Latest news and articles about humanoid robots
While humanoid robots dominate headlines with flashy demos, researchers are quietly grappling with a far more fundamental challenge: teaching robots to participate in natural group conversations. Imperial College's recent exploration of this problem reveals why your future robot coworker might excel at tasks but flounder at team meetings.
Researchers at EPFL have demonstrated a novel propulsion method for small robots using Helmholtz resonance, where acoustic stimulation produces jets of air that can be harnessed for movement. The technique was demonstrated in multiple applications including an acoustic-propelled boat and microfliers weighing only micrograms, created via high-resolution 3D printing, that can hover and be propelled by angled resonator chambers driven by ultrasonic transducers.
A DIY builder shares the design and development of a compact, joint-mounted actuator for a walking robot capable of producing 20 Newton-meters of torque. The second iteration uses a machined aluminum housing with a planetary gearbox and field-oriented control to achieve the required performance after overcoming initial design challenges.
Multi-party conversation isn't just a harder version of chatbot technology — it's a fundamentally different challenge that reveals why most service robots still feel awkward in public spaces. Imperial College's latest research highlights the gap between one-on-one AI assistants and robots that can genuinely participate in group dynamics.
RoboBusiness 2024 will host a State of Humanoids panel on October 20-21 in Santa Clara featuring experts from Agility Robotics, Apptronik, Persona AI, and PSYONIC discussing the current capabilities and challenges of humanoid robots. The discussion will address real-world deployment, safety, standards, economics, and the milestones needed for widespread adoption in manufacturing, warehousing, and logistics.
The future of humanoid robotics is closer than most people realize. The post The 370-billion-dollar race: How integrated design can help humanoid manufacturers succeed in a rapidly growing market appe...
RoboStore has launched Robo Inc., a U.S.-based robotics manufacturer and systems integrator, to help American organizations deploy robots with localized assembly, data infrastructure, and compliance support. The company, which has distributed over 1,500 humanoid and quadruped robots to 4,500+ North American customers, will operate a 66,000-sq.-ft. production facility on Long Island expected to be operational by Q1 2027, positioning itself as a hardware-agnostic integrator focused on application-specific solutions.
Robin, a mobile socially assistive robot developed by Expper Technologies, is being deployed in approximately 30 hospitals, dental clinics, and care facilities to help patients, particularly children, manage anxiety and emotional distress during medical procedures. The wheeled, kid-sized robot uses speech-based interaction and a designed personality to provide emotional support, distraction, and companionship, with research showing positive outcomes in reducing patient anxiety in healthcare settings.
RoboBusiness 2026 will feature a keynote panel with robotics leaders Rodney Brooks (Robust AI), Jonathan Hurst (Agility Robotics), and Ken Goldberg (UC Berkeley) discussing the evolution and future of robotics across manufacturing, logistics, healthcare, and other sectors over the next 20 years. The discussion will cover breakthroughs in humanoid robots, AI, mobility, and dexterity as robots increasingly integrate into everyday industrial and commercial environments.
Avatar Robotics raised $6.5 million in seed funding led by AlleyCorp to scale deployment of semi-humanoid robots for logistics, manufacturing, and warehouse operations. The startup uses a human-in-the-loop model where remote operators teleoperate robots while machine learning collects operational data to gradually increase autonomy, and has already processed over 900,000 products in customer facilities.
IEEE RAS publishes a monthly roundup of robotics news from July 2026, covering regulatory developments including an FCC ban on foreign-made advanced robotic devices citing cybersecurity concerns, alongside research innovations like Northwestern's invisible-spinning drone, MIT/EPFL's amphibious flapping-wing robot, and KAIST's vine-inspired robotic clothing technology.
The gap between humanoid robot capabilities and factory adoption is widening — not because the technology isn't ready, but because nobody's figured out how to make the economics work. Recent announcements prove the industry is solving the wrong problem.
