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Declining rental and retail prices of humanoid robots underscores the urgency of developing robots for more complicated real-world scenarios

By Li Mingzi Updated Jun.1

A young woman fflms a robot performing Peking Opera with her smart phone at the National Robot Rental Ecosystem Summit and Botshare Platform Launch Conference, Shanghai, December 22, 2025. As the nation’s ffrst open robot rental platform, Botshare covers 50 cities and 600 service providers (Photo by IC)

Not long after the Chinese New Year season ended, Lei Yonglin of Hunan Province saw all his humanoid robots rented out within a week.　

The surge in business at his rental service followed the February 16 performance on China's annual 2026 Spring Festival Gala that immediately went viral.　

During the nationwide broadcast, a phalanx of humanoid robots punched, kicked and flipped alongside kids in kung fu outfits, perfectly in sync and with impressive precision.　

In 2025, only Hangzhou-based Unitree Robotics' robots appeared on the show in a similar spot, performing a comparatively modest dance routine.　

This year, three other Chinese robotics Nfirms - Noetix, Magiclab and Galbot were featured alongside Unitree. Lei said many customers now request robots that can replicate the same martial arts routine from the Gala.　

Despite the increased popularity, rental prices have been falling since mid-2025. Even Unitree's most popular model, the G1, rents for 4,000-5,000 yuan (US$582- 727) a day, barely one-fourth of its 2025 peak price. After peak Spring Festival demand this year, daily rental rates quickly fell off, sometimes to under 1,000 yuan (US$145).　

The drop is in step with falling retail prices, triggered by a price war among manufacturers. By October 2025, new robots sold for around 10,000 yuan (US$1,453), but large-scale consumer purchases have yet to take off. "Lower prices make robots more affordable, but they still have a long way to go to become truly useful," Lei said.

Priced to Move

After watching the Gala in 2025, Lei began working with another company to program robots for more complex routines, like K-pop dances, the Charleston and kung fu movements.　

Lei was among China's first wave of robot renters. He bought a G1 Edu in late 2024, and his unboxing video went viral.　

This inspired Lei, already in the vehicle rental business, to expand into robots. Over time, he bought 10 models produced by different companies. But over the past year, daily rentals plunged from around 20,000 yuan (US$2,908) to less than 1,000 yuan (US$145). After deducting costs for wear and tear, shipping and travel, many late entrants barely break even, Lei said.　

The price war intensified after robot rental platforms entered the fray. In December 2025, robotics firm AgiBot launched Botshare, focusing on its own robots, garnering over 200,000 registered users within three weeks. Along with Wanji Yizu, which aggregates several robot brands, the platforms rent robots at rates below the market average.��

"Robot companies are pushing humanoid robots into the consumer market through big platforms," Lei said, adding this aligns with their low-price strategy to win market share since mid-2025.　

Humanoid robots started as luxury items. In 2021, UBTECH's Walker X cost 6 million yuan (US$872,292) on average. It sold only 10 units over two years.　

But that quickly changed. By 2025, the company offered models under 300,000 yuan (US$43,615) to lower the entry threshold. Unitree's new bipedal R1 cost 39,900 yuan (US$5,801) the same year.　

Booster Robotics followed months later with its Booster K1 at 29,900 yuan (US$4,378), while Noetix Robotics' Bumi sold in presale on JD.com for 9,998 yuan (US$1,464), the first to break the 10,000 yuan (US$1,453) barrier, comparable to electronics like high-end smartphones and gaming consoles.　

"The main driver behind price reductions is supply chain advantage," said Zhao Tongyang, founder of EngineAI, a company known for its relentless cost efficiency. Shenzhen's dense supply network allows companies source highprecision components within a 100-kilometer radius.　

A 2025 Morgan Stanley report found that China controls 63 percent of the humanoid robot supply chain, enabling Chinese companies to experiment with trial and error more freely and cheaply.　

Overseas, manufactures need to design key components from scratch. Even Tesla relies on multiple Chinese suppliers to co-develop parts for its Optimus project, which aims to produce humanoid robots at scale to handle unsafe, tedious or mundane labor.　

According to a Bain & Company report released in November 2025, falling component prices could slash production costs from US$40,000-50,000 today to US$10,000-20,000 by 2035, a 60 to 70 percent decrease.

Bots Not Bought

High prices have hindered the widespread use of humanoid robots. But as prices fall, Lei said the main consumer barrier is the technical threshold. Most buyers lack the skills to customize robots, using them mainly as remote-controlled toys instead of exploring their full potential. Lei's company even provides programming and maintenance services for a robot for a nearby power company which has no idea of how to operate the robot.　

In practice, robot rentals are often essentially renting human robot technicians. Since robots lack mature autonomy, each one requires a technician to operate it on-site. This "one-to-one" model makes large-scale adoption difficult.　

