Galbot ET1

The Galbot ET1 is the first bipedal humanoid robot built by the Chinese robotics company Galbot. Standing roughly 1.75 meters tall, about the height of an average adult, it's designed to stand and walk on two legs, and it was unveiled to the world at the World Robot Conference held in Beijing on August 19-20, 2026.

The robot drew attention because just three days after its unveiling, it played an exhibition tennis match against a professional player who had once ranked 15th in the world. During the match, it was pushed side to side, lost its balance, fell, and then got back up — something only possible because it stands on legs. Galbot's actual commercial product, the G1, is a wheeled, dual-arm robot with no legs, so it isn't built in a way that would even allow it to fall over. In other words, the ET1 isn't a product on the market — it's closer to a prototype that had only just been revealed.

Some reports claim it was developed jointly with Tsinghua University, but since this comes from only a single source, it isn't confirmed. The academic partners Galbot itself has cited are Peking University and BAAI (Beijing Academy of Artificial Intelligence).

Articles note that 'the robot on the court is the model unveiled three days earlier,' identifying it as the Galbot ET1. A common misconception is mistaking it for one of Galbot's commercial products — but the robot Galbot actually sells is the wheeled, legless G1, while the ET1 is a new prototype that was first shown at the World Robot Conference just three days before the tennis match. Since the English press materials didn't specify the model name, many reports simply repeated the footage without knowing exactly which robot it was.