Wake up and smell the coffee as smell texts set to be next big thing

It may have been deemed one of the worst inventions when it had a short-lived trial in cinemas, but sending smells through your smartphone is tipped to be the tech breakthrough of 2015.

So rather than behaving like a normal human being buying your significant other a bunch of flowers, in 2015 you can be both romantic and tightfisted at the same time and send it as a smell — through your phone.

According to British innovation charity Nesta’s top predictions for 2015, sending “smell-o-grams” as easily as we now send text messages will be all the rage in the coming 12 months.

While to some, this may sound like the stuff of science fiction, it has already been done before and with pretty disastrous results.

More than half a century ago, Smell-o-Vision was introduced to make cinemagoers feel closer to the action and smell what was happening in each scene.

Needless to say, it didn’t go down well and was voted by Time magazine as one of the worst inventions ever.

However, with the advent of the app, it seems all manner of idiotic concepts are now within our grasp.

Earlier this year scientists at Harvard used an iPhone app to transmit the smell of champagne and macarons from Paris to New York.

The device — the oPhone Duo — can create more than 300,000 fragrances using aroma combinations from eight vapour cartridges.

According to Nesta digitising messages, images and sounds “is so last century”. It’s all about smells.