Yano Research Institute Forecasts Global Market for Physical AI-Enabled Robots to Reach About 3.21 Million Units in 2035

On November 13, 2026, Yano Research Institute announced the results of a survey on the global physical AI market. The company forecasts that the global market for physical AI-enabled robots will grow to about 3.21 million units in 2035, and released global shipment forecasts covering seven major robot categories.

Yano Research Institute's forecast looks at physical AI-enabled robots in terms of shipments across seven major categories, rather than as a single field. A unit-based outlook offers a way to gauge the scale of supply, but without category-level breakdowns or a definition of how applicability is determined, it is not possible to tell which robot sectors the forecast covers.

The significance of the outlook for about 3.21 million units is that it uses unit shipments, rather than monetary value, as the measure of market size. Yano Research Institute says it examined both robots with and without physical AI across seven major categories. The figure is therefore framed not as the result of isolating a single product group related to physical AI, but as an outlook for shipments of applicable robots across multiple robot markets. However, the announcement provided does not specify shipment numbers by category or the scope and base year used to calculate the figure of about 3.21 million units. Without knowing the market's overall composition, it is not possible to determine which sectors will drive the figure or where the market's center of gravity lies. The survey's inclusion of policies and support programs, market entrants, core hardware and software technologies, and trends by industry indicates a research design that does not explain shipment forecasts solely in terms of robot numbers. However, the provided text describes only the survey items and does not show how national policies or technology trends were reflected in the forecast. It offers no basis for linking the projected increase in units to the spread of a particular technology or wider adoption in a specific industry. To understand the industry's structure, it is important to know how the categories of applicable and non-applicable robots are defined and what qualifies as “physical AI-enabled.” Clear criteria could provide a basis for comparisons across categories and regions, but without them, differences in how companies or surveys classify robots could make comparisons difficult. The next details to look for are forecast shipment numbers for each of the seven categories, regional breakdowns, the actual figures used as the forecast baseline, the definition of applicability, and how shipments are distinguished from actual deployment and operation. Only then will it be possible to assess specifically which processes and applications the forecast of about 3.21 million units covers.