What are virtual assistants like Google Home and Amazon Echo and why are they set to be a HUGE hit this Christmas?

VIRTUAL assistants like Google Home and Amazon Echo are set to pummel virtual reality headsets in the fight to become the favourite in the nation's Christmas stockings.

Shortly after Amazon introduced the Echo, a £149.99 hands free speaker with AI-powered virtual assistant Alexa, the virtual home assistant category is poised to beat Oculus Rift and competitors, according to the Consumer Technology Association.

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Analyst Andrew Uerkwitz estimated nearly 10 million to 12 million Amazon Echo and Google Home virtual assistants could sell during the festive period.

"Personal assistants are going to blow VR out of the water", he said.

Google also launched its Home assistant in the US, but is keeping mum about a UK release date.

But the price of the Echo Dot – a tiny version of the original – will give the Echo the edge this year, according to the experts.

Tractica analyst Mark Beccue said: "I saw one feature in a hackathon where you list items in the fridge then Alexa tells you here's what you can make for dinner tonight."

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After dubbing virtual reality as the "next mega tech theme" in 2015 experts have taken a u-turn and slashed the 2016 estimate for sales of VR headsets by 65% to 2.2 million units.

High costs are turning larger families off, it seems.

Sales of high-end VR headsets including Facebook's £549 Oculus Rift and Sony's £600 PlayStation VR headset altogether will be about 300,000, reflecting supply constraints at Sony and the technological reality of Oculus and HTC Corp's £759 Vive: only about six million to seven million computers globally can run the software, said Paul Lee of Deloitte.

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"With high-end VR for a family of four one might be looking at thousands," he added.

Drone sales are expected to to double last year's at around 1.2million but are seen as a pricey novelty similarly to virtual reality.

But smartwatches are on the up.

The Pebble smartwatch has made way for market leader Fitbit to take over and an incredible 12.6million wearables are expected to sell for Christmas.

Around 5.5million of these will be for Apple Inc's Watch.

It follows fears fitness tracker Christmas prezzies could bump up insurance premiums and leak personal data on the dark web.

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