A 4-Foot Robot From China Is Becoming the World's Newest Influencer
The Unitree G1 costs as little as $13,500, talks via AI, and has already racked up 4 billion social media views. Here is who is making money from it and what the new US ban means for them.
Key points
- The Unitree G1, a humanoid robot made by Chinese company Unitree, retails from $13,500 before tariffs and has been shipped to real customers at an average price under $25,000.
- Unitree shipped 5,511 humanoid robots in 2025, with 43 percent of sales going to buyers outside China.
- Edward Warchocki, a G1 robot in Poland, has accumulated over 1 million followers and 4 billion views across social media platforms.
- Miami-based Jake Cooperstein earns $800 to $1,200 per hour bringing his G1 robot, the Brickell Clanker, to parties and corporate events.
- In July 2025, the US Federal Communications Commission, the federal body that approves consumer electronics for use in America, announced a ban on new Chinese-made humanoid robots.
You have almost certainly seen one of these robots and not known what you were looking at.
A cowboy-hat-wearing robot flirting with strangers in Austin. A breakdancing robot celebrating with New York Knicks fans. A robot changing football jerseys at World Cup after-parties in Miami. They have different names and different social media accounts. They are all the same machine: the Unitree G1, a humanoid robot about the size of a ten-year-old child, made by a Chinese company that first reported by Wired AI has become the unlikely leader of a very strange new industry.
So what is this robot, exactly?
The Unitree G1 is a roughly four-foot-tall, light-gray robot with an aluminium body and a hollowed-out face ringed with blue light. On its own, it is an impressive but silent machine. The owners who have turned it into a social media star connect it to a large language model, the same type of AI software that powers chatbots like ChatGPT, so that it can hold live conversations with strangers.
Bartosz Idzik, a software developer in Poland, did exactly that with his G1. He and his business partner bought the robot six months ago and named it Edward Warchocki. The first few days out, Edward could not speak and people were visibly frightened. Once Idzik added the conversational AI, the reaction flipped completely.
"When he started to talk, people loved him," Idzik says. "Without talking, it's just a 40-kilogram machine."
Edward has since visited the Polish parliament, hiked mountains, and gone viral after a video showed it chasing wild boars in Warsaw with a backpack and a Rolex.
Who is making money, and how much?
Jake Cooperstein, a 24-year-old based in Miami, saw Edward's success and bought his own G1 in January. He paid $66,000 for the higher-spec version that allows modifications, and named it the Brickell Clanker after his neighbourhood.
| Version | Base price (before tariffs) | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| G1 basic | $13,500 | Limited modification rights |
| G1 via US distributor | ~$19,000 | Includes import costs |
| G1 educational (U5) | $66,000 | Full parts, customisable |
| R1 (newer model) | Roughly one-third of G1 base | Lighter, faster |
Cooperstein now charges $800 to $1,200 an hour to bring the Brickell Clanker to influencer parties, nightclubs, and corporate events. That is real money for what is, in his own description, mostly him blending into the crowd while remotely controlling the robot's movements with a handheld controller.
Both Cooperstein and Idzik admit the robots spend most of their public time being operated by a human at a distance. The G1 can technically move on its own, but neither owner trusts it to navigate crowds safely yet without risking injury to bystanders.
What does the US ban mean for buyers?
The Federal Communications Commission banned new Chinese-made humanoid robots from the US market in July 2025. Models that already cleared regulatory approval, including the G1 and the newer R1, are currently still permitted. But when Unitree releases its next generation of robots, American buyers will not be able to purchase them.
Cooperstein does not know yet whether he will keep buying Unitree hardware. The company did not respond to a request for comment.
For Idzik in Poland, the picture is cleaner. His company MERA Robotics now runs a fleet of 20 G1 robots across Poland, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia, each built around Edward's AI personality.
Unitree, which is expected to list on the Chinese stock market within weeks, reported that more than half its 2025 revenue came from actual customer deliveries, not lab contracts. The company turned a profit for the first time last year.
What does this actually mean for you?
If a robot approaches you at an event or walks past you on a street, there is a real chance a human nearby is holding a controller. The conversation may be generated by AI. The sponsorship fees, the party appearances, the viral videos: those are deliberate business decisions by the people behind the robot.
The honest takeaway: the people making money from humanoid robots right now are doing it through entertainment and events, not automation. Charging $1,000 an hour to wow a crowd is a real income stream. Replacing a factory worker or a cleaner is still a largely unsolved problem.
Start there, not with the hype.
