Forget the 6 million dollar man! Here comes the $6400 toilet

Is the world ready for the Kohler Numi, the uber-luxurious toilet with on-board foot warmer, built-in boom box, an heated seat that goes up and down on its own, not to mention a special bidet attachment, all controlled by a touchscreen with a 20-foot range?

Ready or not, Kohler Numi is now available for $6,400, and if you’re into high-tech design and desire a level of comfort unforeseen until now, this device could be right up your alley.

Like most high-end toilets from Toto (like I've heard of these guys or something) — such as the high-end NeoRest that costs around $4,000 — and others, there is a bidet function in the Numi, using a retractable wand-like device to spray you in just the right places (oh yeah!), and its temperature, power and aim are all easily adjusted with that touchscreen remote. When the spraying is done, there’s a fan that blows warm air to dry you off.

To entertain you in the meantime, there’s a built-in music system with FM radio and auxiliary input, so yes, you could conceivably plug your iPhone into this toilet. Too bad there’s no Bluetooth capability, but those well-heeled enough to have such a toilet could build that into their bathrooms separately.

Take a look at the video if you’d like to see the Numi’s robotic seat in action, triggered by a motion detector so that your hands won’t have to touch anything toilet-related. Just think, this could be the end of toilet seat up/down arguments.

It also looks like a good to tweet about your latest bathroom related adventure


These toilet types seem to be all the rage in Japan (pre tsunami or post?!), but they seem to have been slow to catch on in North American, according to Kohler representatives. You don’t need to buy an entire toilet of this type to enjoy the benefits of its bidet functionality, however.

After thoroughly checking out the Kohler website I found the Kohler C3 toilet seat that does a lot of the same bidet, deodorizing and drying functions as this one, and from what I see, if North Americans knew what it was like to own such a device, they might be willing to spend some serious money for it. Maybe $6,400 is a bit steep, but $800 for a comparable bidet seat (called a washlet in some quarters) could be possible, and some cost a lot less than that.

How about it, readers? Could these kinds of devices catch on in the Canada or elsewhere?