Neo is a humanoid robot developed by the American-Norwegian company 1X Technologies (backed by OpenAI), designed to be the world's first general-purpose, consumer-ready humanoid for the home. It represents a significant step toward bringing advanced robotics out of the factory and into daily life.
Neo is a soft-bodied, 5-foot, 6-inch tall humanoid robot, weighing about 66 pounds. Its design prioritizes safety and approachability in a home setting. It uses 1X's patented Tendon Drive system, which mimics biological muscle structure for gentle, compliant, and quiet movement (quieter than a modern refrigerator). It has highly dexterous hands with 22 degrees of freedom (DoF) for human-level manipulation of objects.
Neo is intended to act as a personal assistant and housekeeper. Its core functions include:
Household Chores: Folding laundry, loading the dishwasher, tidying up, organizing shelves, and vacuuming.Neo is priced for the early-adopter luxury market.
| Purchase Option | Cost | Note |
| Outright Purchase | $20,000 (plus a $200 deposit) | Includes ownership and a 3-year warranty for early access units shipping in 2026. |
| Subscription Plan | $499 per month | Alternative model planned for a later date. |
The launch of Neo has been met with a highly polarized response, generating both excitement for its technology and intense concern over its operating model.
| Area | Detail |
| Technological Advancement | Features like the quiet, safe Tendon Drive and highly dexterous hands represent a significant engineering leap for consumer robotics. |
| Learning Potential | The human-in-the-loop (teleoperation) system is a pragmatic way to rapidly collect real-world data in complex home environments, driving exponential improvement in the AI's autonomy over time. |
| Design & Safety | The soft-bodied aesthetic and inherent compliance make the robot safe and approachable for use around children and pets, which is a major hurdle for other humanoids. |
| Market Need | Addresses a genuine, high-value need for domestic assistance, particularly for the elderly or those with mobility issues. |
| Transparency | The company has been lauded for being candid about the robot's limitations and the need for human teleoperation during the early phase. |
| Area | Detail |
| Privacy & Security | This is the main criticism. Having a camera-equipped robot remotely piloted by a human operator—who can see inside your home—raises severe privacy alarms, despite safeguards like face-blurring and "no-go zones." |
| Limited Autonomy | Early hands-on reviews showed that Neo currently relies almost entirely on human teleoperation for basic chores, leading critics to call it a "remote-controlled experiment" or an "expensive puppet." |
| High Cost | The $20,000 price tag places it far out of reach for the average consumer, making it a luxury product that essentially funds the company's R&D. |
| The "Social Contract" | Users must agree to a trade-off: in exchange for a functioning helper (even if human-controlled), they must allow 1X to collect data from their home to train the AI. |
Tech Community: Divided. Many praise the radical honesty and the engineering breakthroughs, viewing the human-in-the-loop model as a necessary phase to achieve true AI autonomy. They see the early adopters as funding the foundation of a new technology.
Ultimately, the Neo robot is less a finished consumer appliance and more a bold statement on the future of AI training. While the $20,000 price tag and the profound privacy compromise inherent in its remote-controlled learning phase will limit its adoption to a niche group of wealthy and risk-tolerant enthusiasts, Neo demonstrates a viable, albeit controversial, pathway to solving the complexity of home robotics. Its success hinges not just on its engineering safety, but on 1X's ability to quickly transition its software from human-piloted learning to genuine, reliable autonomy, thereby mitigating the core privacy concern that currently dominates the public conversation.
Would you invest in a $20,000 Humanoid Robot?