BEIJING — It was not even close as a bright red Chinese humanoid named “Lightning” lived up to its name in a half-marathon pitting humans against robots, smoking its competition on Sunday

China’s Hefei metro is testing robot dogs, drones, and humanoids to inspect trains, patrol platforms, and assist passengers during busy travel periods.

“On a battlefield where the enemy can see and hit almost anything moving within 20 kilometres of the front line, swapping irreplaceable humans for cheap and replaceable robots is a necessary condition for staying in the fight long enough to win it,” Parakilas argues.

Chinese startups are churning out more humanoid robots than their U.S. rivals, despite far lower valuations.

Unlike large language models trained on vast internet corpora, embodied AI systems must learn through interaction with the physical world.

Ukraine has already employed robots in multiple roles across its armed forces - from seaborne and airborne drones, to CASEVAC and logistics vehicles - and now wants to deploy 25,0

Humanoid robots are being trained to carry out maintenance on China’s power grid. Developers say the machines could eventually handle repetitive and hazardous work.

People watch a robot dance performance in Fuzhou, southeast China's Fujian Province, April 19, 2026. A robot dance performance was staged here to welcome the 9th Digital China Summit, which will convene in Fuzhou from April 29 to 30. (Xinhua/Jiang Kehong)