China's humanoid robot race got a lot more serious this year. The winning machine didn't just improve on last year — it smashed the human record completely.

A humanoid robot that won a half-marathon race for robots in Beijing on Sunday ran faster than the human world record in a show of China’s technological leaps.

A self-navigating robot called Lightning, developed by Chinese electronics company Honor, won the 13.1-mile race. Its results and others mark significant advancements since last year's inaugural event,

A premapped course, a crew of handlers and a world-beating time: here’s what this Beijing half marathon reveals about how far humanoid robots have come—and how far they haven’t

BEIJING — It was not even close as a bright red Chinese humanoid named “Lightning” lived up to its name in a half-marathon pitting humans against robots, smoking its competition on Sunday

Last year at the Humanoid Robot Half-Marathon in Beijing the winning robot stumbled across the finish line in 2 hours and 40 minutes; much slower than a human. This past week, a C

An autonomous robot from the company Honor ran a half marathon in 50:26, beating the human record by 7 minutes.

The android won a race featuring robots and humans on Sunday in Beijing, achieving a technological milestone while finishing faster than any person in history.

Some robots ran the Beijing half-marathon autonomously, while others were controlled remotely, all competing on a parallel course to avoid collisions with human athletes.

U.S. humanoid startups are being priced as wide-reaching artificial intelligence platforms, while Chinese ones are seen more as industrial hardware plays, said Rui Ma, founder of Tech Buzz China, which regularly brings U.S. investors to visit Chinese startups.