Humanoid robots steal show at festival gala

As the 2026 Spring Festival Gala filled screens with humanoid robots flipping, sparring and sprinting across the stage, holiday rentals of robots surged off camera, pointing to a rapid iteration and early application of such robots in the country.

Four Chinese companies supplied humanoid robots for the gala, which is also the country's most-watched series of TV shows. While robots last year moved somewhat hesitantly, this year's robots could be seen virtually sprinting across the screen, shifting formations mid-stride and completing complex martial arts sequences.

The most talked-about appearance came from Unitree Robotics, whose robots performed backflips, staff routines and synchronized combat sequences with a level of speed and coordination that drew widespread attention both at home and abroad.

Its founder Wang Xingxing said the company's G1 and H2 humanoids debuted fully autonomous cluster-control technology, enabling coordinated high-speed repositioning of up to 4 meters per second, a capability he described as a first for humanoid robot group runs.

"Every movement must be timed to within hundredths of a second to control the stage effect," Wang said, comparing the choreography to human performers moving in rhythm. He estimated that overall positioning speed has improved five — to ten-fold from last year's models.

The technical quantum leap reflects broader progress in embodied artificial intelligence — the integration of perception, decisionmaking and motion control. Yet Wang cautioned that bottlenecks in embodied AI "brains" remain, leaving the industry in an early stage of commercialization.

On Tuesday, the first trading day after the break, humanoid robotics-related firms opened higher before trimming gains in the A-share market. A group of such shares jumped rapidly at the open, but later slipped into negative territory, reflecting investor uncertainty over the pace at which technological breakthroughs can translate into sustained earnings.

Even so, early commercial signals are strengthening. Botshare, a robot rental platform, said it had received more than 1,000 orders covering the Spring Festival holiday, with gross merchandise value expected to rise 80 percent from the previous period and total holiday orders projected to exceed 5,000.

Its CEO Li Yiyan said that orders during the holiday rose nearly 70 percent from a comparable prior stretch, and could maintain around 50 percent growth after the break.

Wei Kai, head of the AI research institute at the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, said: "China's humanoid robots have made significant strides in motor control capabilities, which can be seen in recent events. The evolution of the brain is also very fast. Hierarchical models and end-to-end models have progressed under data-driven paradigms."

Wei said China has established 27 data-collection sites nationwide to support training of embodied AI systems, signaling an effort to industrialize the learning pipeline behind the hardware.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said China had more than 140 humanoid robot manufacturers by 2025, launching over 330 product models. In 2026, more than half of China's provinces and cities have incorporated embodied intelligence and robotics development into their government work reports.

Zhang Yunming, vice-minister of industry and information technology, said during an earlier news conference that China's humanoid robots can now "stand steadily, walk stably and run quickly", and are accelerating the shift from moving on stage and in competitions to being used in homes and factories.

chengyu@chinadaily.com.cn