass and adds colour‑changing, dimmable LEDs you can steer with a handheld remote or your smart‑home hub.
Why this matters
The Varmblixt was already a cultural moment: a shape so agreeable it became IKEA’s top-selling lamp worldwide and a viral image on social feeds. Making it part of the company’s Matter‑compatible ecosystem pushes that design into everyday smart‑home setups, where a familiar object now doubles as a subtle mood machine. It’s also emblematic of IKEA’s broader push into highly affordable, interoperable smart gadgets showcased at CES—from $6 smart bulbs to low-cost remotes and sensors—efforts that aim to lower the barrier to connected homes.
What’s new about the Varmblixt
Sabine Marcelis helped pick the lamp’s curated palette and fine‑tuned how colours flow. Instead of abrupt shifts, the smart Varmblixt cycles smoothly through 12 preset hues when used with its included Bilresa remote. Pair the lamp with IKEA’s Dirigera hub and the Home Smart app and you unlock an expanded palette of around 40 colours plus fine control over brightness and transitions. There’s also a smart pendant version that focuses on nuanced white light, sliding from cool daylight tones to candlelike warm yellow.
Marcelis says the matte finish is what really changes the experience: the light now feels like it’s glowing from within rather than reflecting the room, so colour transitions read as softer and more atmospheric.
Specs and pricing
IKEA priced the table/wall version of the smart Varmblixt at about $99 (Verge reports $99.99), with the pendant around $149.99. Both are expected to reach stores in April 2026. The lamps work over Matter (Thread when available), so they can join existing setups that support the standard. If you’ve been watching IKEA’s smart push, these lights are part of a broader strategy to ship many low‑cost, Matter‑ready devices that play nicely with other platforms—something IKEA itself highlighted at CES. For more on that strategy, see IKEA’s wider Matter push (/news/ikea-matter-21-devices).
A showpiece and a product
At the Venetian, the Varmblixt drew people like a little orbiting moon. The fuss isn’t just about prettiness; it’s design meeting scale. IKEA’s global range manager noted that the lamp sold out repeatedly and that people shared images because it’s a genuine design object you can actually afford. Turning that object into a controllable light means it can be a decorative accent one moment and a low‑impact scene setter the next.
Beyond the donut
CES also saw IKEA reveal a swath of Matter‑compatible kit: tiny $6 bulbs, $8 plugs, multi‑button and scroll remotes with magnetic mounts, and a raft of sensors. These cheap, interoperable parts are the scaffolding that makes a smart lamp more useful—linking it to automations, occupancy sensors and routines. If you’re building a connected home on a budget, IKEA’s approach makes sense: familiar products, familiar price points, smarter behavior. Read more about IKEA’s 21‑device rollout and how it aims to simplify smart homes (/news/ikea-matter-21-devices).
If you want a lamp that looks like a candy and behaves like a tiny ambient theatre, IKEA’s new Varmblixt is exactly that: approachable design upgraded with modern smart functionality. It’s not trying to be the loudest gadget on the show floor; it’s trying to be something you’ll actually want to live with.