Home robots are late to the game. Besides the occasional cleaning robot and robot lawnmower, most homes are devoid of robots.

It’s become an annual prediction to declare the coming year the time the home-robot revolution finally hits, taking those boring domestic tasks off our plates.

This will, of course, eventually happen, but several things need to change between now and then.

Will Allen, HP Fellow at HP Labs, joins The Robotics Trends Show to preview his upcoming keynote at RoboBusiness 2016, “Everyday Robotics – Making Practical Robotic Solutions as Common as Smartphones,” that will examine the many reasons why robots aren’t more present in our homes.

Allen and I discuss some of the biggest challenges facing home robots, including couches and refrigerators, what robots (besides those that clean) will play a major role in the home, and some of the megatrends that will drive home robot adoption.

Allen also shares a couple non-endearing stories about robot vacuums – neither has anything to do with dogs – that show there’s still much-need improvement in how humans and robots interact.

In the podcast, Allen references a couple videos that show HP Labs tinkering with robots. Are these previews of what HP is working on? We’ll have to wait and see, but both of those videos can be found at the bottom of this page.

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Thanks again to Allen for coming on The Robotics Trends Show. And if you’re headed to RoboBusiness (Sept. 28-29 at the San Jose Convention Center), make sure to check out his keynote about how to make the robot invasion a reality.