1X opens pre-orders for NEO, pitching the first consumer humanoid for the home.

1X has launched NEO, positioning it as the world's first consumer-ready humanoid for the home and, notably, opening pre-orders rather than a waitlist. Priced at $20,000, NEO is aimed squarely at households: at roughly 66 pounds it is deliberately lightweight, wrapped in a soft 3D-lattice polymer body and driven by 1X's tendon-drive actuators, an architecture chosen for compliant, low-force motion so the machine can operate safely at arm's length from people, children, and pets. First units are slated to ship to consumer homes in 2026.

The safety-first design philosophy is the strategic tell. Rather than chase peak strength or speed, 1X engineered NEO to be quiet (a claimed 22 dB) and physically gentle, trading industrial payload for the social acceptability a home robot actually needs. NEO ships able to handle a starter set of basic tasks and is designed to learn new skills with continued use, an implicit acknowledgment that today's home humanoids are capability-thin at delivery and improve through data and updates over time.

That gap is where NEO's rollout gets debated. To bridge early limitations, some tasks are expected to lean on remote human assistance and teleoperation, which raises real privacy and reliability questions for buyers weighing a machine that carries cameras and microphones through their living spaces. It is the central tension of the consumer-humanoid pitch: the same always-connected, learning system that lets NEO improve is also what makes households cautious.

For the category, NEO matters because it moves the home humanoid from concept video to a purchasable product with a price and a ship window — landing in the same October window as Figure 03's home-oriented reveal. Whether or not early adopters get a fully autonomous butler, 1X has forced the market to reckon with what a $20,000 household robot really does on day one, and how quickly it can grow into the promise.