Chinese startup unveils human-face robot

October 22, 2025

Chinese startup AheadForm, founded in 2024, has just unveiled the Origin M1 — a robotic head that incredibly realistically mimics human facial expressions: blinking, raising eyebrows, tilting its head, and reacting almost like a real person.

The robot uses 25 micromotors hidden beneath synthetic skin to precisely control facial movements, while RGB cameras in the eyes and embedded microphones allow it to recognize interlocutors, understand speech, and respond in real time.

AheadForm claims to combine this advanced hardware expressiveness with large language and visual models, enabling the M1 to learn, adapt, and develop emotional reactions. It can be mounted on various robotic bodies or operate independently, primarily aimed at research into human–machine emotional interaction and therapeutic applications.

Although robotic heads with human faces are not new, the realism of the M1 sets a new benchmark. After decades of engineers trying to teach robots to move like us, AheadForm now aims to teach them to emotionally understand us — or at least convince us that they can. This opens fascinating, yet unsettling, perspectives on a future where machines may learn to earn our trust — and our closeness.

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