{"id":375754,"date":"2026-08-23T10:16:00","date_gmt":"2026-08-23T17:16:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/?p=375754"},"modified":"2026-08-23T10:16:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-23T17:16:08","slug":"chinas-humanoid-robots-run-100m-in-9-39-seconds-faster-than-bolt-but-it-proves-little","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/chinas-humanoid-robots-run-100m-in-9-39-seconds-faster-than-bolt-but-it-proves-little\/","title":{"rendered":"China\u2019s humanoid robots run 100m in 9.39 seconds: faster than Bolt, but it proves little"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At the 2026 World Humanoid Robot Games in Beijing, China\u2019s humanoid 100-meter record dropped to <strong>9.39 seconds<\/strong>, according to the official Beijing results. On paper, that means a humanoid robot covered the distance faster than Usain Bolt.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">X-Humanoid clocked <strong>9.39 seconds<\/strong>. Honor\u2019s humanoid robot Lightning reportedly reached 9.32 in testing and ran 9.47 in one heat, while Tiangong Ultra also posted 9.39 in a preliminary race. Put those times next to last year\u2019s winning 21.50 and the jump is hard to miss: multiple 2026 robots were already under 9.5 seconds at an event that, according to the official Beijing results, featured more than 2,000 humanoids across 51 events.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">If you follow humanoid robotics, this lands as a <strong>real speed milestone<\/strong>. Still, there\u2019s a reason roboticists are skeptical. A flat track is much easier than a chaotic kitchen, an unfamiliar home, or folding laundry. Rodney Brooks has described these contests as heavy on publicity, and some of the race footage still showed robots needing crash mats after struggling to brake.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The result also lines up with <strong>China\u2019s broader push<\/strong> against the US. Earlier this year there was a robot high-jump record, and in April Honor\u2019s Lightning won the Beijing half-marathon in 50 minutes 26 seconds. Public competition is clearly speeding up the development of machines that are highly capable and highly visible, even if they still aren\u2019t ready for practical deployment.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The race footage is online, and so are the official Beijing results.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At the 2026 World Humanoid Robot Games in Beijing, China\u2019s humanoid 100-meter record dropped to 9.39 seconds, according to the official Beijing results. On paper, that means a humanoid robot covered the distance faster than Usain Bolt. X-Humanoid clocked 9.39 seconds. Honor\u2019s humanoid robot Lightning reportedly reached 9.32 in testing and ran 9.47 in one &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/chinas-humanoid-robots-run-100m-in-9-39-seconds-faster-than-bolt-but-it-proves-little\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;China\u2019s humanoid robots run 100m in 9.39 seconds: faster than Bolt, but it proves little&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9322,"featured_media":375753,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","wpcf-pageviews":0},"categories":[1015],"tags":[],"usertag":[],"vertical":[],"content-category":[],"class_list":["post-375754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9322"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=375754"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375754\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":375755,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/375754\/revisions\/375755"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/375753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=375754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=375754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=375754"},{"taxonomy":"usertag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/usertag?post=375754"},{"taxonomy":"vertical","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/vertical?post=375754"},{"taxonomy":"content-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms-articles.softonic.io\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/content-category?post=375754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}