Tesla
| Country | United States |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2003 |
| Head office | Austin |
| Press material | Press images released for editorial use "Our media assets contains image downloads for use by news media in connection with a story or article about Tesla, Inc. or Tesla products and services." |
| Website | tesla.com |
Who they are
Tesla, Inc. is an American company founded in 2003 and based in Austin, Texas. It is best known for electric cars, home batteries and large grid batteries. Its robot work sits inside the same team that builds its driving software.
On its own Artificial Intelligence and Robotics page, Tesla says it builds autonomy for vehicles, robots and more. The company treats cars and robots as two uses of one set of cameras, chips and neural networks.
What they build
Tesla’s robot is Optimus, also called Tesla Bot. Tesla describes the goal as a general purpose, two-legged, self-controlled humanoid robot. It is meant to take on unsafe, repetitive or boring work.
Tesla first announced the project in August 2021 and showed a walking prototype in 2022. Several versions have followed. Tesla has not published a public specification sheet. At its 2021 presentation it gave planned figures of about 173 centimetres tall, 57 kilograms and a 20 kilogram carrying capacity, and those numbers have not been confirmed for later versions.
Tesla also builds driverless vehicles, which it calls Robotaxi, and has shown a steering-wheel-free car named Cybercab and a van concept named Robovan. These are vehicles, not humanoid machines.
What they are known for
Optimus is one of the most watched humanoid robot projects in the world, mostly because of Tesla’s size and publicity. Public demonstrations have shown the robot walking, carrying parts, sorting objects and handling small items.
Independent reporting has repeatedly questioned how much of that is automatic. At Tesla’s “We, Robot” event in October 2024, journalists reported that people remotely controlled the robots that mixed with the crowd, and that Tesla did not say so clearly. Tesla has not disputed this in a public document we could find.
Claims about near-term mass production come mainly from chief executive Elon Musk in earnings calls. They are targets, not shipped products, and dates have moved more than once.
How they sell
You cannot buy an Optimus. Tesla does not list the robot in any online shop, publishes no price and runs no order book.
In its own first-quarter 2026 update, Tesla said it would replace the Model S and Model X lines in Fremont, California with a first robot line designed for one million robots a year. It also said Gigafactory Texas is being prepared for a second line designed for ten million a year.
In its second-quarter 2026 update, Tesla said the car lines were removed, the first Optimus lines were being installed and production was expected in 2026. It said the first robots built would go to its own “Optimus Academy” to collect training data and develop functions. In short: internal use first, outside customers unannounced.
Tesla’s cars and energy products are sold directly to customers through tesla.com. The robot is not part of that today.
Sources
- Tesla – AI & Robotics
- Tesla Gallery (press kit and image terms)
- Tesla First Quarter 2026 Update (Form 8-K, Exhibit 99.1)
- Tesla Second Quarter 2026 Update (Form 8-K, Exhibit 99.1)
- Tesla Investor Relations – Press Releases
- Optimus (robot) – Wikipedia
- Axios: Tesla Optimus humanoid robot needed human help at AI event
What changed
- Entry created.