What matters most in humanoid joint design?
For engineers, researchers and technical buyers working with humanoid joints, motors and actuators.
Share what you’ve learned about motors, sensing, braking, control, heat and sourcing.
Your thank-you: 90 days of Humanoid Lab + a summary of the findings.Lab access opens 30 November 2026.
Answers are anonymised and reported only in aggregate.
Why your answers matter
Building humanoid joints means trading torque against size, heat, control and cost. This study gathers practical experience from the people making those trade-offs – to see what teams need, what they build themselves and where today’s solutions fall short.
The questions are concrete. Which constraints you hit first when you size a joint. What you make in-house and what you buy. Where heat and braking cause trouble. Which suppliers you’ve evaluated – and what would make you switch.
Run by Humanoid.guide, a market-intelligence platform on humanoid robotics. Results are reported in aggregate, never by company or by name.
- 01You and your programme
- 02Your joints
- 03Packaging, motors, sensing and braking
- 04Control, backdrive and heat
- 05Build in-house or buy
- 06Suppliers, supply chain and service life
What you get for taking part
90 days of Humanoid Lab
An interactive 3D humanoid in your browser, built joint by joint. Open an actuator down to the bearing, switch the whole robot between four drive architectures, and drop your own drive’s CAD into a joint slot to check fit, torque and speed against the reference design.
Access opens 30 November. Worth $300 – a quarter of the $1,200 annual licence. Figures in the Lab are design targets and simulation results, not test data.
A summary of the findings
See where your choices sit next to everyone else’s – on questions like drive types per joint today and in 2029, what teams make and what they buy, the problems they run into and the suppliers they evaluate.
Aggregated across all respondents. No company or person is identified.
Three things you can do in the Lab
Physics simulation
Contacts, friction and joint dynamics run on MuJoCo, the open-source physics engine from Google DeepMind that robotics labs around the world train and test on. Every step, every fall, every grasp – computed, not animated.
Before you start
Who should take part?
Anyone who designs, specifies, buys or builds humanoid joints, motors or actuators – at a robot maker, a component supplier, a research lab or a contract manufacturer. If a question doesn’t apply to you, tick “I can’t answer this” and move on.
How long does it take?
About 12 minutes. Your progress is saved on this device, so you can close the tab and come back later.
Is it anonymous?
Your answers are anonymised and reported only in aggregate – never by company or by name. If you leave an email address at the end, it’s used only for what you ask for there – such as your Lab access and the summary of findings.
When do I get the Lab and the findings?
Leave your email address at the end of the survey. We’ll email you how to get into Humanoid Lab. Access opens on 30 November. The summary of findings follows once the answers are analysed.
What is Humanoid Lab, exactly?
An interactive 3D model of a full-size humanoid, XH-1, that runs in the browser. It’s built for learning and comparing joint and drive architectures. The numbers in it are design targets and simulation results – useful for comparison, not a replacement for your own testing.
Does it cost anything?
No. The 90 days are a thank-you for your time.
Share your experience. Explore the Lab. See the findings.
About 12 minutes. Complete the survey and you get 90 days of Humanoid Lab – access opens 30 November 2026 – and a summary of the findings. Answers are anonymised and reported only in aggregate.