Tesla has released a video (below) of its Optimus humanoid robot out for a leisurely stroll. The 38-second footage shows off the robot’s ability to handle soft, uneven ground, and for most of the time the bipedal bot looks pretty comfortable as it walks about.
The most impressive part, however, comes at the end of the video when Optimus recovers rather gracefully from an awkward slip as it descends a small but steep slope. To recover in this way requires a lot of complex and lightning-fast computing power, so the robot clearly does well to stay upright.
In an online post sharing the video, Tesla boss Elon Musk said, “Optimus can now walk on highly variable ground using neural nets to control its electric limbs.”
Milan Kovac, vice president at Optimus, elaborated in a post of his own, noting that Optimus is seen walking on mulched ground where he once slipped himself.
Kovac said: “What’s really crazy here is that for these [walks], Optimus is actually blind,” adding that the robot is maintaining its balance without any cameras to guide it, relying instead on built-in sensors integrated with its onboard computer.
The executive said that to enable Optimus to plan ahead as it walks, his team intends to incorporate computer vision, a sophisticated system that will enable the robot to perceive and interact with its environment. They also want to improve the robot’s walking style to make it look more natural, and in cases where a fall is unavoidable, it wants to design a safe way for it to topple over to minimize damage.
Looking at videos of Boston Dynamics’ bipedal Atlas robot during its development, we can see that it was walking in a similar way to Optimus back in 2016. A year later it was performing backflips, and not long after that it was able to jog. We’re looking forward to seeing Optimus’s hopefully rapid progression over the next couple of years.
Musk unveiled Optimus in 2021. At the launch event, Tesla didn’t have a working prototype ready so instead it hauled onto stage someone in a skintight bodysuit. It’s fair to say that the robot has come a long way since then.
The Tesla chief said we could see “thousands” of the robots working alongside human staff at Tesla factories as early as next year, taking care of “dangerous, repetitive, [and] boring tasks.” But Musk’s target dates are known to slip, so don’t be surprised if it doesn’t happen.
Plans for a commercial launch are also in the pipeline, but not until 2026 at the earliest. Costing up to a whopping $30,000, Musk claims that Optimus could one day function as a household helper capable of various tasks such as “babysit your kid, walk your dog, mow your lawn, get the groceries, just be your friend, serve drinks.”