I'm sure you've heard this before but I can't help but mention that Start Trek had tablets long before the first iPads were released. We've been taking baby steps in that direction this whole time!

In recent years, humanity managed to develop a tractor beam that can move around objects at the millimetre scale with beams of light.

Before that, we naturally had beams that could move things at the atomic scale. With the right configuration of lasers, power, and control software, I imagine it would be technically possible to use this technology to construct something atom by atom, though it would be painstakingly slow.

So we do have replicator technology. It’d just take years to produce a single tea, earl grey, hot right now, rather than seconds. Not exactly practical, but still interesting nonetheless.