1X Technologies' NEO is the first humanoid robot offered openly to households at a published price, and the headline claim around it is that roughly 10,000 have been ordered. We went back to 1X's own statements and to independent reporting to check what that number covers, what the robot can do today, and whether anyone in the UK can get one.
What the 10,000 figure really is
The number comes from 1X itself. In a letter on its website dated 30 April 2026, chief executive Bernt Børnich wrote that after NEO launched on 28 October 2025, the company "booked out our entire production capacity for the next year in just 5 days (10,000 NEOs)". So the figure counts robots reserved, not people, and describes a first year's production allocation.
It also helps to know what an order involves. 1X's order page asks for a $200 deposit that it labels "fully refundable", with the balance due later. These are pre-orders backed by small refundable deposits, not completed sales, and nobody outside 1X has audited the total. When TechCrunch asked in December 2025, the company declined to give a figure and said only that pre-orders had "far exceeded" its goal. The 10,000 number appeared in 1X's own letter four months later.
Don't confuse it with a separate 10,000: in December 2025, 1X agreed to make up to that many NEOs available to factories and warehouses owned by its investor EQT between 2026 and 2030, with each company signing its own contract.
What NEO is, and the key specs
NEO is a two-legged humanoid designed for the home rather than the factory. 1X's specifications put it at 5ft 6in (about 1.68m) and 66lb (about 30kg). It can lift 154lb (about 70kg) and carry 55lb (about 25kg). Its 842Wh battery lasts around four hours, and 1X says six minutes of charging adds an hour of running time.
Rather than heavy gearboxes, NEO uses what 1X calls Tendon Drive: motors pulling on synthetic tendons, which the company says makes movement gentler and quieter. It quotes a noise level of 22dB. The body is padded with a 3D lattice polymer under a machine-washable knit suit, and comes in tan, grey or dark brown. Each hand has 22 degrees of freedom on the order page, and in July 2026 1X announced an upgraded 25-degree-of-freedom hand. Onboard computing is an Nvidia Jetson Thor module, with two stereo fisheye cameras as eyes, and Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and 5G.
Price, and what it would be in pounds
There are two US options. "Early Access" ownership costs $20,000 and comes with a three-year warranty and priority delivery. The "Standard" subscription costs $499 a month with standard delivery; the Wall Street Journal reported a six-month minimum term. Either way you start with the $200 deposit.
1X has not published a UK price. Purely as a currency conversion at about $1 = £0.75 (the rate on 21 October 2026), $20,000 is roughly £15,000, $499 is about £375 a month and the deposit about £150. Those figures exclude import VAT, duty and shipping, and are not prices 1X offers here.
When it will actually arrive
1X's order page still says "US Deliveries start 2026", and the original launch announcement said the company would deliver "primarily in the U.S" first and "expand to other markets starting in 2027". In its April letter, 1X said NEOs coming off the line at its new 58,000 sq ft factory in Hayward, California were being "prioritized for our internal team" for testing in homes, adding: "Some of you will get your NEO this year, some will get them later."
As of today, we could not find an announcement from 1X that deliveries to paying customers have begun, which leaves about ten weeks for the 2026 promise. The company says Hayward is ramping towards 10,000 robots a year, with a goal of more than 100,000 a year by the end of 2027 once a second site in San Carlos comes online.
The 'Expert Mode' privacy debate
The most argued-over feature is Scheduled Expert Mode. For chores NEO hasn't learned, a 1X employee can connect remotely, see through the robot's cameras and guide it, which also produces training data. When the Wall Street Journal's Joanna Stern spent a day with NEO at launch, a teleoperator in a VR headset was behind everything she saw it do; 1X only shared a video of it opening a door by itself.
Børnich was frank about the trade-off. "It's not for everyone," he told the Journal. "If you buy this product, it is because you're OK with that social contract. If we don't have your data, we can't make the product better."
1X says owners stay in control: an Expert can only connect at a time the owner has scheduled and must be accepted by voice or in the app, owners can set no-go zones and blur faces, and the ear lights change colour while someone is connected. These safeguards are the company's own description; we are not aware of any independent audit of them.
What it can and can't do yet
1X says NEO will arrive with "basic autonomy": opening doors, fetching items, turning off lights, and conversing through a built-in large language model with memory. Chores such as folding laundry and tidying are scheduled through an app, with Expert help for anything new.
The limits are just as clear. Børnich told the Journal that NEO initially won't handle anything hot, heavy or sharp, so no cooking, and the paper reported that households with young children would not qualify for the early adopter programme at first. In its hands-on test, folding a sweater took about two minutes and loading a few items into the dishwasher took about five. NEO was named one of TIME's Best Inventions of 2026 this month, but that is recognition of the idea, not an independent test in real homes.
Who is behind 1X
1X was founded in Norway in 2014 as Halodi Robotics, building its motors in Moss, renamed itself 1X in 2023 and is now based in Palo Alto. The OpenAI Startup Fund led a $23.5 million round in March 2023, followed by a $100 million round led by EQT Ventures in January 2024. TechCrunch puts total funding raised at more than $130 million. In August 2026, Reuters relayed a report by The Information that SoftBank was in talks to buy a majority stake at a valuation of about $6 billion. Reuters could not confirm it, and we have found no announced deal since.
How it compares with rivals
NEO is almost alone as a humanoid you can reserve for your home. Figure AI markets Figure 03 for household tasks but only works with business partners such as BMW, and has no consumer shop. Tesla's Optimus has no price or pre-order; Elon Musk is aiming for public sales by late 2027. China's Unitree will sell you its small R1 today from $4,900, but it is a developer and research platform, not a housekeeper. We compare them all in our guide to humanoid prices and availability.
Can UK buyers get one?
Not yet. The order page offers US deliveries only, and 1X's only statement on other countries is that it will expand to "other markets starting in 2027". It has not named the UK, given a UK price or said how Expert Mode would work here. Anyone in Britain hoping to buy should treat 2027 as the earliest possibility rather than a promise, and wait for 1X to confirm UK plans before paying anything.
The bigger test comes sooner: once NEOs reach paying US customers, we should finally see independent reports of how much the robot does by itself. We will update this story when that happens.