TL;DR: While American firms showed off marketing videos last year, Chinese companies quietly shipped 90% of all humanoid robots globally. They are scaling fast and leaving Western competitors behind on pure hardware volume.
The race for humanoid robot supremacy is starting to look awfully familiar. China is executing the exact same strategy that made them a global powerhouse in electric vehicles. Early state funding, cheap local supply chains, and rapid scaling have pushed Chinese firms to the absolute top of the robotics leaderboard.
Look at the numbers from 2025. Chinese companies accounted for nearly 90% of all humanoid sales worldwide. Unitree shipped 5,500 units, while Shanghai-based Agibot moved over 5,100. By contrast, Western giants like Tesla, Figure AI, and Agility Robotics barely scratched 150 units each.
Elon Musk recently admitted that China will be Tesla’s toughest competition. He claims Optimus will eventually win out on pure capability. That might be true, but China is using local components to slash costs and get robots into the real world right now. The global market is projected to hit $38 billion by 2035, and China currently owns the factory floor.