While humanoid robot technology has matured significantly with improved hardware, vision systems, and AI capabilities, the primary barrier to factory floor adoption is cost economics rather than technical capability. Manufacturers face challenges justifying humanoid investments at current price points (several hundred thousand dollars per unit) when specialized industrial robots deliver higher throughput and faster ROI, though the landscape could shift as humanoid costs decline.
The FCC's sudden restrictions on foreign humanoid and mobile robot imports mark a turning point in how governments view autonomous systems — not as toys or industrial tools, but as critical infrastructure with genuine security implications. After years of letting the industry self-regulate, policymakers are scrambling to catch up.
Google DeepMind unveiled Gemini Robotics 2, an advanced vision-language-action model enabling full-body control of humanoid robots with improved dexterity and multi-robot collaboration capabilities. The system can now control entire robots like Apptronik's Apollo 2 to perform complex tasks requiring whole-body coordination, such as walking, manipulating objects with five-fingered hands, and executing multi-step instructions lasting several minutes.
A hobbyist has modified Stewy, a hexapod walker robot built on a Stewart platform mechanism, to add tactile sensing capabilities by measuring voltage drop across resistors in series with the servo motors. By monitoring current draw through Ohm's law, the robot can now detect torque and force feedback in its legs, improving mobility on uneven terrain without adding strain gauges or expensive sensors.
This roundup highlights the top 10 robotics stories from July 2026, including major funding rounds for Chinese humanoid robot companies, advances in reinforcement learning for manipulation, new humanoid robot launches (Apollo 2, Isaac 1), AMD's robotics platform, brain-computer interface demonstrations, and new U.S. import policies affecting humanoid and mobile robots.
The FCC just banned imports of foreign-made humanoid robots on national security grounds. Combined with the recent OpenAI-Hugging Face breach and Microsoft's new AI security push, we're watching robotics transform from an engineering problem into a geopolitical one — and the industry isn't ready.
GMEX Robotics has entered a definitive agreement to acquire MediaMeta.ai, a Singapore-based company specializing in social intelligence and human behavioral modeling AI. The acquisition aims to integrate MediaMeta's technology into GMEX's robotics platforms for consumer, hospitality, healthcare, and other sectors, enabling robots to better interpret and respond to human social cues and contextual behavior.
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission has announced restrictions on imports of foreign-made humanoid and mobile robots, citing national security and cybersecurity concerns related to critical infrastructure vulnerabilities. The ban applies to new devices but includes exemptions for robots receiving conditional approval from the Department of Defense or Department of Homeland Security, and does not affect previously purchased models or federal purchases. Industry leaders including Standard Bots and Agility Robotics have supported the move, with concerns centered on potential backdoors in foreign robots and unauthorized data transmission.
In a single week, three humanoid robotics companies raised a combined $2.95 billion. This isn't hype — it's institutional capital making long-term infrastructure bets on a technology that finally cleared the viability threshold.
This article discusses integrated robotic actuators as critical components for humanoid robot development, explaining how they improve joint performance and system integration. It examines the challenges of designing actuators for humanoid robots—including space constraints, responsive control requirements, and system simplification—and presents the CubeMars AK45-10 as an example of a compact integrated actuator solution combining motor, gearbox, encoder, and control electronics for various joint applications.
NEURA Robotics has partnered with RWTH Aachen University to establish NEURA Gym RWTH Aachen, a specialized facility for training physical AI models that enable robots to perceive, decide, and act in real-world environments. The company plans to build 10 such facilities globally, combining physical robot training with high-fidelity simulation to generate datasets for its Neuravese cloud platform, with facilities in Germany, the U.S., and China expected to be operational by end of 2026.
Holiday Robotics, a Seoul-based startup, raised $105 million in Series A funding to develop FRIDAY, a wheeled humanoid robot designed for industrial manufacturing tasks. FRIDAY features 64 degrees of freedom with 40 dedicated to dexterous hands, safety-focused hardware design, and a vision-language-skill (VLS) approach to AI that combines perception, learning, and real-world deployment for reliable operation alongside human workers.
