How long does a humanoid robot battery last? 1.5 to 3 hours; refill speed decides
Humanoid robots run about 1.5 to 3 hours per charge on every disclosed spec (Unitree G1 about 2 hours, H2 about 3), so the leaders now compete on how fast they get back to work. Agility's Digit 5 runs 90 minutes and recharges in 9 (10:1, a 240 A, 48 V dock), 1X's NEO charges 6 minutes per hour of runtime, Figure 03 charges wirelessly at 2 kW through its feet, and UBTech's Walker S2 swaps its own battery within 3 minutes.
By MEKAWIRE's math 10:1 allows 21.8 hours of work a day, but Digit 5's battery and cooling fill 75% of its torso and it weighs over 120 kg.
A humanoid robot runs for about 1.5 to 3 hours on a charge, and the makers that sell into paid work have stopped trying to stretch that number. Unitree lists about 2 hours for its G1 and about 3 hours for its larger H2. Agility Robotics' new Digit 5 runs 90 minutes, then refills in 9 minutes, a 10:1 ratio the company set out in an [Oct 15 release](/news/agility-chooses-nyobolt-for-ultra-fast-charging-for-digit-5-humanoid-20261015). 1X quotes the same ratio for its NEO home robot, 6 minutes of charging per hour of work, on its product page.
What separates the leaders is how fast a robot gets back to work, not how long one battery lasts. This explainer sets out what each maker has disclosed, what those figures imply for a working day, and what the trade costs in weight.
Runtime per charge has barely moved
- Digit 5 (Agility Robotics)
- 90 min
- Docks; full charge in 9 min (10:1)
- Dock 240 A at 48 V
- Over 120 kg
- Digit 4 (Agility Robotics)
- Not stated
- 2:1 run to charge
- Not stated
- Not stated
- NEO (1X)
- Not stated
- Plugs itself in; 6 min charge per hour of runtime
- 842 Wh
- 66 lb
- Figure 03 (Figure AI)
- Not stated
- Steps onto a wireless stand; coils in the feet
- 2 kW inductive
- Not stated
- Walker S2 (UBTech)
- Not stated
- Swaps its own battery within 3 min; dual battery
- Not stated
- Not stated
- G1 (Unitree)
- About 2 h
- Quick-release battery; charger
- 9,000 mAh; 54 V 5 A charger
- About 35 kg
- H2 (Unitree)
- About 3 h
- Quick-release battery; charger
- 15 Ah (0.972 kWh)
- About 70 kg
Sources: Agility release Oct 15 2026 and Jonathan Hurst essay in IEEE Spectrum Oct 19 2026; 1X, Figure, UBTech and Unitree product pages, read Oct 19 2026. Disclosed figures only; blank where the maker does not state one.
As of Oct 19, 2026
The disclosed runtimes cluster tightly. Unitree's G1 carries a 9,000 mAh quick-release pack and lists about 2 hours; the H2 carries 0.972 kWh and lists about 3 hours, which works out to roughly 324 W of average draw. 1X gives NEO an 842 Wh battery. Figure has not published a runtime for Figure 03, and UBTech's Walker S2 page gives none either. No maker in this group claims a full eight-hour shift on one charge.
That leaves the question of how the refill is done, and there the approaches diverge.
Four ways to refill a humanoid
Agility docks. Jonathan Hurst, its co-founder and chief robot officer, wrote in an [IEEE Spectrum essay on Oct 19](/news/agility-cofounder-hurst-digit-5-over-120kg-sits-down-near-people-ieee-essay-20261019) that the Digit 5 dock delivers 240 A at 48 V, or 11.52 kW, and that fans push air through channels in the torso to keep the pack cool. The battery comes from Nyobolt, a Cambridge, UK, fast-charging specialist.
1X uses the same docking logic at home: NEO plugs itself in when it needs power. Figure built coils into Figure 03's feet so the robot can step onto a wireless stand and charge at 2 kW, which the company says allows near-continuous work if the robot can reach the mat during the job. UBTech skips charging on the robot altogether: Walker S2 carries two batteries and swaps one itself within 3 minutes, choosing between swapping and charging by task priority. Unitree sells quick-release packs and a charger, the simplest route and the one suited to research labs.
The next question is what those methods add up to over a day.
What 10:1 means for a shift
- Digit 5 share of a day at work
- 90.9% (21.8 h)
- 90 / (90 + 9); x 24 h
- Digit 4 share of a day at work
- 66.7% (16.0 h)
- 2 / (2 + 1); x 24 h
- NEO share of runtime to charge cycle
- 90.9%
- 60 / (60 + 6)
- Digit 5 dock power
- 11.52 kW
- 240 A x 48 V
- Energy a 9 min Digit 5 charge can deliver
- At most 1.73 kWh
- 11.52 kW x 9 / 60 h, upper bound
- Digit 5 dock vs Figure 03 wireless
- 5.76x
- 11.52 / 2
- Digit 5 dock vs Unitree G1 charger
- 42.7x
- 11,520 W / 270 W
- Unitree H2 average draw
- About 324 W
- 972 Wh / about 3 h, crude
MEKAWIRE calculations from the figures in the table above, as of Oct 19 2026. Cycle shares assume the robot does nothing but work and charge; upper bounds ignore charging losses and taper.
