A phase of accelerating volume growth in 2026
With public sector procurement accelerating and consumer market demand heating up, Third Bridge experts expect the global humanoid robot market to enter a phase of accelerating volume growth in 2026. Third Bridge experts say this upgraded forecast mainly reflects two changes. First, public sector data collection projects continue to increase. Second, the consumer market is expected to see clear growth in the second half of this year.
Third Bridge experts note that humanoid robots have gradually entered innovative applications including unmanned retail, shopping mall wayfinding, showroom presentation and some industrial settings. As hardware costs gradually fall and software capability keeps improving, the industry should move faster towards applications at scale.
The development of multimodal large models is driving a rapid improvement in commercial application capability. Third Bridge experts say mainstream vendors can now achieve multi-object recognition and grasping. Where robots could previously handle only a single item, they can now combine this with human position detection to complete precise handover tasks, and the human-machine interaction experience in wayfinding and presentation settings has also improved noticeably.
Third Bridge experts expect unmanned retail could, at the earliest, achieve a fully automated closed loop this year covering product selection, payment, grasping and delivery. Even so, experts believe shipments of unmanned retail robots will hold steady this year, because hardware costs remain relatively high and the payback period is longer than for conventional retail solutions. The market therefore remains dominated by pilot projects and brand showcases, and large-scale commercial deployment will still take time. Should costs continue to fall, related demand is expected to grow explosively next year.
Compared with the rapid progress in commercial applications, industrial settings remain at an early stage.
Third Bridge experts believe humanoid robots still face several challenges before large-scale industrial application. Continued investment in model training and hardware infrastructure is needed, and the payback period has yet to improve further alongside technological progress and application at scale.
Experts note that current priority technology directions include pre-trained models, stronger compute support, and efforts to standardise data quality and build cross-platform general capability. Industrial settings do not currently require robots that can "do everything". The first priority is stable execution of high-frequency, standardised tasks such as materials handling. At the same time, robots need to improve on failure rates, maintenance efficiency, human-machine collaboration safety, and compatibility with factory MES and WMS systems. Changes in the on-site environment and the capacity for data iteration are also key challenges. Ultimately, customers care most about deployment cost, operating cost and return on investment.
On the supply chain, Third Bridge experts say a clear trend towards contract manufacturing has emerged in the assembly of complete humanoid robot units. Because unit manufacturing requires high capital investment and a long payback period, most vendors, particularly second and third-tier companies, prefer to outsource manufacturing. Experts add that companies in the automotive supply chain hold a strong competitive advantage in contract manufacturing of complete humanoid robot units, given their mature manufacturing experience and capacity for production at scale.
All insights in this article are based on information provided by Third Bridge experts.
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