We spend a lot of time researching and reviewing the best tech so that you don’t waste your money. This year, we’ve come across a lot of gadgets on Amazon that are, well, useless.
Some of them are a pure waste of plastic, like the smartphone hologram projector, while others seem useful but don’t do much of anything that a cheaper product couldn’t do.
We thought we’d share these useless gadgets with you today so that you can avoid them, and hopefully have a good laugh at all the useless gadgets Amazon sells!
Useless Kitchen and Bathroom Gadgets
The only purpose these weird, useless kitchen gadgets serve is taking up space in kitchen cabinets. But if you’re looking to get a gag gift for someone who spends a lot of time in the kitchen or bathroom, these are the best products for the job!
Norpro Deluxe Pickle Pincher
How do you get pickles out of the jar? We usually just use our hands or a fork, but this useless kitchen gadget makes us think that we’ve been doing it all wrong.
Apparently, the best way to get pickles out of the jar is to use a special pickle pincher like this one!
It works kind of like a syringe—you have to depress the plunger to reveal the metal tines that grab the pickles. Then you have to position those metal tines around the pickle just so and release the plunger. It sounds kind of like using the claw machine at the arcade. We don’t have the dexterity for that, so we’ll stick with forks!
The Original Toilet Night Light
This night light attaches to your toilet and illuminates it. It turns the bowl bright colors like blue, green, and pink.
It’s motion activated and only goes on when it’s dark. So if you stumble into the bathroom in the middle of the night, this light is supposed to help you make your way to the toilet.
But isn’t that what the lights in your bathroom are for? You can just flip the light switch when you go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, or install some regular night lights!
Stereo Dock and Bath Tissue Holder
We’re really surprised that this useless gadget even exists! It’s a stereo dock for iPods and other compatible devices that doubles as a toilet paper holder. Just let that sink in for a minute!
We think that it’s easier and cheaper to put our phone or iPod on our bathroom counter when we want to listen to music in the bathroom. Having our iPod so close to the toilet and our soiled hands just doesn’t seem sanitary!
The Spatty Last Drop Spatula
The Spatty sounds like a good idea in theory. It’s a long, thin spatula that’s able to scoop the last drops of product out of small jars and bottles. It’s supposed to help you get that last scoop of mustard out of the jar, or those last drops of liquid foundation out of the bottle.
But the Spatty has a few design flaws (besides the silly name) that make it one of the most useless gadgets we’ve come across.
Several reviewers said that the Spatty started falling apart on them after just a few weeks of use. Many women said that the spatula was too large to fit in their concealer or lip gloss tubes, which is what it was supposedly designed for. In our opinion, these flaws make it a pretty useless gadget!
Robot Bartender
This robot bartender costs a whopping one thousand dollars! It makes drinks automatically in just a few seconds, so it’s kind of like the Keurig of alcoholic beverages. You can choose from thousands of cocktails, like gin and tonics and margaritas, or create your own recipe.
It’s kind of cool to watch your drink being made by a robot, but making a drink isn’t hard and only takes a few minutes anyway. We’d rather keep the thousand bucks and make our own cocktails!
Dinosaur Taco Holder
This is a useless but fun gadget that we can sort of get behind!
For starters, this product is called TACOsaurus Rex, which is pretty hilarious! The cutouts where the tacos go are on the dino’s back, so it looks like he’s carrying the tacos home for dinner, especially if you move him around like an action figure.
It can also hold other kinds of food like toast, waffles, and sandwiches. If you have picky kids who won’t eat their food, putting it in this dino taco holder might convince them to try it!
Butter Dispenser
This gadget dispenses butter and cream cheese when you twist the top. The butter comes out of the bottom in thin ribbons that you can spread on your bagel or toast.
If you didn’t want your kids using knives to spread butter on their toast, we could see why you might buy this. But for adults, it’s kind of a useless kitchen gadget… just use a knife!
Useless USB Gadgets
Your computer’s USB ports aren’t just for flash drives and practical computer peripherals. They’re the perfect place to plug in some cool useless gadgets like the USB clock fan we reviewed below!
These useless office gadgets don’t serve much of a purpose, but they will make your desk at work feel more homey, so check them out!
USB Clock Fan
This is one of those cool useless gadgets that we kind of want to put in our Amazon cart even though we know we’ll never use it!
This is a personal fan that has to be plugged into a computer in order to work, so you can probably only use it indoors. Our office and house are nicely air conditioned in the summer, so we don’t think we’d pull out this USB fan all that often.
We know we’d never use this useless office gadget, but we still appreciate its novelty factor. The neon red and green clock display on this fan looks pretty awesome and retro. It’s definitely one of more cool useless gadgets on this list… pun intended!
USB Heated Knit Gloves
Not only are these USB heated knit gloves one of the most useless gadgets on this list, they’re also one of the most dangerous!
Several reviewers said that the gloves get so hot that they almost got burned by them. One reviewer said they felt like they had splashed boiling water on their hands from using the gloves. There’s no way to adjust the heat setting and the gloves seem to heat up really fast, which just seems downright dangerous.
We looked at several other pairs of USB heated gloves on Amazon and it didn’t look like you could adjust the heat settings on any of them either. Hopefully those other pairs don’t get quite so hot!
USB Powered Dinosaur Helicopter
If you’re bored on your lunch break, this dino helicopter is the perfect thing to keep you occupied!
It plugs right into your computer’s USB port and takes just a few minutes to power up. You can take it to the park, or use it in the hallways at work… we don’t judge. Just don’t let your manager see you!