Travis Kalanick, former Uber co-founder, has launched ATOMS, a robotics startup that raised $1.7 billion in equity funding led by a16z and Ben Horowitz. The company plans to build specialized robots and industrial automation systems across food production, mining, and mobile robotics, positioning itself as an OEM for industrial sectors rather than pursuing general-purpose humanoids.
Humanoid, a London-based AI and robotics company, secured $152 million in Series A funding at a $1.35 billion post-money valuation to develop industrial humanoid robots. The company is building the HMND 01 Alpha wheeled robot and a bipedal version, powered by its KinetIQ AI framework, with plans to begin beta deployments in Q4 2026 and mass production of wheel-based robots, supported by strategic partnerships with Schaeffler and Robert Bosch.
While the industry races toward humanoid deployment, a quieter revolution is happening in how robots understand physical contact. From full-body tactile sensing to friction-aware world models, researchers are finally addressing the gap that's kept manipulation tasks frustratingly brittle.
Generative Bionics unveiled Gene.01, a humanoid robot featuring full-body tactile sensing and physics-native AI, at AMD Advancing AI 2026. The scalable platform is designed for industrial applications with human-aware collaboration capabilities and is being adapted for shipyard operations through a partnership with Fincantieri, with the robot model open-sourced for developers.
Samsung's surprise entry into humanoid robotics with a new RX division and plans to manufacture this year signals a dramatic shift in how the industry views commercial viability. When one of the world's largest consumer electronics giants makes a move this big, it's worth asking what changed.
Tesla has revealed its upcoming Cybercab autonomous vehicle design featuring a built-in SpaceX Starlink V5 satellite internet dish alongside GPS and 5G LTE connectivity. The integration aims to provide redundant internet access and enable fleet-level communication capabilities for autonomous taxi operations, though the practical necessity remains unclear given widespread 5G coverage in urban deployment areas.
Samsung has established a new robotics division called RX (Robotics eXperience) headed by Dongkun Lee, formerly of Hyundai, with oversight from CEO TM Roh. The company plans to build robotics research hubs globally and aims to begin manufacturing humanoid robots this year, backed by a $13 billion investment in manufacturing facilities in South Korea.
BrainCo demonstrated a brain-computer interface (BCI) platform that enables users to control robots through neural signals, with an EEG headset decoding brain activity and converting it to robotic commands in under 200 milliseconds. The company also unveiled an Embodied AI Data Collection Solution designed to address the shortage of high-quality training data for teaching robots complex physical tasks by combining real-robot execution, human demonstration, and EEG neural recordings.
Boston Dynamics is hosting a free webinar on human-robot interaction design, featuring experts who will discuss how to build trust and safety into humanoid robots through predictability rather than human mimicry. The session will cover communicating robot intent, safety design for autonomous operation, the role of large language models in natural interactions, and leveraging mechanical form over human-like appearance, using their Atlas humanoid as a case study.
Palm Garden AI's Coherence Guard represents a fundamental shift in how we think about robot behavior. Rather than teaching robots what to do, we're finally building systems that help them understand what they shouldn't do—and that changes everything.
AGIBOT unveiled four embodied AI products at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference 2026, including the A3 Ultra humanoid robot, G2 Max heavy-payload industrial task robot, OmniHand 3 Ultra-M dexterous hand, and X2 Edu educational platform. The Shanghai-based company, founded in 2023, emphasized moving beyond impressive demonstrations to focus on manufacturing, deployment, and reliable integration of robots into real operating environments, having produced 15,000 robots to date.
This article critiques the robotics industry's heavy reliance on teleoperation and human demonstration for training robots, arguing that this approach hits fundamental scaling limits. The author contends that teleoperation datasets are orders of magnitude smaller than those used for language models, quality is poor, and the real world's constant variations require infinite new demonstrations—making it essentially a permanent labor system rather than a path to autonomous robots. The piece suggests reinforcement learning in synthetic environments, as used for language models, may be a more promising approach for achieving genuine robot generalization.
