Unitree R1

What it is

R1 is a humanoid robot from Unitree, a Chinese robotics company. Unitree released it on 25 July 2025 with a starting price of 39,900 yuan, and it is the company's third humanoid model.^[2][3] A humanoid robot is a machine built on a human plan — a torso, two arms and two legs — so that it can move and work in spaces already designed for people, instead of the environment being rebuilt around the machine.

Versions and prices

The R1 product page lists three versions. The R1 AIR is priced at 29,900 yuan and the standard R1 at 39,900 yuan; the R1 EDU has no listed price and is sold through a sales contact.^[1] At launch, Shanghai Securities News reported the standard version at 39,900 yuan.^[3]

Size, weight and joints

Standing, the robot is listed at 1230 x 357 x 190 mm. The AIR weighs about 27 kg, the other two versions about 29 kg.^[1] Degrees of freedom — the count of joints that can be driven independently, each one adding a direction in which the machine can move — also differ between versions: 20 for the AIR and 26 for the R1 and R1 EDU, split as 6 per leg, 4 or 5 per arm, 2 in the waist and 2 in the head.^[1]

Securities Times reported somewhat different numbers: a weight of about 25 kg and 26 joints, together with speech and image multimodal large models integrated into the robot.^[2] A multimodal model is one that takes in more than one kind of input, so a robot carrying one can in principle work with spoken instructions or read a scene from a camera image.

Motion

The product page lists about 1 hour of runtime, an arm payload of about 2 kg and an 8-core processor.^[1] Payload is the weight an arm can hold and still move with; about 2 kg places the R1 in the range of light handling work, and roughly an hour of runtime suits short tasks and demonstrations better than long continuous operation. Securities Times reported that Unitree described the R1 as "born for motion", and that its video showed the robot doing roundhouse kicks, boxing, somersaults, handstands and downhill running.^[2]

Where it sits in the line

Earlier in 2025, Unitree had put the H1 on JD.com at 650,000 yuan and the G1 at 99,000 yuan.^[2] The R1's 39,900 yuan starting price is far below both figures. Price is one of the things that has kept humanoid robots out of classrooms, laboratories and small-scale trials, so the entry price is as much a part of this launch as the hardware itself.

Timing

Shanghai Securities News noted that the R1 was released the day before WAIC 2025 opened in Shanghai.^[3] WAIC, the World Artificial Intelligence Conference, is an annual industry meeting held in the city, so the launch placed the new machine in front of the conference's visitors.