Humanoids and Robotics

One brain

Most Humanoids Are Built in China and Run an NVIDIA Brain

Humanoid robots are built mostly in China, and most of them think with an American chip. Cantor Fitzgerald estimated in June 2026 that China produces more than 80% of the world's humanoids. NVIDIA names Figure, Agility Robotics and Boston Dynamics as early adopters of its Jetson AGX Thor robot computer, and the South China Morning Post reported in August 2025 that Unitree, AgiBot, Galbot, Engine AI and UBTech adopted it too. Tesla is the exception: Optimus runs Tesla's own chips.

That makes the humanoid brain a single-vendor part on both sides of the Pacific. Jetson Thor is Blackwell-generation NVIDIA silicon made by TSMC in Taiwan, and the robots that carry it are assembled in China. The chip count sits elsewhere, in the joints, and Humanoid Semiconductor Stack covers those layers; this page follows the brain and the two-way dependency around it.

Makers

US and Chinese Makers Buy the Same Computer

Jetson Thor

Jetson Thor Is the Default Humanoid Computer

NVIDIA made Jetson AGX Thor generally available on August 25, 2025, with a developer kit from $3,499. The module delivers up to 2,070 FP4 teraflops with 128GB of memory inside a 130-watt envelope, and runs NVIDIA's Isaac GR00T robot software. At COMPUTEX in June 2026 NVIDIA showed an open humanoid reference design built from a Unitree H2 Plus body, Sharpa hands and Jetson Thor. The software stack is what holds makers to NVIDIA: models trained in NVIDIA's simulation tools deploy straight onto Thor.

Optimus

Tesla Is the Only Humanoid Maker With Its Own Chip

Tesla is the only humanoid maker with its own AI chip. Optimus uses Tesla's FSD-class computer today, and Elon Musk said on Tesla's October 21, 2026 earnings call that AI5 goes into Optimus "approximately April of next year," with volume around then. He also said Tesla has started "early production" on its high-volume Optimus line in Fremont, and that reaching the line's full rate will take at least a year. Optimus 4 will be built at a new Optimus factory at Giga Texas, planned for about 10 million robots a year, 10 times the Fremont line's 1 million; Tesla expects production there to start around summer 2027. AI5 wafers come from Samsung Taylor and TSMC; Tesla Terafab Supply Chain follows them.

China's alternative

China's Own Robot Chip Trails Thor by a Wide Margin

China's first robot-specific computer comes from D-Robotics, spun off from Horizon Robotics in early 2024. Its RDK S100 combined compute and motor control on one chip and was adopted by Leju Robotics and LimX Dynamics; the RDK S100P, reviewed in August 2026, offers 128 INT8 TOPS with six Cortex-A78AE cores and a Cortex-R52+ safety controller for $899 to $1,000, against 2,070 FP4 teraflops for Thor. The numbers are not directly comparable, but the gap is wide, and D-Robotics sells mainly in China. A domestic brain is the piece China's humanoid industry does not yet have.

Two-way dependency

US Robots Need Chinese Magnets; Chinese Robots Need NVIDIA Brains

• Some US volume
• Made abroad

The dependency runs both ways. A US-built humanoid needs neodymium magnets in every actuator, and China makes about 94% of them (IEA, 2024 data) and licenses rare earth exports; see Raw and Refined Materials. A Chinese-built humanoid needs an NVIDIA brain made in Taiwan. Joint electronics, the largest part of the chip count, come from Texas Instruments, Analog Devices, Infineon and others, some of it from US fabs.

Chip content

The Chip Count Sits in the Joints

A humanoid carries hundreds of chips, and only one or two are the AI computer. The rest sit in the joints: motor drive transistors, gate drivers, encoders, current sensors and microcontrollers, plus battery monitors and power regulators. Humanoid Semiconductor Stack counts them layer by layer, and the component pages cover each part: GaN Motor Drive ICs, Encoders and Position Sensing, Force and Torque Sensors, Robot BMS ICs and PMICs for Robot Compute.

US status

Only the Joint Electronics Have Real US Production

• Some US volume
• US planned
• Made abroad
• Not disclosed

Related coverage

Related Coverage

• Humanoid Semiconductor Stack
• Tesla Terafab Supply Chain
• Spotlight: Tesla
• Robotics and IoT
• NVIDIA
• AI Inference and Edge Compute SoCs
• Raw and Refined Materials
• China Bifurcation