A humanoid robot sprints past the human : NPR
A robot starts the E-Town Half Marathon and the Beijing Humanoid Half Marathon, in the suburbs of Beijing, on Sunday April 19, 2026.
Ng Han Guan/AP
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Ng Han Guan/AP
BEIJING — A humanoid robot that won a half-marathon race for robots in Beijing on Sunday ran faster than the human world record, demonstrating China’s technological advancements.
The winner from Honor, a Chinese smartphone maker, completed the 21-kilometer (13-mile) race in 50 minutes and 26 seconds, according to a WeChat message posted by the Beijing Economic and Technological Development Zone, also known as Beijing E-Town, where the race began.
That was faster than the human world record holder, Ugandan Jacob Kiplimo, who covered the same distance in around 57 minutes in March during the Lisbon road race.
The robot’s performance marked a significant step forward from last year’s inaugural race, in which the winning robot finished in 2 hours, 40 minutes and 42 seconds.
But the competition, which took place in parallel with a race for humans, did not go off without setbacks: one robot fell flat on the starting line, another bumped into a barrier.
A robot crashes into a board after crossing the finish line of the Beijing E-Town Half Marathon and Humanoid Robot Half Marathon held in the suburbs of Beijing, Sunday, April 19, 2026.
Andy Wong/AP
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Andy Wong/AP
Du Xiaodi, test development engineer at Honor, said his team was happy with the results. Du said his robot’s design was modeled on those of exceptional human athletes, with long legs of about 95 cm (about 37 inches), and was equipped with what he called a powerful liquid cooling system, largely developed in-house.
“In the future, some of these technologies could be transferred to other areas. For example, structural reliability and liquid cooling technology could be applied in future industrial scenarios,” he said.
Although it will still take time to achieve widespread commercialization of humanoid robots, onlookers have already been impressed by the robots. Sun Zhigang, who was in the audience last year, watched Sunday’s race with his son.
“I feel huge changes this year,” Sun said. “This is the first time robots have outperformed humans, and it’s something I never imagined.”
Wang Wen, who came with his family, said the robots appeared to have stolen much of the spotlight from human runners at the event.
“The speed of robots far exceeds that of humans,” he said. “This could signal the arrival of some sort of new era.”
Beijing E-Town said about 40 percent of the robots navigated the course autonomously, while the rest were controlled remotely.
State media outlet Global Times reported that a separate, remote-controlled robot from Honor was the first to cross the finish line in 48 minutes and 19 seconds. But it said the winner used autonomous navigation and won the championship under the event’s weighted scoring rules.
State broadcaster CCTV reported that the finalists, who also belonged to Honor and used an autonomous navigation system, completed the race in 51 minutes and 53 minutes respectively. A robot served as a traffic policeman to direct participants with its arm gestures and voice, CCTV added.
A robot runs as it participates in the Beijing E-Town Half Marathon and Humanoid Robot Half Marathon in suburban Beijing, Sunday, April 19, 2026.
Andy Wong/AP
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Andy Wong/AP
In China, technology has become an area of competition with the United States, with national security implications. Beijing’s latest five-year plan pledges to “target the frontiers of science and technology.” Accelerating the development of products such as humanoid robots and their applications is part of the 2026-2030 plan of the world’s second largest economy.
London-based technology research and advisory group Omdia recently ranked three Chinese companies – AGIBOT, Unitree Robotics and UBTech Robotics Corp. – as the only top-tier suppliers in its global assessment of general purpose embedded intelligent robot shipping numbers.
They all shipped more than 1,000 units of robots last year, with the top two companies shipping more than 5,000 units, according to the report.
