From industrial production workshops to medical operating rooms, from frontline security patrols to daily household life, in recent years, domestic robots have firmly established their presence in the global market with solid technological accumulation and a well-developed industrial layout, becoming one of the most representative products of China’s “intelligent manufacturing going global.” The latest data released by the General Administration of Customs shows that in 2025, China’s industrial robot export scale will surpass imports for the first time, officially joining the ranks of net exporting countries for industrial robots. In the first half of 2026, the export value of these products reached 6.29 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 18.6%, with a sales network covering 141 countries and regions worldwide.
Looking at Guangdong, within the robot industry clusters in Shenzhen, Foshan, Dongguan, and other areas, companies’ production lines are operating at full capacity 24 hours a day. Orders for industrial robots used in welding, logistics, and palletising continue to rise, and a large number of fully tested devices are being directly shipped to Europe, America, and Southeast Asia. In the first half of the year, the export of industrial robots in Guangdong Province increased by 16.8% year-on-year, accounting for 23.6% of the total export value of this category in the country. Zhong Sheng, Deputy Director-General of Huangpu Customs, introduced that industrial robots produced in the eastern center of Guangzhou (Huangpu District and Zengcheng District) have entered the markets of 31 countries, with a year-on-year increase of 22.9% in export value; industrial robots manufactured in Dongguan have been exported to as many as 70 countries and regions.
“After years of hard work, China’s robotics industry has achieved leapfrog development, with export scale continuously expanding. The products are widely used in various fields of global production and life. The main categories currently include industrial robots, surgical robots, cleaning robots, intelligent bionic robots, and so on.” Wang Jun, Deputy Director-General of the General Administration of Customs, stated.
At present, the export of domestic robots has formed a product echelon with clear levels and complete categories, with consumer-grade, industrial-grade, and cutting-edge humanoid robots all making simultaneous efforts and flourishing comprehensively. According to data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, in the field of intelligent robots, the quadruped robots developed and produced in China account for nearly 70% of the global market share; the number of complete humanoid robot products has reached over 400, accounting for more than half of the global total.
From modern factories in Europe and the United States to supermarkets in Southeast Asia, from operating rooms in overseas hospitals to underground tunnel corridors in cities, the domestically produced robots that have gone abroad vividly illustrate the vigorous development of China’s new productive forces. The ability of domestic robots to establish a foothold in the international market is not driven by short-term popularity but is the inevitable result of long-term technological accumulation. Today, companies are no longer limited to exporting individual devices. Instead, they have launched integrated intelligent inspection solutions targeting the pain points of manual inspections in high-risk industries such as electricity, winning the favour of numerous overseas customers.
Today, domestic robots have become a shining new business card for China’s foreign trade exports. Wang Jun said that the customs will continue to follow up the development needs of the robot industry, continuously optimise the regulatory service model, improve the level of cross-border trade facilitation, steadily increase the “intelligence content” of China’s foreign trade products, and inject continuous Chinese power into the development of the global intelligent industry.
Post time: Jul-25-2026
