Tesla Optimus (announced concept)

What Tesla showed

On 19 August 2021, at its first AI Day, Tesla revealed a humanoid robot. The machine was later named Optimus. What the event introduced was a concept: a design and a set of intended capabilities rather than a finished machine doing work on stage.^[1]

Size, weight and strength

The concept shown was about 1.73 m tall and weighed about 56.7 kg. Tesla described it as able to carry about 20.4 kg and lift about 68 kg.^[1] A report on the AI Day presentation gave slightly different numbers: a height of 1.72 m, a weight of 57 kg, a payload of 20 kg plus 5 kg carried on the arms, and a top speed of 8 km/h.^[2] The two sets of figures differ by small amounts; both describe an intended machine roughly the size and weight of an adult person.

Building at human scale is a deliberate choice. Tools, staircases, door handles, shelves and workbenches are all sized for people, so a machine with a human-like body and two arms can in principle be placed into existing workplaces without redesigning them. The numbers above describe how much such a machine was meant to move: a payload of about 20 kg covers many of the boxes, parts and tools handled in warehouses and factories, while the higher lifting figure refers to what the arms and legs were meant to raise in a single effort.

Actuators, a face screen and a car's computer

According to the report on the presentation, the design used 40 electromechanical actuators spread through the limbs, and a screen on the face for displaying information.^[2] An actuator is the part that turns an instruction into motion, the equivalent of a muscle and a joint combined in one unit, so a count of 40 indicates how many separately driven joints the design called for.

The head was to carry the same cameras used in Tesla cars and the same FSD chip, and the robot was to share the cars' AI system.^[2] This was the most distinctive part of the proposal: rather than building a perception and decision system from scratch, Tesla presented the robot as another body for software it was already developing for driving, with cameras as the main sensors and a chip of its own design doing the computing.

Safety and control

Tesla said the robot would be easy for a human to overpower and switch off.^[1] The statement addresses a question that comes up whenever a machine with the strength described above is discussed: what stops it if something goes wrong. The answer given at the presentation was not a set of software limits but a physical one, namely that a person should be able to bring the machine to a halt by force.

Timing and stated purpose

Musk said a first physical version was expected in 2022.^[1] He also said the robot would have a profound effect on the economy and take on the work people least want to do.^[1] That framing, a general-purpose machine for dull, repetitive or undesirable tasks, is what placed the concept in a longer line of humanoid robot projects rather than in Tesla's car business.

Where it sits

Optimus began as an announcement rather than a shipped product. The 2021 event set out dimensions, strength, a sensor and computing plan, and a schedule.^[1][2] The rest, including how well it would walk, which tasks it would actually perform, and whether the stated target would hold, was left to later work.