But something was coming that made people think that the days of Optimus robots were over and this WAS 3PO. Yeah, so everything changes dramatically when a new rival, the Unitrix G1, appears for only $16,000. This not only turns the market upside down but also makes people wonder, can Tesla's Optimus retain its throne? It would not be wrong to say that humanoid robots are enticing targets for manufacturers. Every month and even every day we get news of a new humanoid robot being developed by a new robotics company. This trend has truly taken off as just about two years ago it was only Boston Dynamics and Tesla that were making new robots.

Now China is heavily invested in robots and it seems every company's got one.

Of course, this is not a bad thing. We actually like seeing this trend.

Currently, Optimus and Unitrix G1 are getting discussed a lot.

Let's talk about appearance and design first. Similar to Optimus, Tesla has upgraded from Gen 1, launched back in March of last year, to a more advanced version, Gen 2, at the end of 2023.

This upgrade has made the appearance and design of the Tesla bot a lot more attractive, with a very high level of refinement. On the other hand, Unitrix has developed a humanoid robot version from H1 to their current G1. Fairly speaking, the design has turned 360 degrees to make the Unitrix humanoid robot look much less intimidating.

In the H1 generation, the entire body was covered in black, enough to make your kids scream if you brought one home. The design wasn't impressive either, even when it was dressed in a brand-emphasizing shirt. However, when the Unitrix G1 was introduced, we felt a sense of novelty mixed with familiarity as it seemed to resemble something Boston Dynamics had released in April of this year. We're sorry to say this, but the Unitrix G1 is 70% similar to the Atlas robot Gen 2. Even the introduction video makes anyone confuse these two robots as the same thing, while you can review the way Tesla introduced their Optimus Gen 2. Not too complicated, but makes people remember it from the details, it appears.

Putting aside whether Unitrix borrowed ideas from Boston Dynamics or not, it's easy to see that the G1 version is significantly smaller in size and stature than the Unitrix H1 humanoid.

As far as we know, the Unitrix H1 is the size of an average adult at 5'11 or 180cm tall, quite similar to Optimus' Gen 2. However, the new-generation Unitrix G1 is only the size of an average 8-year-old child with a published height of 4'2 or 127cm. In terms of size, Optimus meets the standard proportions of a good humanoid robot better, as you can see that most other humanoid robots are also around 5'8 or taller. Of course, we're not saying that the Optimus will be more effective than the Unitrix, because each size does have its advantages.

Example, in industrial environments or places requiring a higher reach, where objects are put up high and out of reach for kids and the elderly, Optimus is more suitable, whereas the Unitrix G1 may perform better in narrow spaces or tasks that require better flexibility.

Tesla's Optimus is mainly composed of lightweight metals such as aluminum, plastic, and carbon fiber, with a ratio of 40% metal and 60% impact and scratch-resistant casing.

Thus, overall, Optimus looks quite balanced and deserves the title of the best-designed humanoid robot in the world to date. The current reported weight for Tesla's humanoid robot is 138 pounds, making it lighter than the initial 160. Looking at the Unitrix G1, the Chinese manufacturer has announced a quite astonishing weight for their new robot, only 77 pounds or 35 kg. They can hold it gently as it's wrapped in 90% metal, mainly aluminum except for the head and feet, which seem to be made of plastic. Normally, a robot with a stable weight like Optimus would have an advantage in maintaining balance compared to a lightweight robot, even if it affects its movement speed.

However, the Unitrix G1 achieves exceptional balance-holding capability.

In the intro video, it remains upright even when someone tries to push it over, which is something Tesla has not yet dared to test with their own humanoid robot yet.

But it's undeniable that the Unitrix G1 is quite attractive.

We've noticed that in most humanoid robots today, such as Optimus, Unitrix, or Boston Dynamics, they're equipped with at least one strip of LED lights on the robot's head.

These LEDs may indicate the robot's status such as low battery, fully charged, or danger alert. Both Unitrix G1 and Optimus have these features.

Speaking of the heads of Optimus and the Unitrix G1, Tesla and Chinese manufacturers may consider equipping their robots with a display screen on their face along with the sensors.

While Tesla utilizes neural network-based sensors in their FSD full self-driving software, combined with multiple 2D cameras for wide-angle environmental observation, the Unitrix G1 robot is equipped with 3D LiDAR and Intel RealSense D435 depth cameras.

These sensors provide a robust hardware platform for powerful and sensitive perception, allowing the G1 robot to better understand its surrounding environment.

Both Optimus Tesla and Unitrix G1 are built quite well in terms of design and offer different advantages. However, we believe that in some aspects, Optimus' design is more aesthetically pleasing because it resembles the human form. Unitrix also excels in minimalism, striving to reduce costs without compromising design quality.