This is why humanoid robots primarily end up in entertainment. Data firm IDC reports that 36.8 percent of humanoid robots sold globally were used in staged performances and similar events.　

But universities and research institutions remain key buyers. IDC data shows that in 2025, 24.6 percent of humanoid robots were purchased for research and education.　

Most orders are small as buyers remain cautious. According to industry association Humanoid Robot Scenario Application Alliance, about 60 percent of orders are below 1 million yuan (US$144,918), while large orders over 10 million yuan (US$1.4m) make up only 6 percent.　

Wang Xingxing, founder of Unitree Robotics, told NewsChina that universities are a strategic market where the company holds a dominant position. Feedback from research scenarios helps the company identify directions for technical iteration and improvement.　

Corporate orders tend to be bigger but less frequent, mainly concentrated in the automotive sector. In July 2025, Shenzhen-based UBTECH won a 90.5 million yuan (US$13.16m) robot procurement project from automobile and parts exporter MIEE Automotive Technology, headquartered in Shanghai Government-initiated data collection centers are more stable sources of demand. China's 15th Five-Year Plan (2026-2030) suggests promoting embodied intelligence as a new growth engine for the economy.　

Among the 11 orders worth tens of millions of yuan revealed by UBTECH in 2025, for example, four are from the automobile and battery industries, while seven are government purchase orders for data collection.　

Large data collection centers generally require around 100 humanoid robots for physical maintenance and monitoring work that humans currently handle, while medium-sized centers need dozens. Interact Analysis reports over 50 such centers by 2030, forecasting demand for more than 2,000 units.

Built for Growth

However, the market remains cautious about a possible industry bubble. Morgan Stanley noted that more than 2 billion yuan (US$290m) in China's humanoid orders announced late 2025 were mostly framework agreements, not finalized contracts, possibly inflating figures.　

An executive officer of an embodied AI company who spoke on condition of anonymity revealed that many intent orders are for marketing purposes, and actual contract fulfillment involves renegotiation and strict acceptance criteria.　

Several top players have been gearing up for IPOs, using high-value order announcements to boost market valuations rather than reflect real demand, the executive said.　

In 2025, publicly announced orders for humanoid robots topped 5 billion yuan (US$726.9m). While at least 14 firms signed orders in the tens of millions, only six provided shipment figures. Unitree and AgiBot were the only companies delivering more than 5,000 units. UBTECH said it produced over 1,000 in 2025, but shipped just 500.　

Limited functionality is a major reason for slow deliveries. An Mingbo, product director at All-round Embodied Intelligence Technology in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, said that the most popular robots are bought for research, consumer use or data collection and model training.　

When deployed in factories, their performance drops with any change in environment. This inability to adapt to unfamiliar scenarios means they cannot meet the precision demands of factory lines, where errors can cause costly losses.　

Robots cannot completely replace human workers yet. Most humanoid robots are limited to simple, repetitive tasks at fixed workstations. They are unable to handle fine manipulation, let alone adapt to complex and dynamic real-world environments.　

UBTECH revealed that its Walker S2 robots, priced at 200,000 yuan (US$29,076), achieve only 30-50 percent of human production efficiency in tasks like stacking boxes or quality inspection.　

"Whether orders from factories are sustainable depends on whether it makes economic sense," An told NewsChina, adding that low return on investment is the main hurdle for widespread commercial use.　

Mass production is also limited. According to the anonymous robot company executive, most Chinese companies rely on small workshops, with few capable of mass production.　

The lack of industrial standards forces suppliers to produce small, model-specific batches, further restricting scale. Translating billion-yuan orders into stable production and practical applications is an unavoidable challenge for the entire industry.　

When asked about upcoming shipment plans for the coming year by tech news outlet Sina Tech, a representative of Noetix Robotics, whose robots were featured in the Spring Festival Gala spot, said the company will instead focus on long-term, real-world applications and capacity growth.　

But the Gala did provide a glimpse into the industry's future. Unitree Robotics told media that the technical challenges engineers overcame to prepare for the martial arts performance translate highly to real-world scenarios, including multi-robot coordination, compliant manipulation (adjusting hand motion under external force) and dynamic environment interaction.　

"China's humanoid robots can now ‘stand, walk and run' with stability and speed," Zhang Yunming, vice minister of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said in January in Beijing, "They are now moving from performances and competitions to homes and factories."

Two robots are displayed at Huashi AI 7S Flagship Store & Wuchang Robot Exhibition Center, Wuhan, Hubei Province, February 13, 2026. In addition to robots, the 500-square-meter store also sells smart connected wearables, intelligent sensor toys and AI educational equipment (Photo by VCG)

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