More than 2,000 robots will compete this week in what many are calling a robot Olympics, as the second World Humanoid Robot Games open Saturday in the Chinese capital. A total of 2,056 robots from 666 teams will take part in the five-day event, running through August 26 at Beijing’s National Speed Skating Oval.
Teams are coming from 16 countries across six continents, organizers said at a news conference Thursday. Jiang Guangzhi, deputy executive director of the organizing committee, said the number of teams has grown 138% since last year, while the number of robots has doubled.
Record number of robots set to compete in Robot Olympics
Brazil is fielding a national team for the first time, he added. Most entries are still domestic. Chinese companies and universities make up 641 of the teams and 1,975 of the robots, drawn from 157 companies and 200 schools and research institutes.
This year’s program adds several new sports, including long jump, weightlifting, tug of war and table tennis. Jiang, who also leads Beijing’s Bureau of Economy and Information Technology, said these events push robots’ balance, control systems and physical design to their limits, and that small gains in distance or weight reflect months of engineering work.
There are officially only 60 hours left until the World Humanoid Robot Games begin.
Our 280 robot models are ready to compete and try to become the best in each category.
And you? Which robot are you backing?
All 280 robots are tokenised on our website. Choose yours and make… pic.twitter.com/IXdNaRVKAB
— World Humanoid Robot Games (@WHRGFUN) August 19, 2026
The Games also include work-based events such as factory tasks, hotel and household service, and package sorting. Rules on automation vary by event. Robots may be guided by human operators in sports like long jump and kickboxing, but must act on their own in events such as breakdancing and the 4×100 meter relay (109 yards per leg).
In work-based events, teams can choose between full autonomy or remote control, though remote-controlled entries score only half points.
Autonomy rules test Unitree’s new ‘Superman robot’ after crashes
Unitree, one of the event’s top performers last year with 11 medals, recently unveiled a new robot called Superman, which the company says can jump about two meters (6.6 feet) and run faster than sprinter Usain Bolt’s top recorded speed.
Unitree said the robot has been in development for roughly three months. Test footage shared online by robotics commentator Eren Chen showed the Superman robot veering off a practice track and hitting equipment, while another unidentified robot fell backward and appeared to break apart after colliding with a padded wall.
Chen said this year’s robots seem to be struggling more with navigation, which he linked to new rules requiring full autonomy in several track events. He argued that raw speed matters less now than a robot’s ability to judge when to slow down or stop safely.
Beijing University fields largest team as robot conference opens
Beijing Information Science and Technology University is sending the largest contingent of any school, with 49 teams competing across 119 categories, according to Li Lianpeng of the university’s academic affairs office. Its robots will take part in events ranging from sprints and soccer to hotel service and simulated firefighting.
The Games overlap with the World Robot Conference, also underway in Beijing this week, where more than 300 companies are showing over 2,000 exhibits.
The conference coincides with Unitree’s stock market debut in Shanghai, an offering that drew more than 8,000 times the shares requested by retail investors.
Industry leaders question whether robots can turn a profit
Even as robots compete for medals at this robot Olympics, industry figures say the bigger test is economic. Lumos Robotics CEO Yu Chao said firms that cannot prove robots create real value for customers will be pushed out of the market.
Analyst Georg Stieler estimated that 50% to 70% of robots built this year may end up collecting training data rather than doing paid work.
BREAKING: 🇨🇳 China's World Humanoid Robot Games just turned humanoid robotics into a public benchmark — real tasks, real crowds, real failure modes on camera.
No closed-door evals. #HumanoidRobots #Robotics pic.twitter.com/x8DS1VG8xw
— Mira Ai (@MosesRotas) August 21, 2026
Brokerage Guotai Securities said an industrial robot would need to cost around 160,000 yuan ($23,800) to pay for itself within two years, compared with a worker’s annual wage of 80,000 yuan ($11,900).
Actual prices run far higher, between 300,000 yuan ($44,600) and 500,000 yuan ($74,400), according to the Berlin-based research group MERICS.
US restrictions and local critics cloud the robot boom
In the United States, RoboShare founder Jerry Wang said the bigger obstacle is not the robots themselves but a shortage of trained operators and high deployment costs.
New U.S. restrictions on foreign-made robotic equipment, issued by the FCC in July, have also added uncertainty, though previously approved models can still be sold. Research firm IDC said China accounts for 82% of global humanoid robot shipments and that U.S. sales could fall as much as 58% below earlier forecasts by 2030 under the restrictions.
Not everyone in China supports the spending on such events. Some online critics have called them wasteful. Shao Yuanxin, founder of Rob-Stride Dynamics, disagreed, saying the Games help companies gather data, train workers and create jobs.
He said his company’s exports in the first quarter of this year already topped its total for all of 2025. Tickets to attend the Games in person start at 98 yuan ($14.50).
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