Humanoid robots are here, but they’re a little awkward. Do we really need them?

AI engineer Jenna Reher works on humanoid robot Figure 01 at Figure AI's test facility in Sunnyvale, California. Figure plans to start with a relatively simple use case, such as in a retail warehouse, but aims for a commercial robot that can be ‘iterated on like an iPhone’ to perform multiple tasks to take up the work of humans as birth rates decline around the world. — AP

Building a robot that’s both human-like and useful is a decades-old engineering dream inspired by popular science fiction.

While the latest artificial intelligence craze has sparked another wave of investments in the quest to build a humanoid, most of the current prototypes are clumsy and impractical, looking better in staged performances than in real life. That hasn’t stopped a handful of startups from keeping at it.