GE’s new smart refrigerator adds a barcode scanner and an 8-inch tablet

Have you always wanted to check your groceries at home? If so, the latest smart refrigerator from GE Appliances is the right choice for you. There is a barcode scanner built into the water dispenser that works in conjunction with an internal camera and an 8-inch tablet to help you track the food you need and add it to your digital shopping list.

The GE Profile Smart 4-Door French Door Refrigerator with Kitchen Assistant is being announced at CES 2026, which starts next week, and is scheduled to launch in April for $4,899 — $500 more than a similar model without Kitchen Assistant.

This is the first GE refrigerator with a full tablet, but it’s not the first with one — that award goes to GE’s Kitchen Hub, which was a giant 27-inch tablet attached to an above-range microwave.

This time, the company says it’s looking to use technology to address specific pain points, such as maintaining your shopping list, meal planning, and food waste management. “We are integrating very purposeful technology into the product,” said Amy Hite, product manager, GE Appliances. Edge. “We didn’t just put the iPad on the front of the door.”

The new feature here is the built-in scanner located below the tablet and above the water dispenser. The idea is that you scan empty packages as you take them out of the refrigerator or pantry. This adds them to your shopping list in GE’s SmartHQ app — complete with brand, flavor and size — making it perfectly easy to create your own shopping list.

You can also add items manually via the 8-inch touchscreen, which, by being integrated into the water dispenser area, appears less noticeable than those found in other brands. Another option is the new built-in voice assistant, “Hey, HQ.” The screen also provides access to recipes from Taste of Home and a meal planning feature, and you can add the ingredients you need from a recipe to your menu with just a few taps.

There’s a camera inside the fridge that monitors your fresh food drawer, letting you check the store via the app if you’re low on spinach. It’s built into a flush-mounted LED strip above the doors and contains an actual shutter.

Once your list is ready, you can order your groceries through Instacart in the app, check off items while you’re in the store, or export the list as a PDF. “The goal here is not to try to keep an inventory of what’s in the fridge, but rather to make the shopping process easier for you,” Haight says.

The company plans to add AI-powered object tracking to the camera to enable more accurate food tracking – a feature that Samsung’s Family Hub smart refrigerators already offer. “The vision of AI is the future here,” Haidt says. “There’s a real problem with food waste, so we’re trying to solve that problem by helping you know what you have, so you don’t buy duplicates.”

The SmartHQ voice assistant is a first for GE Appliances. In addition to adding items to your shopping list, it can handle tasks like kitchen timers, dispensing a set amount of water, and answering refrigerator-related questions, like “How do I change my water filter?”

Headquarters does not respond; Instead, he answers any questions that appear on the screen. However, there is a speaker in the refrigerator, as well as a microphone, which you can use to stream music and podcasts.

“Voice control fills the gaps that are difficult to reach with Alexa and Google Assistant integrations,” explains Justin Brown, director of digital product management at GE Appliances. He says it will be available on other devices in the future.

There are many apps, services, and smart speakers that can do some or all of the above, but consolidating all of these capabilities into one device — the refrigerator — and having it accessible by the whole family holds some appeal. However, being limited to one manufacturer’s ecosystem and app seems limiting, especially for meal planning. My experience with the SmartHQ app so far has not been great.

There’s also a very real concern about having a tablet built into your fridge that may stop getting updates or break off long before your fridge does. However, sticking tablets into devices is not a trend that will go away any time soon. Hisense just announced a range of touchscreen refrigerators and ovens that will also be at CES, and all of Samsung’s latest devices have 7-inch or larger tablets.

The other fear is that once companies have screens in your home, they will start showing you ads, something Samsung has already done. The trade-off between the convenience these interfaces provide, and the lack of control you ultimately have over them, is something we’ll be watching closely.