BYD's First Humanoid Robot Just Showed Up in a Patent

So basically: BYD sells more electric cars than anyone. Now it is building a humanoid robot, and we finally got an official look at it. On Friday, Oct. 9, China’s patent office published a BYD design patent for an “embodied intelligence robot.” It shows a black and white humanoid with no face and every joint out in the open.

What the patent shows

A design patent only covers how something looks, not how it works. So this is not a spec sheet. It is eight drawings and one page of notes.

Here is what they show, according to CnEVPost and EVsays:

• Two arms, two legs, five fingered hands
• A rounded head with no screen, no eyes, no mouth. Just a smooth shell with a dark band where a face would be
• Light panels over a dark frame, so the white parts are the cover and the black parts are what moves
• Exposed joints everywhere. Shoulders, elbows, wrists, hips, knees, and ankles all left visible. The hips are an open frame of rods instead of a cover

The patent says the robot is meant for walking, balancing, and interacting, in service, education, and industrial settings.

EVsays found the dates interesting. BYD filed it on April 30. China granted it on Oct. 6 and made it public three days later. That means the robot’s look was locked months before BYD posted a teaser silhouette in July.

Meet Xiao Di

The design looks a lot like “Xiao Di,” a humanoid a BYD executive teased on social media earlier. BYD has not confirmed the patent is the final Xiao Di.

Numbers BYD has shared before, as reported by CarNewsChina:

• Height: 1.61 meters, about 5 foot 3
• Weight: 58.5 kg, about 129 pounds
• Joints: 31 degrees of freedom
• Hands: can return to the same spot within about 1 millimeter

It is going to the car dealership first

This is the fun part. BYD’s executive vice president Stella Li said in June she wants two to three robots in every BYD dealership. They would greet customers, explain car features, and show off the screens inside the car.

She also said robots will not replace the human connection with salespeople. And if robots someday go into homes, BYD could sell them through those same dealerships.

EVsays did the math. BYD had 3,461 stores in China in the second quarter. Two to three robots each is roughly 7,000 to 10,000 robots, just for showrooms.

Still not officially launched

BYD told China Securities Journal in July that it would unveil a humanoid in August at its Di Space exhibition center. As of Oct. 9, CnEVPost says BYD still had not formally launched it. The patent is new public info, not a product debut.

BYD has been building toward this for a while:

• A dedicated robot research team since 2022
• An investment in humanoid maker Agibot in 2023
• A stake in Percibot in April 2025
• UBTech’s Walker S1 humanoid tested in BYD’s Changsha car plant

My take

Every big car company is turning into a robot company, and BYD is the one that should scare people the most.

Tesla’s pitch for Optimus is that building cars at scale is the hard part, and Tesla already knows how. BYD can say the exact same thing, with an even bigger supply chain behind it.

The dealership plan is smart too. A showroom is an easy first job. No heavy lifting, no factory safety rules, and tons of real people to learn from.

I also like that BYD is not hiding the machinery. No fake face. Just a robot that looks like a robot.

Optimus vs. Xiao Di is about to be a real fight.