The adult industry has had a rough ten years, as limitless, free online porn has reduced its revenue stream to a trickle. But the sector isn’t just about pornography, it’s also about sex toys – and right now a lot of people are very excited about about one particular kind of toy. Over the last 12 months, a real buzz has been growing: 2016, they say, is going to be the year of the sexbot.

The moment you mention sexbots, people tend to imagine lifelike beautiful women. Fictional portrayals, ranging from the Stepford Wives to Ava in Alex Garland’s Ex Machina have, perhaps, given us unrealistically high expectations. Deep in our collective psyche we believe that sexually functioning robots are indistinguishable from gorgeous actresses.

Stepford's wife: the original sexbot Credit: Film Still

The near future is likely to be far more prosaic. It’s true that you can drop $7000 on a lifelike, high-end sex doll at RealDoll. And its true that both artificial Intelligence (AI) and robotics are developing at breakneck speed. But it’s going to be a while before you have both in a package that sits on your lap and coos prettily after mixing you your favourite Martini.

“It’s a bit over-hyped,” says Ian Pearson, of Futurizon, which, in conjunction with the online sex shop Bondara, recently published a report entitled The Rise of the Robosexuals. “The kind of sex dolls and toys that exist today are objects. If you’re talking about an android that would appear to be another human being, you’re looking at 2030-40.”

What we are likely to see in the near term are more sophisticated augmented reality sex toys. An example of this might be using a fleshlight-type device or a vibrator in conjunction with Occulus Rift-style VR goggles. This would give a highly immersive experience, but one which is simulation and stimulation rather than actual intercourse with an android. “We’ll see a of lot products in this area over few years,” says Stowe Boyd, a futurist and the head of research at Gigoam Research.

"The 'uncanny valley' hypothesis suggests that when robots become very close to humans, people experience strong feelings of revulsion" Rhymer Rigby

In a similar vein, any early robots are likely to be augmented sex dolls. These might look the part and even talk a bit, but they’ll have all the self-awareness of a dishwasher. “Any personality they have is likely to very rudimentary for the short and medium term,” says David Levy, author of Love and Sex With Robots.

None of this means we should write off the human-like sexbot though. Many of the pieces needed to make them are already here. It’s just that technology often takes a surprisingly long time to reach the shiny, integrated, user-friendly forms we know and love. For example, if you take the mobile internet, many of its component technologies existed 15 or even 20 years ago, but it’s only recently that the web on your phone has become a genuinely useful mass-market proposition.

Ava, Ex Machina's 'sentient' robot Credit: Film still

So it’s likely to happen in fits and starts and come from several directions. Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality sex toys will get more and more sophisticated. Vibration and haptic feedback technologies will improve. Home robots will become more widespread. Then, at some point in the next decade, says Boyd, “You might get AIs that can perform an approximation of limited behaviours you expect during sex. People wouldn’t think they were having sex with a human but it would be close enough.”

In fact, it might even be too close. There is the so-called “uncanny valley” hypothesis which suggests when robots become very close to humans, some people experience strong feelings of revulsion. So the ideal sexbot may always wear its inflatable doll ancestry on its rubber sleeve.

RealDoll are working on a product that can ape human interaction

One intriguing possibility, says Pearson, is the idea of general purpose robots gaining sexual functionality. “You could have a robot that did chores around the house – and then, especially, if you were single, you might want to make it sexually useful too.” Indeed, you only have to look at the number of men who sleep with the nanny to see that this particular path is well-trodden one. You spend a lot of time with the robot, you become friends, your wife doesn’t understand you in the way the robot does, and one thing leads to another...

But it’s also possible that things go the other way, with bots that evolved from high-end sex dolls gaining greater general functionality. Whatever the case, says Levy, any robot that you could have something approaching a “real” relationship with, sexual or otherwise, “would be a general purpose pseudo-human.”

Of course, there are concerns about all this. Dr Richardson, a robot ethicist at De Montfort University in Leicester who leads the Campaign Against Sex Robots, has said that she believes the creation of sexualised robots would damage human relationships in the real world.

She may well have a point, but it’s unlikely to stop the march of the sexbots. The recent history of the anti-pornography movement in the West has been one of failure. Whatever your views on sexbots, it’s difficult to imagine them being outlawed or even curtailed if there is real demand for them.

"Sexbots could provide physical relationships for those who, for mental or physical reasons, struggle to form them" Rhymer Rigby

If they do become widespread, we could see all sorts of fascinating scenarios. “A man who is in relationship with a woman who has great sex with a robot could experience performance anxiety,” says Levy, conjuring up the image of a kind of Lady Chatterley’s Robot Lover. But on the plus side, sexbots could prevent business travellers from playing away. If, that is, you don’t consider making sweet, sweet robot love infidelity; Google suggests that plenty of people take a dim view of robocheating.

On a more serious note, sexbots could provide physical relationships for those who, for mental or physical reasons, struggle to form them. They could also be a boon in countries like India and China where selective abortion of girls has resulted in huge gender imbalances in the population and tens of millions of men who have no hope of ever finding female partners. And, says Boyd, “The impact on prostitution could be similar to what VHS did to dirty movie theatres.”

Perhaps the most interesting futures of all are even further ahead though. What if sexbots become truly sentient and self aware? What if they can gain free will - become smarter than their creators. What if our sexbots start to get choosy?

“Sexbots may want to form relationships of their own,” says Pearson. “They might want to have sex with each other rather than us.”