Specs of the Unitree H2 humanoid robotic, considered one of a number of being developed in China. Supply: Unitree
Based mostly on our knowledge, Chinese language industrial robotic gross sales once more in 2025 by roughly 10%. With different main markets comparatively weaker, China additional cemented its prime place in international robotic gross sales. For 2026, we’re cautiously optimistic and anticipate mid- to high-single-digit progress.
Gross sales of collaborative robots in China have outpaced the broader market over the previous two years — and there are sturdy indications that this pattern will proceed. Key drivers embrace simpler set up, excessive flexibility, comparatively low power consumption, and new functions, notably in electric-vehicle manufacturing.
Intense worth stress — and the consolidation that comes with it — will persist. On the similar time, we see each industrial robots and cobots trending towards extra “clever” options as a method of differentiation, equivalent to semi-autonomous welding.
After China’s industrial robotic exports grew by a median of about 65% per 12 months from 2022 to 2024, that momentum continued in 2025. Whereas full-year 2025 figures should not but accessible, export ranges had already surpassed the prior 12 months’s whole by the top of the third quarter. We anticipate this trajectory to proceed into 2026.
Extra Chinese language capital flows into embodied AI
China is shifting alongside to the U.S. the forefront of improvement in bodily AI. By our estimates, funding in early-stage robotics corporations in each the U.S. and China in 2025 was roughly 5 to 6 occasions greater than in Europe.
In China alone, we see no less than 5 embodied AI corporations which have every raised greater than $210 million to this point, and capital continues to circulate aggressively into the house: On Jan. 12, X Sq. introduced it had raised RMB 1 billion (about $140 million) in an A++ spherical led by ByteDance and HongShan Capital (previously Sequoia China). Meituan and Alibaba had participated in earlier rounds. In simply two years, X Sq. has raised greater than $400 million.
X Sq. is pursuing what founder Wang Qian calls “an unbiased basis mannequin for embodied AI.” The core thesis: AI designed for the bodily world requires completely different architectures than language fashions.
Based on the corporate, its WALL‑A system not solely processes visible inputs, however it will probably additionally “perceive” causal bodily relationships — enabling robots, for instance, to deduce hidden objects and autonomously right errors with out human intervention.
Many within the West have primarily been watching U.S. efforts equivalent to Open‑X‑Embodiment, NVIDIA GR00T, or Amazon Vulcan. Nonetheless, China is more and more producing approaches which are equal — and in some instances complementary — alongside the identical trajectory towards “bodily intelligence.”
The differentiator is much less a few basically completely different stack, and extra in regards to the constant mixture of large-scale embodiment datasets, end-to-end vision-language-action (VLA) fashions, and the systematic coupling of high-level planning with sturdy, contact-rich execution. These are exactly the constructing blocks that separate a compelling demo from a dependable deployment.
The Quanta robotic is meant to offer a path to humanoids within the family. Supply: X Sq. Robotic
Know-how is leaving the lab — pilots should ship financial worth
For humanoid robots and bodily AI in China, we anticipate a shift in 2026 away from headline-grabbing spectacles and towards actual functions with business worth. Buyers are demanding it.
The anticipated IPO of Unitree in 2026 may change into one of many bigger Chinese language robotics tech listings in a while, with extra prone to comply with. On the similar time, consolidation will speed up as weaker gamers fall away.
Whereas U.S. corporations equivalent to Bodily Intelligence, Skild.ai, and Google Gemini Robotics nonetheless lead on generalization, Chinese language suppliers like X Sq., TARS, AgiBot, Galaxea, and Galbot may benefit from providing full-stack programs constructed round clearly outlined duties. This permits sooner iteration cycles, greater reliability, and higher price/efficiency — as a result of each element is optimized as a part of a tightly built-in system.
Excessive-quality, real-world knowledge is gas
Chinese language corporations are additionally leaning more durable into real-world operational knowledge to enhance their fashions.
On Dec. 30, 2025, the startup TARS Robotics — based about 11 months earlier — launched its open “World in Your Arms” dataset. Much like the autonomous driving playbook, the corporate argues that high-quality, human-centric knowledge is the essential gas for bodily AI.
Based on TARS, its knowledge assortment method can generate as much as 1.8 TB per operator, per day of high-precision 6D movement knowledge. The corporate says this helped increase robotic success charges on complicated manipulation duties in unstructured environments from about 8% to about 60%.
Chinese language robotics startups have raised important funding prior to now few years. Supply: STM Stieler
Openness and community results as a Chinese language platform technique
On Jan. 4, Galaxea Dynamics launched its G0 Plus with an out-of-the-box VLA mannequin. The corporate now ships its cellular dual-arm robots with a pre-installed, brazenly accessible VLA.
Within the “Choose Up Something” demo, it confirmed a full pipeline — understanding pure language, planning actions, and executing in the true world — together with zero-shot functionality.
The system was skilled on the Galaxea Open-world Dataset (GOD), which incorporates real-world knowledge from basic greedy duties in addition to extra complicated interactions. The corporate mentioned its plug-and-play method permits builders to get the system working in below half-hour after which fine-tune it for brand new duties.
This strategic positioning may assist Galaxea construct a platform position in AI-enabled robotic management over the medium to long run.
Hybrid kind components matter extra for ROI calculations
Intralogistics use instances — alongside easy meeting and inspection duties — are among the many first functions that Chinese language makers of humanoids goal to commercialize in 2026.
Notably, the Chinese language corporations with the strongest AI fashions for two-arm manipulation are usually pragmatic in regards to the humanoid kind issue: All of them even have wheeled robots of their portfolios.
In parallel, industrial robots will more and more profit from advances in VLA fashions — and there’s significant overlap with humanoid robotics. For instance, AgiBot demonstrated a system at an electronics producer in November wherein robotic changeover time was decreased to a median of 10 minutes utilizing a mixture of teleoperation and reinforcement studying.
Though AgiBot is among the many best-funded Chinese language startups in bodily AI and likewise builds its personal humanoid robots, the pilot used robotic arms from Franka Robotics (previously Franka Emika).
In regards to the creator
Georg Stieler advises a number of the world’s largest robotics corporations. He spent greater than 10 years dwelling in China and now splits his time between Switzerland and the Folks’s Republic of China.
Because of multi‑12 months, shut collaboration with AI startups in Silicon Valley, Stieler can also be deeply aware of its tradition.
