About Nesta

Nesta is an innovation foundation. For us, innovation means turning bold ideas into reality and changing lives for the better. We use our expertise, skills and funding in areas where there are big challenges facing society.

What’s on the horizon for 2025? From the emergence of energy islands to translating the language of plants, Nesta’s Future Signals is your essential guide to the innovations and ideas set to shape the year ahead.

Based on cutting-edge data, expert insights and real-world observations, Future Signals highlights developments that could drive profound societal change. These insights will help anticipate challenges, uncover opportunities and inform innovative solutions to pressing global problems.

At our first ever Future Signals event we dived into our annual collection of transformative trends, heard from the experts who curated them and explored our Signals gallery – with guests casting their vote in answer to the critical question: which Signal will have the biggest impact on society in 2025?

The evening reception featured an interactive and immersive experience, showcasing the cutting-edge ideas.

Take a sneak peek at the eight signals that could shape 2025:

Jolt from the blue: the dawn of energy islands

Could energy islands be the gateway to a clean energy future, or will mounting costs sink their appeal?

Energy islands

The power of parenting in everyone’s pocket

Tailored, expert parenting advice is one tap away. Is this the year it will reach parents who could benefit from it, but can’t afford to pay for it?

AI parenting support

Play renaissance: this is the year play gets serious

After a decade in the wilderness, play is about to rocket up the political and policy agenda in England.

Play renaissance

The Minister’s menu: could the government subsidise healthy food through public restaurants?

Many Brits eat out regularly and tend to eat less healthily when they do. Could public diners help to provide balanced diets and more?

Public diners

Leavesdropping: translating the hidden language of plants

Scientists have made big strides in understanding how plants communicate with each other. Could this help solve some of humanity’s biggest challenges?

Translating plants

One small drip for man: the race to purify lunar water

The race to find space resources is on. But who gets to decide how they are used?

Lunar water

Marmite science: metascience goes mainstream

How do we get the most out of scientific research? Metascience could provide the answers.

Metascience

Robots behaving badly: why manners matter in a world designed for humans

We’re getting closer to sharing our world with humanoid robots - which raises the question of what human-robot etiquette should look like.

Robot etiquette