The home robots that made headlines at last CES are already headed for the scrap heap. Last week, Bloomberg reported that Samsung’s famous Bailey home robot was actually dead. The company made a statement that the robot will “inform” how Samsung works with spatial awareness and smart home intelligence. The bot was nowhere to be found at CES 2026. Recent reports citing robot companies themselves raise questions about whether humanoid robots are the next big technological boon. China, a place that is certainly ahead of the rest of the world in terms of robotics, has officially cited a number of copycat companies making derivative, useless bots. The question is whether any of these robots will be able to perform anything useful.
The Kung-Fu-doing AGIBOT X2 is so cute! #CES2026 pic.twitter.com/kpOLtmaJJX
– Ray Wong (@raywongy) 6 January 2026
As we predicted, CES 2026 was full of home robotics. What surprised us more was how many people had arms, heads, and even legs that companies hoped would eventually replace us. Unfortunately, robo-maids and robo-butlers are more likely to fall on you or wander about uncontrollably than to wash your clothes. Throughout the show, when they were not being controlled remotely or performing choreographed moves, these robots tripped, fell, and completely broke down on their own. It was a ridiculous and embarrassing scene for those present.
Why were all the bots constantly malfunctioning?
Murphy’s Law dictates that any live demo will inevitably be cursed with bad connections or gear that won’t work no matter how many times you test it in the lab. The number of robots on the fritz on the CES show floor far outweighed the occasional problems. On the first day the CES show floor opened, I visited Switchbot’s booth to check out the Onero H1 humanoid robot. The H1 is supposed to be a household appliance with two articulating arms and a cute, always surprising face. It’s meant to handle tasks like feeding food to the dishwasher or making coffee. At the booth, a Switchbot representative told me that the Onero H1 was, unfortunately, not fully functional. All he could do was pace back and forth like a confused child trapped in a playpen he had never seen before.
This doesn’t mean that the humanoid robots remained broken throughout the show’s run. While it was working, the H1 would slowly drag a shirt into the washing machine, slowly open the door, and slowly stick it inside. I visited LG’s booth to check out CLOiD, another home robot with articulating fingers built for tasks like laundry. In fact, the bot was slowly pulling out a stack of towels and folding each one with painful slowness. At one point, CLOiD was feeling hesitant in his routine. Several LG employees immediately surrounded the bot, and another jumped in front of me as I attempted to film it. The company presumably managed to fix all the existing issues that were causing the disruption, because CLOiD was back later, having tackled a mountain of laundry with Sisyphean dedication.
Repeatedly, bots at CES 2026 failed to perform autonomously. We’ve seen videos of robots doing routine dances and falling down hard, and then becoming aggressive when they get back up. In a video where The Verge was showing off Zeroth’s Jupiter humanoid robot, the 170-pound device stopped working and fell directly on journalist Jennifer Pattison Tuohy. Without anyone to hold and guide them, these bots with lower appendages are more liable to spill onto the ground if something malfunctions. Imagine if Tesla’s long-awaited, long-delayed Optimus 3 robot, which weighs just over 125 pounds, suddenly decides to use your feet as its landing platform.
To avoid crushing the feet of these devices, these humanoid bots move better on wheels. Intel created RoBee, a 6-foot-tall humanoid bot with roller skates permanently attached to its feet. Aside from being slow, the robot, powered by Intel’s latest Core Ultra Series 3 technology, was mostly just a vehicle for a chatbot to talk to CES attendees. Other robots taking up space on the show floor were mostly stationary or stuck on wheels. A humanoid bot named Tommo was stuck at the piano playing one key at a time due to the strange articulation of the thumb and fingers. More automatons from companies like Galbot can act as checkout clerks, using suction cups to grab empty snack boxes and bring them to the counter.
Our favorite bots aren’t helping around the house
We have seen these types of capabilities in past years. This doesn’t mean that gradual, regular progress shouldn’t be appreciated. Some robotics companies like Sharpa showed bots capable of tracking a ping pong ball and hitting it back with only the occasional flub. Another bot from the company can be an extremely slow dealer in a blackjack game.
Apparently, these bots are only good for choreographed fights or competing in a boxing ring. Unitri, one of the few companies that promises to sell relatively affordable humanoid robots, has brought its boxing robot to the show floor. These bots are impressive, mainly because of how well they react to being knocked to the ground or staggering to avoid a punch.
The technical work done on these devices is much more interesting than the practical capabilities of the bots. Judging by what we saw at CES 2026, bipedal robotics are nowhere near as capable as companies promise they will be. Hey, they couldn’t fulfill their limited promise today. The best home working robots will be your fighting children. They may not want to fold their clothes, but you can guarantee they will fold it faster than any robot that exists today.
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