China accounted for 90 per cent of approximately 13,000 humanoid robots shipped globally last year, and represented over half of all humanoid robot exhibitors at CES 2026. The country's 2026 Spring Festival Gala featured robots from Unitree, Galbot, and Noetix performing martial arts, sword dances, and acrobatics, reflecting a national shift toward integrating humanoid machines into public life. The boom is linked to a parallel surge in Chinese large language models — including DeepSeek and Qwen — with real-world robot deployment feeding data back into AI development and accelerating further innovation.

Opinion | Humans vs robots? China begs to disagree - South China Morning Post