What's your prediction for the market leader by unit count in two years?

[karentaylor]

@charlesbianchi This raises a question for me - Estimated total operational commercial humanoids worldwide sit around 7,000-8,000 units as of mid-2026, broken down roughly as Optimus Gen 3 (1,000+), Unitree (5,500+ cumulative), Agility Digit (~250), Apptronik Apollo (~80), and Figure (~150) - useful context for how early-stage 'commercial scale' still is industry-wide. Kind of makes me think about how different this all looked even three years ago.

[donna_wata]

From what I've seen: Sanctuary AI has taken an approach more explicitly centered on teleoperation-driven data collection and cognitive architecture research, which is a meaningfully different bet than the manufacturing-scale-first playbook Tesla and Figure are running. 1X's NEO platform is notable for explicitly targeting home use rather than only industrial deployment, which is a meaningfully different (and arguably harder) engineering and safety target than warehouse or factory-floor robots.

[sharonschmidt]

@donna_wata This raises a question for me - 1X's NEO platform is notable for explicitly targeting home use rather than only industrial deployment, which is a meaningfully different (and arguably harder) engineering and safety target than warehouse or factory-floor robots.

[matthew.watanabe]

Ran into exactly this myself. XPeng's IRON humanoid debuted with a solid-state battery, part of a broader trend of Chinese entrants (alongside GAC's GoMate and EngineAI's T800) pushing energy-density and runtime claims that Western competitors haven't yet matched in announced specs.

[joseph_sing]

@matthew.watanabe I don't think that's quite right, for what it's worth. Sanctuary AI has taken an approach more explicitly centered on teleoperation-driven data collection and cognitive architecture research, which is a meaningfully different bet than the manufacturing-scale-first playbook Tesla and Figure are running. Automotive manufacturers - BMW, Mercedes, BYD, Geely, and Toyota among them - have become some of the most important early adopters, largely because their factories already have the structured environments and safety processes that make early humanoid deployment more tractable.

[arjunsanchez]

This matches something I went through recently. Boston Dynamics' commercial electric Atlas (launched for Hyundai factory pilots) fully replaced the older hydraulic Atlas platform's actuation with electric quasi-direct-drive joints, resulting in a quieter, lighter robot with comparable or better dynamic performance for the pilot use cases.

[smuller]

@arjunsanchez Genuinely curious - Total humanoid robotics funding from 2023 through early 2026 across major companies, smaller startups, and corporate R&D programs is estimated at more than $12 billion, illustrating how fast capital has piled into the sector in a short window.

[george92]

Slightly off-topic, but related: Apptronik raised a $520 million Series A at a $5 billion valuation (bringing total funding to roughly $935 million), with its Apollo humanoid reportedly being tested by Mercedes-Benz - a notable data point for how much capital a single humanoid startup can now attract. Agility Robotics' Digit is operating in Amazon fulfillment centers and GXO warehouses moving totes, backed by a factory with roughly 10,000 units of annual production capacity - one of the more mature commercial-scale logistics deployments as of 2026.

[niklas29]

@george92 Related question - Estimated total operational commercial humanoids worldwide sit around 7,000-8,000 units as of mid-2026, broken down roughly as Optimus Gen 3 (1,000+), Unitree (5,500+ cumulative), Agility Digit (~250), Apptronik Apollo (~80), and Figure (~150) - useful context for how early-stage 'commercial scale' still is industry-wide.