Now, what truly matters is what tasks the robot can perform, its operational efficiency, and for tasks assigned to them. The dexterity of humanoid robot hands is always valued.

Who will have the better hand? Listen to Elon Musk say this.

Yeah, Elon Musk has said multiple times that Optimus gets 22 degrees of freedom in the future version, possibly Gen 3 or 4. Degrees of freedom is a term used to describe the number of independent movements a robot can perform. More specifically, for humanoid robots, degrees of freedom describe the ability of the robot's joints and body parts to move.

The more degrees of freedom, the more the robot's hand can do until it reaches 27 degrees of freedom like a human hand. It'll be no different from a human. With this update, Tesla's robotic hand becomes crazier than ever, with Elon talking about it even being able to thread a needle.

Jim Fan, NVIDIA's Senior Research Manager and lead of Embodied AI, noted that Optimus's hands are among the best in the industry in his comment about the Optimus video.

While this update's not happening right now, it's eventually going to come, and 11 degrees of freedom is more than enough for Tesla to be able to diversify its tasks, whether in the Tesla factory or around your house. However, in contrast to Optimus's five-fingered hand, according to

Unitry, the G1 humanoid robot can be optionally equipped with a three-fingered dexterous hand, which can be optionally equipped with haptic feedback. Through hybrid force position control, the Unitry G1 can simulate the precise operation of a human hand and accurately control a variety of objects. Whether it's cracking walnuts, carrying heavy objects, or picking up fragile objects like eggs, the G1 can demonstrate extreme high precision and stability. What's more, the G1 robot can also handle delicate operations such as opening soda bottles and even welding.

Although the exact number of degrees of freedom in the Unitry G1's hand is unknown, it's undeniable that it is no less impressive than what Optimus has. Going a little further in the hand, the Unitry

G1 has a large joint movement of space, with 23 to 43 joints and a maximum joint torque of 121 Nm.

The Tesla Optimus has 28 joints, 14 rotary actuators, and 14 linear actuators. While Tesla's shown off moves like jumping, yoga, and extremely flexible squats to demonstrate the flexibility of its Optimus robot, Unitry also did not hesitate to show off the high-low dynamic movements of the G1 robot, such as standing up, folding chairs, and swinging sticks. Comparing the operations and number of tasks of the two humanoid robots, it's difficult to decide which one's better, because both are like two different movie genres, a romance movie and an action movie.

Optimus performs operations more gently, but highlights the dexterity.

Unitry G1 is decisive and full of brutality. Overall, both are good.

So, what's there to discuss about the performance of Optimus and Unitry G1?

The biggest drawback of Optimus that we all know is its speed, a moving speed that's always compared to the speed and gait of a certain president, because currently, according to

Optimus's engineer, Milan Kovac, confirmed that it's only about 6 meters a second or 1.34 miles an hour. Tesla has set the target speed for Optimus at 5 miles an hour until these robots are more commercially available on the market. Meanwhile, Unitry once set the world record for the fastest humanoid robot with the H1 robot at 3.3 meters a second or 7.4 miles an hour.

However, the G1 version is a bit slower, with a robot having a brisk walking speed of 2 meters a second or 4.5 miles an hour. In terms of market, this is a fast speed for any humanoid robot or AMR that's currently on the market. The truth is that the movement and speed of a humanoid robot will have many benefits in emergency or dangerous situations. A fast-moving robot can react promptly, help save lives, or resolve situations quickly. In service applications, a fast-moving robot can interact and serve customers more efficiently, improving the user experience. Finally, faster movement helps the robot save time in moving from one place to another, optimizing the workflow. The movement speed of Tesla's Optimus still lags behind considerably when compared to Unitry's robots, but that's not all. There are tasks where the robot simply needs to remain stationary to perform them. In such cases, the upper body becomes more crucial as it significantly impacts the robot's work efficiency. Despite its slower speed, Optimus confidently beats out Unitry when it comes to operating time before these robots need to be recharged. With the 2.3 kWh battery pack that Tesla's announced, the manufacturer may continue to increase the battery pack capacity for upcoming updates, but for now, it may be only 2.3 kWh. With its battery pack size, Optimus can operate for more than 8 hours before needing to get recharged, and the charging time is only within a maximum of 10 minutes. You know, it doesn't take that much time to charge a small battery pack when

Tesla's already got giant ones for its electric vehicles. The huge advantage of electric car batteries is transferred to Optimus, which saves Tesla from having to spend too many stages to produce and source these separately. We say Optimus beats out G1 in terms of operating time because the regular Chinese robots only go up for about 5 hours, while Unitry has an operating time of about 2 hours, which means you have to recharge this robot multiple times a day if you use it a lot. As for the ability to perform tasks, more time is needed to answer for both Optimus and

Unitry because the AI on them has not reached its maximum upgrade when it's still in the early stages. Elon Musk has talked about Optimus being able to do anything when we just needed to show it a video and it can learn, and it's emphasized self-learning ability many times since its launch.