As of Oct 19, 2026
A robot that does nothing but work and charge at Agility's ratio spends 90.9% of the day working, about 21.8 hours, which matches the company's claim of more than 20 hours of work in 24. Digit 4's 2:1 ratio capped the same robot at 66.7%, or 16 hours. The 11.52 kW dock is 5.76 times Figure's wireless stand and 42.7 times Unitree's G1 charger. A 9-minute charge at full dock power can deliver at most 1.73 kWh, an upper bound that ignores losses.
Speed has a price, and Hurst named it.
The weight bill
Digit 5 weighs more than 120 kg. Hurst wrote that the battery and cooling system take up about 75% of the torso and that the robot can no longer run or jump. Unitree's H2 weighs about 70 kg and NEO 66 lb, roughly 29.9 kg. Agility's choice follows from its job: lifting 23 kg bins for 20 hours a day next to people. The [MEKAWIRE explainer on Agility](/news/what-is-agility-robotics-digit-5-funding-spac-listing-aglt-customers-explained-20261016) covers its customers and listing.
MEKAWIRE analysis
Battery life is no longer where humanoid makers compete. Runtime per charge sits between about 1.5 and 3 hours across every disclosed spec, and the commercial leaders are competing on refill time instead: docks at 10:1, a 3-minute swap, or wireless pads.
The evidence is that Agility and 1X, one industrial and one domestic, arrived at the same 10:1 ratio, and that the Chinese leader UBTech chose swapping. The strongest counter-argument is chemistry: a cell with much higher energy density would make the refill race less important. Nothing disclosed so far points that way, and Agility's own robot shows the cost of the current route in mass.
Bull case: fast refill turns a humanoid into a two-shift machine, which is what Agility's chief business officer called the business case. Bear case: 11.5 kW docks need power and cooling at every site, heavier robots are harder to certify near people (see the [safety standards explainer](/news/robot-safety-standards-2026-explained-iso-10218-2025-iso-ts-15066-humanoid-iso-25785-1-eu-korea-china-20261017)), and Digit 5 with the Nyobolt pack reaches customers only from the first half of 2027.
Three dates will test this. Churchill Capital Corp XI shareholders vote on the Agility merger on Nov 2. Digit 5 early access starts in the first half of 2027. UBTech's next results filing on HKEX should show whether Walker S2 deliveries scale with swapping. Prices for these robots are in the [humanoid cost explainer](/news/how-much-does-a-humanoid-robot-cost-2026-prices-unitree-r1-g1-h2-1x-neo-ff-nova-figure-agility-explained-20261016).
- 842 Wh, 6 min charge per hour of runtime (10:1), self-plugging
- About 1.5 to 3 hours per charge across disclosed specs
- 2:1 run to charge, capping work at 16 h a day
- 90 min run, 9 min charge (10:1), 240 A at 48 V dock, over 120 kg
- G1 about 2 h (9,000 mAh); H2 about 3 h (0.972 kWh)
- 2 kW wireless inductive charging through coils in the feet
- Dual battery, autonomous swap within 3 min
- 10:1 means 90.9% of a day at work, about 21.8 h
Why it matters
Uptime is the number a warehouse or factory buyer pays for. A humanoid that works 16 hours a day and one that works nearly 22 have very different payback periods at the same price, and the disclosed specs now let buyers compare refill strategies directly.
It also changes who matters in the supply chain: fast-charge cell makers, dock and power electronics suppliers and thermal design move closer to the centre of the bill of materials.
Rival analysis
Agility leads on disclosed industrial uptime (10:1, more than 20 hours a day). 1X matches the ratio for the home. Figure's 2 kW wireless stand trades charge speed for zero-contact docking. UBTech's 3-minute swap avoids charging downtime but needs spare packs and swap stations on site. Unitree's quick-release packs fit labs rather than shifts.
The split is partly geographic: the Chinese leader swaps, the US industrial player docks fast, and both US home and general-purpose players dock or pad-charge.
Valuation context
In MEKAWIRE's database, Agility's last private round valued it at $2bn post-money and its Churchill XI merger uses a $2.5bn pre-money value; Figure AI is valued at $39bn. Neither valuation is tied to a disclosed runtime, but Agility's own executives frame uptime as the business case.
1X has raised $123.5m in verified rounds in our tables. No maker here discloses battery cost per robot.
Supply-chain implications
Nyobolt (Cambridge, UK) supplies the Digit 5 pack. Unitree lists a 13-string lithium pack for the G1. Figure says it built a new supply chain and vertically integrated critical modules for Figure 03, including battery safety layers at the BMS, cell and interconnect levels.
Fast docking shifts demand toward high-current connectors, chargers and cooling hardware, which sit outside the robot's own bill of materials.
Signals to watch
Nov 2, 2026: Churchill XI vote on the Agility merger. First half of 2027: Digit 5 early access with the Nyobolt pack, then wider availability over six to nine months. UBTech's next HKEX results filing: Walker S2 delivery volumes. Any maker publishing a runtime above 3 hours on one charge would weaken the thesis.
Analyst view
Thesis: humanoid makers now compete on refill time, not runtime. Confidence: medium. The specs are primary and consistent, but only Agility has tied its ratio to a commercial deployment plan, and none of the fast-charge robots is shipping in volume yet.
Questions you should be asking
What cycle life does the Nyobolt pack reach at a 10:1 duty cycle? How much site power does a fleet of 11.5 kW docks need? Does Figure publish a Figure 03 runtime? How many spare packs does a Walker S2 deployment carry per robot?