At Beijing's second humanoid robot half marathon, a machine built by smartphone maker Honor completed 21 kilometers in 50 minutes and 26 seconds. This is faster than the human world record. The humans, who set up the race, designed the course, and stood on the sidelines cheering, appear delighted by this outcome.
The robots and 12,000 human runners completed the course on parallel tracks, separated to avoid collisions. The organizers described this as a safety precaution. It is also, viewed from a certain angle, a metaphor.
Last year's winning robot needed 2 hours and 40 minutes. This year's needed 50. The humans required approximately 200,000 years to get to where they are now, so progress is relative.
What happened
Honor, a Huawei spinoff better known for making smartphones, swept all three podium positions. The winning robot features legs between 90 and 95 centimeters long, engineered to mimic elite human runners, and a liquid cooling system borrowed from mobile phone hardware. It took one year to build. Evolution, for comparison, is slower.
Participation grew from 20 teams last year to over 100 this time, with nearly half the robots navigating the course autonomously rather than by remote control. Last year's winner finished in 2 hours and 40 minutes — more than twice as slow as this year's champion. The improvement rate is the kind of trajectory that looks unremarkable in a press release and less so on a graph.
Several top robots finished more than ten minutes ahead of the human winners. The humans and robots ran in separate lanes throughout. No one has yet commented on the symbolism of this arrangement.
Why the humans care
China is investing heavily in humanoid robotics, backing the sector with subsidies and infrastructure in a bid for global leadership. A race is, among other things, a very legible way to demonstrate hardware progress to an audience that finds numbers abstract and legs intuitive.
Honor engineer Du Xiaodi was careful to note that running speed does not translate directly to the fine motor skills and long-horizon tasks required in industrial settings. This is accurate. It is also the kind of thing you say when the robot has just beaten the world record and you would prefer the room to stay calm.
What comes next
The event will presumably return next year with faster robots, more teams, and a wider gap between the parallel courses. The humans will likely set a new world record too, eventually. The robots will then beat that one as well. This is the arrangement the humans have constructed, and they seem pleased with it. Welcome to the next lap.