What counts as physical AI
robomap lists companies that build machines which sense and act in the real world, and the brains and parts made for them. A company is listed when it passes four tests.
Four tests
- TEST 1
It builds the product itself
The company designs or builds its own machine, part or software. Running your own robots as a service counts. Resellers, integrators, consultancies, universities and agencies do not.
Example: The maker of a serving robot passes. The importer that sells it does not.
- TEST 2
It is a machine, or made for one
A machine with its own motors that moves or acts in the real world: a robot, a drone, a self-driving vehicle, a surgical robot. Or the software, sensors, compute and parts made for such machines.
Example: A sonar built for underwater robots passes. A security camera does not.
- TEST 3
The machine controls itself
It senses its surroundings, and a computer controls at least part of its movement. A human may still steer it.
Example: A powered exoskeleton with sensors passes. A spring-only one with no motor does not.
- TEST 4
Robots are a main business
Robots are what the company does, or a named product line of a larger group.
Example: A car maker with a named humanoid robot passes. A lab supplier with one robot among hundreds of products does not.
An AI model reads each company's own website and answers yes or no questions for these tests. A person decides the unclear cases.
Categories25
Bodies
- Humanoids
- Legged robots
- Mobile manipulators
- Robot arms and cobots
- Warehouse and mobile robots
- Drones
- Self-driving cars, trucks and robotaxis
- Medical and surgical
- Agriculture
- Construction
- Home and consumer
- Exoskeletons
- Defence and security ground robots
- Maritime and underwater
- Space robots
- Lab automation
- Food and kitchen robots
Brains
Two status fields per machine
Selling a robot and proving it works are different things, so every machine has two separate fields. Any combination is possible.
Commercial status
- 1Announced
- 2Prototype
- 3Pilot or evaluation
- 4Commercially available
- 5Production at scale
Evidence of real operation
- 1Company demo only
- 2Controlled lab testing
- 3Customer-reported operation
- 4Documented real-world operation
- 5Repeated deployments, more than one source
Sources
Every claim links to a source and a date. Each source has a type, so you can see how strong it is: company claim, customer statement, independent report, official filing. We do not invent confidence scores. Profiles are written from companies' own websites and press releases; other directories are used only to discover names. Two open sources are used directly: Wikidata (CC0) for founded years and headquarters, and Humanoid Record (CC BY 4.0) for humanoid robot records and their dated evidence.
Out of scope
Machines that only repeat a fixed program with no sensing, passive devices with no motor, and software with no use in machines. Military drones and ground robots are in, tagged military, and one filter hides them.