Dancing robots featuring cutting-edge techs wow audience at Spring Festival Gala

Cutting-edge technologies that include artificial intelligence (AI) have shored up a standout synchronized dancing performance offered by humans and humanoid robots together on the stage of the grand Spring Festival Gala on the eve of the Chinese New Year in Beijing.

A team of robot dancers took to the stage alongside their human counterparts for a fun performance featuring the Chinese folk dance Yangge during the 2025 Spring Festival Gala on Tuesday evening, leaving the audience utterly amazed.

The robots also impressively performed the "handkerchief spin" - a signature move in Yangge which typically requires great skill and practice.

Choreographed by Zhang Peng and Li Mengyu - who also directed the gala at last year's Kashgar sub-venue - the performance brought together dancers from diverse ethnic groups, including Kazakh, Hui, Tujia and Buyi, to present a unique blend of tradition and innovation.

The AI software captures every movement of the dancers, transforming them into instructions fine-tuned by the engineers.

Thanks to the large models used in training, the robots' learning efficiency was vastly improved.

It was already the second time for a robot team to make appearance on the Spring Festival Gala stage.

From the four-legged robotic ox on the stage of the Spring Festival Gala in 2021 to this year's bipedal humanoid robots, technological advances have driven the creative possibilities.

"Four legs help maintain stability on the ground easily. But when it comes to only two legs, the robot can't maintain stability with just one foot on the ground. The key is to ensure the robot's fluency and stability throughout the entire dance movement," said Zhang Yangguang, an engineer at Unitree Robotics which produces the robots.

Since debuting its first bipedal humanoid robots in 2023, the team has tackled significant technical challenges, such as robots' ability to move autonomously across complex terrain.

For the Yangge dance this year, the robot team programmed more than 130 dance moves, testing the robots' reliability as each of the 19 joints in the humanoid robots was required to perform large and precise movements.

From a mere concept to reality, these humanoid robots have bridged the gap between technology and art on the grand stage of the Spring Festival Gala.

"Regarding artistic creation, I think what is essential is to keep art in pace with the times. We need to continuously develop the excellent connotations of our traditional culture. In the past, we incorporated sound and light technology and multimedia in dance at theaters, and now we are merging it with cutting-edge technologies and robots. It's an entirely new challenge," said Zhang Peng, vice dean of the Dance School at Xinjiang Arts University.

The Spring Festival Gala is a Chinese New Year special produced by China Media Group (CMG). It is broadcast annually on the eve of the Chinese New Year on its flagship CCTV-1 and internationally through the China Global Television Network. The gala has the largest audience of any entertainment show in the world, and is recognized by the Guinness World Records as the world's most watched television program.

Dancing robots featuring cutting-edge techs wow audience at Spring Festival Gala

Dancing robots featuring cutting-edge techs wow audience at Spring Festival Gala

Dancing robots featuring cutting-edge techs wow audience at Spring Festival Gala

Dancing robots featuring cutting-edge techs wow audience at Spring Festival Gala

Hong Kong's stock market ended lower Monday with the benchmark Hang Seng Index down 1.23 percent to close at 25,765.36 points.

The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index fell 1.25 percent to end at 9,083.53 points, the Hang Seng Tech Index ended flat at 5,662.55 points.

Hong Kong stocks close lower Monday