Humanoid robot makers shipped almost 25,000 units in the first half of 2026, up 432 percent on a year earlier, according to research firm IDC, with revenue up 323 percent to more than $740 million.
Chinese vendors built more than 95 percent of them, and Chinese customers bought 77.9 percent, more than 19,000 units. Nine of the top ten makers are Chinese.
Shanghai-based Agibot led with more than 8,600 units, about 35 percent of the market, followed by Unitree with roughly 5,000. After that the numbers fall away steeply, with Booster Robotics at around 1,000, UBTech about 900 and Leju about 460, according to Forbes’ breakdown of the data.
Prices are falling as volumes rise. Revenue per robot works out at about $29,600, down from roughly $37,000 a year earlier. IDC expects annual shipments to pass 750,000 by 2030.
The figures sit awkwardly beside those the International Federation of Robotics published on Wednesday, which counted about 7,000 humanoids sold for professional use in the whole of 2025. The IFR counts only full-size machines taller than 140 centimetres, so the two totals are not directly comparable, but the gap shows how much depends on what gets called a humanoid.
What neither count answers is use. The IFR said many humanoids went to research labs and data-collection projects rather than productive work. IDC’s shipment numbers do not separate a robot on a factory line from one in a showroom or a classroom, and that is the distinction investors pricing these companies most need.