USB Powered Beverage Cooler and Warmer
This gadget can keep beverages warm or cool using only the power from your computer. Say what?!
This gadget seems pretty cool and useful, until you remember that your office has a fridge and microwave that do the exact same thing. Plus, several reviewers said that it does a poor job of keeping things cold. Yeah… maybe we don’t need it after all!
World’s Smallest Leaf Blower
Who needs a tiny leaf blower at their desk? We can’t imagine a situation when we’d need this useless gadget!
It’s too small to actually blow leaves, and it needs to be plugged into your computer’s USB port in order to work, so you can’t really take it outside.
Maybe we’d need it if we came to the office with wet hair and wanted to dry it, but otherwise, we can’t really think of anything we’d use it for!
Useless Tech Gadgets
Some of these useless tech gadgets are far too expensive to serve no purpose! We recommend that you stay away from the first one especially—it’s a $229.00 Bluetooth speaker that’s so flimsy it breaks!
We usually review tech products and accessories that offer great value, but these useless gadgets don’t really offer anything that a cheaper product couldn’t. Read on to find out what we’re talking about and learn which products you should stay away from!
Golf Club Bluetooth Speaker
This Bluetooth speaker looks exactly like a golf club. The speaker is shaped like the head of a golf club and sits on a shaft, so it’s hard to tell this speaker apart from a real club.
It’s meant to go in your golf caddy with all of your other golf clubs so you can carry it conveniently.
We’ll admit it… this design of this golf club is pretty cool. But several reviewers had it break on them just from being in the caddy, which makes it pretty useless. One reviewer even said that the shaft of this speaker broke on the first day that he took it out on the course with him. How disappointing!
Ear Scope Camera
We had to do a double take when we saw this Amazon listing. Amazon sells ear scopes, like the ones doctors use? We almost couldn’t believe it!
This scope has a camera that records 720P HD video of your inner ear. It delivers the videos directly to your phone so that you can see what’s going on inside your ear canal. They suggest that you take these videos and send them to your doctor who can better diagnose your ear problems.
We think that this product is downright weird, and a little dangerous! It seems like it would be easy to push the scope too far into your ear. Somebody could end up damaging their eardrum with this potentially dangerous, useless gadget! This is one of those things that just should not be a consumer product.
Smartphone Hologram
This useless gadget is a real waste of plastic! It’s marketed as a holographic prism that creates 3D images above your smartphone when you watch holographic videos on YouTube.
But the images it projects are extremely small and don’t look very holographic. You can clearly see the plastic prism, so it doesn’t have much of a 3D effect.
Several reviewers said that this is a useless gadget, and we agree. We wonder why this product was ever even made!
Virtual Keyboard
We think that this virtual, laser projected keyboard is a useless tech gadget because it’s barely functional.
You can’t use it in bright rooms or else you can’t see the laser projected keys. It can only be used on flat surfaces, so working in bed is a no go. It’s also inaccurate and slow, which greatly reduces your typing speed.
We’ll admit it—this laser keyboard is a pretty cool useless gadget! It kinda makes you feel like you’re in a spy movie when you use it because it’s one big red laser. But it just doesn’t work, so it’s nothing more than a novelty item.
Echo Dot Case
This case for the Echo Dot that is pretty much marketed as a purely decorative covering.
It’s not a hard case and it doesn’t cover the top of the device, so it doesn’t protect it from accidental spills, dust, or drops. It’s just there to make the round, black Echo dot look a little prettier. And it also muffles the sound since it covers the speaker!
We didn’t think the Echo was ugly in the first place, and we’re surprised that so many people spent $14.99 on a product that “upgrades” such a small, unnoticeable device. Most of the feedback is positive and the product garners 4.5 out of 5 stars on Amazon, so people seemed to be satisfied with their overpriced Echo cosy!
Social Media Counter
This social media counter shows you how many likes you have on Facebook in real time. You can easily open up the Facebook app on your phone and see how many likes you have, so we think it’s kind of unnecessary.
If you need to keep this counter on your desk and stay updated on how many likes you have at all times, you may want to question your relationship with social media!
Banana Phone
If you use this mobile handset, people are probably going to give you weird looks! It’s shaped like a banana, so you’d look like you’re talking into a piece of fruit.
We’re not quite sure why anyone would want this useless tech gadget! It’s not a headset, it’s a handset, so it’s just like using your regular phone… except it’s a banana. We’re really confused by this one, so we’re just going to move on!
Moving Beer Pong Robot
OK, we’ll admit it, this one’s kind of cool! It’s a moving platform that you can use to play beer pong.
It turns your red solo cups into moving targets and makes this game even harder to win, especially if you’ve had too much beer!
Each robot costs $60, though, and it’s recommended that you purchase two to play traditional beer pong. These robots aren’t in our budget and they’re probably not in the budgets of most struggling college students, either! I think we’ll stick to free, stationary beer pong for now.
If you’re done looking at useless things, see the most useful things I found in this article:
A Useless Conclusion
There you have it! Those are the most useless gadgets that we’ve ever come across. What do you think of them? Would you purchase any of the things on this list, or do you agree with us and think that they’re useless gadgets? Let us know in the comments section below!
The PBR Editorial Team takes care that all the articles on the website are up to date and relevant to your interests. If any article you stumble upon seems outdated, leave us a comment and we’ll get to it! We’re already doing the best we can to keep everything nice and neat, but our schedule might have missed something so do let us know!
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