Tim Culverhouse | Peerless Media
By
Tim Culverhouse
June 26, 2026
Tim Culverhouse | Peerless Media
What were your biggest takeaways from Automate 2026 in Chicago?
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Tim Culverhouse | Peerless Media
What were your biggest takeaways from Automate 2026 in Chicago?
It was quite a week in Chicago for Automate 2026, North America’s largest robotics and automation event.
Despite some travel hiccups that extended our stay, it was an enlightening week at McCormick Place to check in on all the latest global innovations in automation, components, robotics and vision.
I had some (extra) time to think about my time in Chicago, and came up with five main takeaways from Automate 2026. Here are my five biggest observations from the event.
While walking around the show floor, and having conversations with industry professionals at booths all around McCormick Place, I was struck by both the breadth and the depth of physical AI across the robotics ecosystem.
I write about physical AI a lot on Robotics 24/7. But, seeing the countless ways that organizations are developing and deploying physical AI offerings to combat labor shortages across industries was breathtaking.
The ongoing evolution (maybe revolution?) of physical AI is enabling organizations to harness this incredible power to generate real-world results. It’s driving the pace of automation adoption faster than ever before. It seems like end users are catching up as well.
Whenever I turned my head while walking the show floor, I swear I saw a new cobot. Maybe it was a company’s first cobot, or maybe it was a heavier-payload cobot from a long-time cobot company.
I interpreted this expansion of collaborative technology to mean one thing: companies are taking the safety requirements of humans working alongside robots more seriously than ever before.
This has opened new doors for collaborative applications across industries.
Another term that I heard a lot at Automate 2026 was edge. More and more companies are harnessing the data collection and data analysis capabilities at the robotic edge.
This innovation has opened new doors for robotic perception, path planning, navigation and more, especially in robot arms.
Enabling this innovation, along with meteoric growth in vision, are enhancements in the components space.
Specifically, processors, GPUs, cameras, motors and drives are shrinking in physical size, but growing exponentially in power. It was amazing to see and hold these components in my hand, and understand how much compute power was represented in such a small physical package.
These advancements have generated an influx of critical robotic data at the edge, and opened new doors for data collection and analysis at the edge of innovation.
There were more humanoids (and similar form factors) at Automate compared to MODEX. The Humanoid Robot Forum was a hit with Automate attendees, and multiple companies showed off their humanoid capabilities.
Additionally, I was intrigued by the number of general-purpose robots on the Automate show floor. These robots popped up more than I initially anticipated seeing in Chicago, and I’ll be curious to see about their adoption within the marketplace.
What were your biggest takeaways from Automate 2026? We're already looking forward to Automate 2027, May 10-13 at the Las Vegas Convention Center.
Tim is the Editorial Director of Robotics247.com. His mission is to provide valuable information and insights to robotics professionals and decision-makers, and to help them solve business challenges. He is a creative, deadline-driven, and detail-oriented storyteller. In addition, he is a sports broadcaster and public address announcer.
Artificial Intelligence Deep Learning Machine Vision Machine Learning Autonomy Mobile Robots Industrial Automation Collaborative Robots Robot Arm Components Controllers Grippers Motion Control Motors and Drives Sensors Cameras Lidar Software Cloud and Edge Data Management Fleet Management Simulation News Features Editors Pick Automate Cobots High-Performance Computing Humanoid Navigation Orchestration Path Planning Perception Safety
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