At the same time, Unitry G1 is based on simulation training and deep reinforcement learning, using the rapid development of AI to continuously upgrade and develop. Hopefully, we'll see these robots soon take advantage of AI to help humans in dangerous tasks out there in the real world.

Finally, what we think many of us are looking forward to the most is the price. No one wants to call this a race because both Optimus and Unitry have prices that are shocking the entire industry. Why the Optimus, Tesla, and Unitry G1 price will be a fierce race. The first thing to consider when buying a humanoid robot is its affordability, but looking at some humanoid robots and their estimated prices make anyone shaken because the average price is between $70,000 and $300,000. The reason humanoid robots are expensive is because it's not easy to build and the utility humanoid robots bring after a long time of use can be estimated at hundreds of thousands of dollars. Both Tesla and Unitry are actually achieving something that goes against the majority. While Elon Musk has repeatedly promised to keep Optimus at around 20 grand,

Unitry G1 has a list price of $16,000 for its basic configuration, which is much cheaper than the H1 version, which has a base price of 90 grand. At this price, anyone can own both Optimus and Unitry G1 without wondering whether or not these humanoid robots will be sold worldwide.

The reason Tesla can keep the price low for its robots is that the manufacturer can produce the transmission, the motor, and the battery for its robots without the need for suppliers.

They've saved a large amount of money by transferring the technologies and electric vehicles to their humanoid robots, along with the potential for large-scale production with at least 5 gigafactories in operation. This is a big advantage to Tesla compared to other manufacturers out there. Meanwhile, to reach its projected price of $16,000, the G1's smaller size and design requires less material and can use smaller motors than the H1 version, but both units weigh about the same. With a smaller robot, you'd expect a lower bill of materials. In terms of designing and manufacturing robots, every detail is crucial for improving efficiency and reducing costs. Unitry said that when they asked about how they managed to bring down the cost of the G1 so significantly, for example, reducing the number of wires and cables, minimizing the quantity of chips, decreasing screws, and so on. These might seem basic, but they're indeed crucial and necessary. Except for chips, almost all hardware components of Unitry's robots are designed in-house. Through their experience in robot design and manufacturing, they achieve better performance and lower costs. Despite seeming contrary to common belief, for instance, both motors and gearboxes are models designed by Unitry Robotic. The price of $16,000 could possibly be the cheapest unit on the market, and many are excited because of this impressive price point. Unitry H1, although it may have borrowed some ideas from Boston Dynamics' Atlas, was smart in achieving such a low price. We think the new Atlas Gen 2 will cost at least $200,000, considering the spot dog is at $74,000. But keep in mind that these are just the expected prices for both robots. They could be more expensive, or they could be cheaper than what has been announced.

Optimus could cost under $20,000, and Unitry could cost over $16,000, and vice versa. Time will tell. What are the goals for Tesla, Optimus, and Unitry for the big market? Elon has said that

Tesla's AI-powered Optimus robot will be a fundamental transformation for civilization, as we know it, once the prototype is fully developed. Optimus is important precisely because it isn't revolutionary. Instead, it's a natural evolution of how technology can solve business problems, like addressing the global labor shortage and finding better, safer ways to perform tasks that are either too repetitive or too dangerous for us humans. For example,

Amazon, the second-largest private company in the U.S., is concerned about running out of labor to hire in the U.S. Therefore, the company is rapidly developing automated solutions. Their latest solution is a robot that can pick and stow items much faster than human workers. Most importantly,

Elon announced that the Optimus robot could turn Tesla into a $25 trillion company, more than half the value of the current S&P 500, highlighting Tesla's ambition through the Optimus robot as a strategic weapon to achieve this goal. With the Unitry G1 being so small, this design decision actually eliminates the Unitry G1 from being a realistic human labor replacement, as it would not be able to achieve the same scope of work as a worker. So, the question remains, what market is the Unitry G1 actually designed for? With its entry-level price, nimble kinematic design, large overall operating range, and optional features, the G1 could be a great research platform for university labs. The G1 could provide a quicker start for a lab that wants a platform to develop new embodied AI algorithms. Tasks that were once considered difficult for machines are now a piece of cake under the skillful control of the G1. In short, whether it's Optimus or Unitry

G1, both bring their own advantages in design, and will definitely continue to highlight the development of humanoid robots in the near future. Time will tell, will Optimus or Unitry

G1 win the race? Which one are you going to choose? Let us know in the comments down below.

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