A robot named Lightning has run the 100m in 9.32 seconds, beating the human world record, China’s state broadcaster has reported.
The humanoid, developed by the Chinese smartphone manufacturer Honor, reached a peak speed of 14.5 metres per second during a test event for the second World Humanoid Robot Games, which began on Saturday. The performance surpassed the 9.58sec men’s 100m world record set by Usain Bolt 17 years ago at the World Athletics Championships in Berlin.
China has been promoting humanoid robots as an emerging industry, with policymakers and companies betting that advances in AI and hardware will accelerate their deployment in manufacturing, logistics and consumer applications.
Lightning also won the Beijing half marathon in April in 50 minutes and 26 seconds, faster than the men’s world record. The robot stood 169cm tall and had 95cm-long legs at the half marathon. Researchers have since lengthened its legs by 10cm for these Games.
More than 2,000 humanoid robots were participating in the five-day games, now in its second year, a spectacle intended to demonstrate China’s rapid progress in advanced robotics as the technology race with the US heats up. There are 51 events and more than 1,000 competitions taking place including running, table tennis and football.
The games, which are taking place in the National Speed Skating Oval built for the 2022 Winter Olympics, opened the same week as Beijing held the 2026 World Robot Conference, where companies showcased around 3,000 products, including humanoid robots. China makes the majority of the world’s humanoid robots.
Last month, the US Federal Communications Commission announced a ban on imports of new foreign-made humanoid robots. The FCC cited national security reasons in a move that targeted China. The Pentagon recently also added Unitree, one of China’s leading humanoid robot makers, to its list of companies that it deemed have ties with the Chinese military. Beijing has hit back at the accusations.
At Saturday’s opening of the robot games, the organisers and robot makers said that Chinese humanoid robots defeated human world records, as hundreds of humanoid robots marched in formation on to the field in a massive display of synchronised coordination.
In a standing high jump, a humanoid robot was able to reach 2.88m, well above the 0.95m best result by a humanoid in last year’s first edition of the games . It surpassed the human high jump record of 2.45m set by Cuba’s Javier Sotomayor in 1993. Both robots were from Beijing-based X-Humanoid.
Experts say humanoid robots are still mostly used for demonstrations, performances and research – at least for now – and it will take time to achieve mass real-world deployment. Some spectators at the robot games said they were excited about the humanoid robots’ quickly improving abilities.
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Humanoid robots are “evolving rapidly”, said Li Yanfeng, an education worker and a Beijing resident. “At first, I wasn’t very accepting of artificial intelligence. I was even a bit resistant to it, because of the possibility that it might replace or displace humans,” she said. “But now that I see this development is unstoppable, I decided to come and take a look.”
Yang Shangzheng, another spectator, said: “These sports are perfectly normal for humans, but now robots can do them. I find it amazing.” Liu Tao, who was watching the games with his son, said he was hoping to see “the best robots China currently has to offer”.
This year’s robot games – which the organisers say has 16 countries participating, among them Germany, Japan and the US – also includes other events such as weightlifting and tug of war.