The price of bipedal humanoid robots, which China has actively promoted since last year through events such as its Lunar New Year gala shows, has fallen to the 2 million won range. Observers point to this as the result of cutthroat competition that emerged as companies flooded the entertainment robot market, where technological entry barriers are low. With this year expected to mark the "first year" of humanoid robot commercialization, analysts predict that companies failing to secure profitability will be weeded out.
According to local media including Caijing, Noetix's "Xiaobumi," which ranks first in humanoid robot sales on Chinese e-commerce platform JD.com, is currently selling for 9,118 yuan (approximately 2.04 million won). This price, which applies government subsidies and the platform's own discounts, is about 10% cheaper than the list price of 9,998 yuan (approximately 2.24 million won). Unitree's entry-level model "R1" is also selling at 29,349 yuan, sharply reduced from last year's launch price of 39,999 yuan.
While there is an effect tied to the "618 Shopping Festival," China's largest sale event in the first half of the year, the prevailing assessment is that prices have entered a long-term downward trend. Industry leader Unitree stated in its recent initial public offering (IPO) filing that the unit price of its humanoid robots fell 72%, from 593,400 yuan in 2023 to 166,400 yuan last year. The rental market is the same. According to The Beijing News, the daily rental rate for a 100,000-yuan humanoid robot reached 25,000 yuan early last year but plunged to 2,199 yuan as of early this year. On some secondhand trading platforms, transactions are taking place for less than 1,000 yuan.
What is notable is that most of the items whose prices have recently fallen are bipedal robots. Bipedal robots have short battery life and low stability, limiting their use in industrial settings, and for now they are mainly used for entertainment and performances.
The industry cites not only cost reductions from mass production but also low technological entry barriers as a key factor behind the intensifying cutthroat competition. Cai Bingzhen, director of Chinese consulting firm GGII (Gaogong Robotics Institute), told Caijing, "Robots in the entertainment and performance fields only need to repeat preset movements, so the technological entry barrier is relatively low," adding, "Many companies are competing fiercely to secure market share and shipment volumes." C.C. Wei, chairman of TSMC, the world's largest semiconductor foundry, also fired a direct shot at Chinese robots in March, saying they were "useless, just jumping and running around for show."
By contrast, the value of industrial robots such as wheeled robots and robotic arms that are actually used in factories remains relatively firm. According to GGII, the overall price decline for industrial robots last year was only about 13% compared to the previous year. This year, quite a few manufacturers have even raised prices amid pressure from rising costs of core components such as semiconductors. Inovance Technology, a company specializing in robot components and smart factory solutions, and robotic arm maker AUBO raised their robot sales prices by 5-15% and 5-8% respectively this year, citing rising costs of components, raw materials, and logistics. China is accelerating manufacturing automation, introducing 300,000 units into factories—nearly half of the world's industrial robot installations.
The industry expects restructuring of the humanoid robot market to begin in earnest from this year. There are currently as many as 150 humanoid robot companies in China, but as of last year, two firms—Agibot and Unitree—split about 71% of total shipments between them. Most of the remaining companies are only receiving small orders of tens of millions of yuan, and their main customers are universities and research institutions, leaving a long road to full-scale commercialization. Yao Maoqing, vice president of Agibot, stressed, "After the success of mass production, the key metric the industry will focus on will not be simple sales prices but how well robots are actually being utilized at industrial sites."
