How 1X Is Teaching Its Humanoid Robot to Learn on Its Own

The home robot from 1X is taking a step that could change how machines learn everyday skills.

This week, 1X unveiled what it calls the 1X World Model (1XWM), a new AI system designed to help NEO understand the physical world and act inside it more naturally. Instead of relying mainly on hand-coded rules or thousands of hours of human-operated robot training, NEO now learns from internet-scale video, much like humans do.

According to 1X, this marks a shift away from traditional robot AI systems that directly map images and text to actions. Instead, NEO first imagines what should happen next… then acts on it.

The company says this approach enables the robot to handle objects, motions, and tasks it has never encountered before, using knowledge already embedded in video footage of people interacting with the world.

From seeing to doing: The video brain

Traditionally, training a robot for simple chores like picking up a cup required thousands of hours of costly, real-world data from human operators. 

The new 1XWM approach takes a different path. It uses a video-generation model at its core — similar to advanced AI that creates video from text — but crucially grounds it in the physics and viewpoint of NEO’s own body.

When given a prompt like “pack the lunchbox,” NEO’s AI doesn’t just guess the next arm movement. Instead, it first imagines a short video of the future, visualizing itself completing the task. A second AI component, called an Inverse Dynamics Model, then translates the imagined video frame by frame into the exact motor commands needed to make it a reality.

This method works specifically because NEO is built like a person. The company argues that the robot’s human-like shape and movement are key. Since the AI is trained on vast amounts of video of people interacting with the world, that knowledge transfers more directly to a robot that moves similarly.

“After years of developing our World Model and making NEO’s design as close to human as possible, NEO can now learn from internet-scale video and apply that knowledge directly to the physical world,” said Bernt Børnich, CEO and founder of 1X, in the company’s announcement. “With the ability to transform any prompt into new actions — even without prior examples — this marks the starting point of NEO’s ability to teach itself.”

From known tasks to novel challenges

In demonstrations, this has allowed NEO to handle both familiar and brand-new situations.

It can perform learned tasks, such as grabbing objects, even when they’re placed in new, cluttered settings. More strikingly, the company has shown that it’s attempting entirely novel tasks, such as pulling a tissue from a box, ironing clothes, or brushing a person’s hair, without specific prior training for those actions.

Daniel Ho, an AI Researcher at 1X, stated: “With the 1X World Model, you can turn any prompt into a fully autonomous robot action — even with tasks and objects NEO’s never seen before.”

Perhaps the most profound implication is how NEO could improve.

Instead of being bottlenecked by the speed at which engineers can collect new demonstration data, the robot can now generate its own experience. A successful attempt reinforces its knowledge; a failure provides new data for the model to learn from. This creates a potential “flywheel” where the robot’s capabilities can expand autonomously.

Pricing and availability

The technology is still evolving. 1X openly notes in its technical blog that the system can sometimes generate videos that look correct but subtly violate physics or depth, causing the real robot to miss its grasp. Dexterous tasks such as pouring and drawing remain challenging.

However, the team has found that generating multiple possible future videos and selecting the best one can already improve real-world success rates.

For those looking to bring this evolving intelligence home, NEO is currently available through 1X’s online store. Early Access units are priced at $20,000, with priority delivery slated for 2026. A subscription model is also available for $499 per month.

Industrial humanoids are moving quickly, with HMND 01 Alpha demoing live factory work by picking parts at CES 2026.

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