Boston Dynamics

Stories

CES 2026 puts physical AI and humanoid robots center stage

As of July 2026: Its Atlas humanoid tied to a 2028 factory timeline

For years, the buzz at CES was software: apps, chatbots, voice assistants. In 2026, the biggest crowds gathered around machines that walk, lift, and drive themselves.

Updated Jul 20

AI foundation models give robots the ability to see, reason, and act in the physical world

New Capabilities

As of May 2026: Integrating DeepMind AI into Spot and Atlas platforms

For decades, industrial robots have been powerful but rigid. Google DeepMind's Gemini Robotics-ER 1.6, released April 14, 2026, is the latest version of a new approach: it gives robots the flexible reasoning that powers chatbots, tailored to understand and act in physical space. Paired with an agentic vision system, it reads pressure gauges, thermometers, and digital readouts with 98% accuracy—a capability that emerged from collaboration with Boston Dynamics, which deploys the Spot robot in industrial facilities.

Updated May 31