Cutting the cord in your car is a simple upgrade.
Palm Garden AI has developed Coherence Guard, a relational decision layer software platform designed to help humanoid and service robots behave appropriately around people in real-world human environments. The system evaluates whether robot actions are socially and contextually appropriate before execution by considering factors like timing, proximity, emotional tone, and trust preservation, rather than replacing existing robot control systems. The company built this technology based on three years of structured observation at its Palm Garden Retreat in Thailand and believes it addresses a critical gap as general-purpose robots move into hospitality, care, retail, and domestic settings.
Weave Robotics has launched Isaac 1, a wheeled home humanoid robot priced at $7,999 or $449/month, designed to handle household tasks like laundry folding, tidying, and bed-making. The robot features adjustable height (3-5.9 ft), autonomous navigation, eight-hour battery life, and privacy-focused design elements including camera shutters and a charging privacy screen, with deliveries beginning this fall.
Signal's latest beta comes with a feature that will make it easier to use the app on multiple devices.
Bluetooth and Wi-Fi work in tandem to power the wireless Android Auto experience.
Researchers at KAIST developed a four-legged robot named HOUND with a new control technology called APT-RL that enables it to autonomously select and switch between walking, running, jumping, and other locomotion skills in real-world environments. The system uses reinforcement learning and simulation-based training to allow the robot to adapt to complex outdoor obstacles like stairs, gaps, and forest terrain without requiring individual gait controllers.
Hyundai is reportedly acquiring SoftBank's remaining 20% stake in Boston Dynamics for approximately $325 million, which would give the Korean automaker full ownership of the robotics company. Hyundai plans to accelerate commercialization of Boston Dynamics' Atlas humanoid robot, with production beginning in Georgia in 2028 and targeting 30,000 units annually, starting with logistics and welding tasks before moving to complex manufacturing by 2030.
Fujitsu, Nvidia, and Japan's leading robotics manufacturers (Fanuc, Yaskawa, Kawasaki Heavy Industries) announced a major collaboration to develop "physical AI" — autonomous robots that can think independently and work alongside humans in factories, homes, and hospitals. The initiative aims to address Japan's labor shortage by combining Nvidia's AI technology with Japanese manufacturing excellence, with the first phase of collaboration expected later in 2026.
NVIDIA introduced the Jetson T3000 and T2000 modules based on its Thor architecture to enable mass-market robotics and edge AI deployment. The T3000 delivers 865 FP4 teraflops with a compact form factor and functional safety capabilities, while the T2000 provides an entry-level option with 400 teraflops for visual AI agents and autonomous systems. NVIDIA also released AI agent skills that automate memory optimization, helping companies like Agile Robots and Hitachi reduce memory usage by up to 15GB while maintaining performance.
Walden Robotics emerged from stealth with $300 million in funding at a $1.1 billion valuation, launching general-purpose robots designed to continuously learn while performing real work in manufacturing. Led by MIT professor Russ Tedrake (former Toyota Research Institute executive), the company is deploying semi-humanoid robots with two arms and a wheeled base at Toyota plants for tasks like machine tending and assembly, combining large behavior models with real-world operations.
Agility Robotics CEO Peggy Johnson outlined six policy recommendations for the U.S. government to strengthen the humanoid robotics industry, including building domestic component manufacturing capacity, developing a coordinated national strategy, establishing industry-led safety standards, supporting workforce development, and lowering adoption barriers for small manufacturers. Johnson emphasized the need for deliberate action to maintain technological leadership against international competition, particularly from China.
Apple announced the new CarPlay feature not long after Google announced a similar update for Android Auto.
Icarus Robotics has selected KULR Technology Group to supply batteries for JOY, its autonomous free-flying space robot scheduled to launch to the International Space Station in early 2027. JOY will use KULR's K1S battery systems engineered to NASA safety standards, with flight heritage from the Artemis II mission, to power its embodied AI systems for autonomous navigation and maintenance tasks aboard the ISS.
Third-party app stores are coming to Android on July 22.
