China says 100,000 humanoid robots will march off production lines this year. Where will they go?
AgiBot's A3 Ultra full-size humanoid robot on show at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai, July 18, 2026. Credit: AgiBot
China's humanoid robot makers are racing to build tens of thousands of machines this year. The harder task will be finding enough customers to buy them.
While China has already deployed hundreds of thousands of non-human industrial robots, humanoid sales are lagging. China’s two leading robot firms, Unitree and AgiBot, combined sold fewer than 11,000 humanoids last year — about ten thousand more than 2024 but still far behind deployment of other types of robots.
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