In which sports have robots managed to beat humans?

– When it comes to machines surpassing human abilities, the mind often goes to chess and the historic clashes between champions and computers.

But today, robots are not limited to board games. They can run, drive vehicles, play table tennis, shoot hoops or kick the ball and, in some cases, have managed to beat even experienced athletes.

Below are 10 sports disciplines where robots have demonstrated extraordinary results:

Running

In April 2026, the Chinese humanoid robot “Lightning” drew attention after completing the Beijing half marathon in 50 minutes and 26 seconds.

The time was faster than the human record mentioned for this distance. However, the robot ran on an adapted track and needed battery changes, so the comparison with human athletes is not direct.

Football

The robotic goalkeeper “RoboKeeper” is designed to react in hundredths of a second to shots. Through optical sensors and predictive algorithms, it determines the trajectory of the ball and during demonstrations has saved penalties with very high results.

Motorsport

Autonomous cars have begun setting records on track as well.

In 2025, the Dallara AV-24 of the Indy Autonomous Challenge, driven by artificial intelligence, recorded at the Modena Autodrome a time faster than a previous record set by a Lamborghini Huracán.

Badminton

The quadruped robot “ANYmal,” developed by ETH Zürich, has demonstrated the ability to play badminton.

Cameras, sensors and algorithms enable it to track the movement of the shuttlecock and react to shots. It is still not at the level of the best professionals, but the demonstration shows a high degree of coordination.

Table tennis

The “Ace” robot, developed by Sony AI, uses high-speed cameras and machine learning algorithms to predict the trajectory of the ball and respond to shots in real time.

In demonstrations, it has managed to beat players of a good level.

Basketball

Toyota’s “CUE” robot is particularly skilled at shooting.

In 2020 it made 2,020 consecutive free throws, entering the Guinness World Records. It then also made a shot from a distance of 24.55 meters. Its main advantage is the extraordinarily precise repetition of the same movement.

Air hockey

In this game with a very fast pace, robots developed in Japan and the USA have managed to beat human players.

Sensors and image processing systems enable them to react to puck shots at very high speed.

Curling

The “Curly” robot, developed by German and South Korean researchers, has shown it can compete in a sport where strategy is as important as accuracy.

In a series of four encounters, it won three against experienced human teams, analyzing the movement of the stone and the ice conditions.

Drone racing

In 2023, the autonomous drone “Swift,” developed by the University of Zurich, beat three world champion pilots on a real drone racing track.

It also recorded the best lap time. The result was published in the journal Nature and was considered an important achievement for autonomous navigation in dynamic environments.

Table football

Various university projects have created automatic tables that track the movement of the ball and react in very short time.

A system developed by the Lausanne Polytechnic has managed to regularly beat human players of medium and high level, benefiting from the processing of hundreds of images per second and the absence of fatigue.

These experiments show that the advantage of robots in sports lies not only in speed, but also in accuracy, repeatability, immediate data processing and the absence of fatigue.

However, in many of these cases the comparison with humans remains limited, as robots compete in specialized conditions or perform only part of the sports activity.