China showcased more than 20 bipedal robots lin Beijing’s Yizhuang tech district on Saturday to compete in what was billed as the world’s first humanoid half-marathon.
While the spectacle turned heads and showcased notable progress in robotics, none of the machines came close to matching human endurance over the grueling 21-kilometer distance.
The event drew teams from Chinese universities and tech firms eager to demonstrate the country’s progress in humanoid robotics, a sector where the Chinese Communist Party is aggressively trying to close the gap with the United States, which continues to lead in cutting-edge models.
Robots race against humans in Beijing half-marathon.
The winning robot crossed the finishing line in two hours and 40 minutes, while the men’s winner of the race had a time of one hour and two minutes.https://t.co/xiwHaiOErH pic.twitter.com/SCfXfQiCzr
— Sky News (@SkyNews) April 19, 2025
The robots varied widely in appearance and movement style, lurching, jogging, or wobbling along the course.
Many fell over and were helped back up to their feet by event organizers.
The leader of the winning team acknowledged that human runners still dominate in speed and stamina but claimed that their robot could rival U.S. counterparts in core technical capabilities.
Twenty-one humanoid robots joined thousands of runners at the Yizhuang half-marathon in Beijing, the first time these machines have raced alongside humans over a 13-mile course https://t.co/xG960UMCyu pic.twitter.com/KOg7kwr3qT
— Reuters (@Reuters) April 19, 2025
Tang Jian, chief technology officer of the Beijing Humanoid Robot Innovation Center which developed the robots, told reporters the company was “very happy with the results”.
“We had set three goals for ourselves: first, to win the championship; second, to complete the entire half marathon with a single robot – a very important goal for us; and third, to finish the race in under three hours,” he said.
21 humanoid robots ran a half-marathon against humans in Beijing this morning
Best robot time: 2 hours, 40 minutes
Best human time: 1 hour, 2 minutesThe robots in action are a sight to behold:pic.twitter.com/z3gahWXAQi
— Morning Brew
(@MorningBrew) April 19, 2025
“We collected real-world running data from professional athletes and trained the robot so that its gait, cadence, stride length, and various postures could match those of professional runners as closely as possible.”
With the global race to develop functional humanoid robots heating up, the country that ends up on top of this technological arms race will likely gain massive economic and technological advantages.
In recent months, videos of Chinese humanoid robots executing stunts, from riding bicycles to performing backflips, have gone viral, often with the help of state media eager to spotlight these advances as a sign of technological development.
Wow, China has almost perfected 4 legged robots.
Deep Robotics, a Hangzhou-based startup, just started commercial sales of the X30 robot dog:pic.twitter.com/CHaQ4PMulD
— Rowan Cheung (@rowancheung) November 13, 2024
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