"Tiangong Ultra" robot wins world's first humanoid half-marathon

The world's first humanoid robot half-marathon was held on Saturday in Beijing, with the "Tiangong Ultra" humanoid robot developed by the Beijing Humanoid Robot Innovation Center claiming the championship by completing the 21.0975-kilometer race in 2 hours, 40 minutes and 42 seconds.

The second and third places for the humanoid half-marathon were taken by robotic participants from Beijing's Noetix Robotics.

Following the system of Formula One Championship, the race set up refreshment stations for robots' battery changing.

The 21-km route featured different terrains including ramps and rails instead of all flat stretches, posing challenge to the humanoid robots' mobility and flexibility.

A total of 20 humanoid robots from teams nationwide participated in the competition.

Some of them took large strides forwards, while some were running with small steps. There were also accidents, such as falling down and insufficient battery life. However, all these scenarios were able to test robots' abilities under complex circumstances.

"Tiangong Ultra" robot wins world's first humanoid half-marathon

"Tiangong Ultra" robot wins world's first humanoid half-marathon

"Tiangong Ultra" robot wins world's first humanoid half-marathon

"Tiangong Ultra" robot wins world's first humanoid half-marathon

"Tiangong Ultra" robot wins world's first humanoid half-marathon

China will continuously build a robust domestic market to bolster its economy and counter external challenges in accordance with the requirements and arrangement from the annual Central Economic Work Conference, which put domestic demand at the forefront of eight key tasks for next year's economic work, according to experts.

The tone-setting conference was held in Beijing from Wednesday to Thursday in which the Chinese leadership decided priorities for the economic work in 2026.

Over the past four years, domestic demand has contributed an average of 86.4 percent to China's economic growth, according to the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), China's top economic planner.

"The top priority is to expand domestic demand as the key reason for this is that our demand is relatively weak. The first step here is figuring out how to increase consumption," said Chen Binkai, vice president of Central University of Finance and Economics.

Consumption has continued to play a leading role in the country's economic growth this year. In the first three quarters, final consumption expenditure contributed 53.5 percent to economic growth, an increase of 9 percentage points compared to the whole of last year.

The annual Central Economic Work Conference proposed that in 2026, a special campaign to boost consumption will be implemented in depth, the supply of high-quality goods and services will be expanded, policies on new and emerging industries will be optimized, unreasonable restrictions in the consumption field will be eliminated, and the potential of service consumption will be unleashed.

"Previously, much of the consumption we have encouraged is for manufactured goods. However, the growth rate of our service sector is not as ideal as that of the manufacturing sector. Therefore, increasing some investment to encourage consumption in the service sector may play a better role in stabilizing growth and expanding domestic demand," said Huang Qunhui, a researcher of the Institute of Economics under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Experts said that income is the primary factor determining consumption, and only by increasing residents' disposable income, can their consumption capacity be improved.

They also said that the conference, while emphasizing the promotion of consumption, also clearly pointed out the need to formulate and implement a plan to increase the income of urban and rural residents.

"The Third Plenary Session [of the 20th CPC Central Committee] mentioned the need to increase the proportion of residents' income, specifically the proportion of labor compensation within that income. The Fourth Plenary Session [of the 20th CPC Central Committee] further proposed implementing a specific income-increasing plan for urban and rural residents. Of course, consumption is not solely an income issue. We need to strengthen basic public services and improve our social security fund. If these issues are further improved and optimized, and residents have higher incomes, they will be more willing to spend more on consumption, especially on development-oriented consumption," said Huang.

Expanding domestic demand remains top priority for China's economic work in 2026: experts