If you�ve ever had an induction range, you know how sleek and awesome they are. They do have the same function as any type of stove, as your food is still going to be cooked on it. The advantage to induction ranges is that it’s much easier to clean, but it has the same general idea of specific areas to put pots and pans when cooking.

On the other hand, this fancy new Thermador Freedom Induction Cooktop gives you the entire surface to place whatever cookware you may be using wherever you want. It uses some natural-mapping user interface that will recognize cookware size, position, and shape, and deliver the heat accordingly to those places. This automatically made me think of a hibachi, although I have a feeling it wouldn’t be a great idea to toss all of the raw food directly on top of the range. Especially since it costs $5,000 and would be rather expensive to replace.