Essay
Beijing is already living with embodied AI
A delivery bot in the hotel, a humanoid making lattes, tenth graders prompt-engineering robots. The gap between talking about AI in the physical world and living with it is wider than I thought.
During my recent visit to Beijing, another eye-opening experience. The robots aren’t just coming. They’re already everywhere.
A delivery bot brought packages to my hotel room. A humanoid made my latte near Zhongguancun. At dinner, a robot rolled up with four dishes stacked perfectly. The couple next to us didn’t even look up. Completely normal.
Talking to an old classmate — our high school students are programming robots using LLM-based tools. Not drag-and-drop Scratch. Prompt-driven development in natural language. Tenth graders.
What impressed me most wasn’t the technology. It’s the absence of friction. Nobody’s asking “should we use robots?” They skipped that question.
Since the government put embodied AI into its Five-Year Plan as a national priority, over 140 companies are building robot tech. Entry-level humanoids now cost under $10,000.
I start to wonder what this means for the rest of us. The gap between “talking about AI in the physical world” and “living with it” is wider than I thought. Beijing is clearly on the other side of it.
Originally shared on LinkedIn.