What grocery store robots are
A grocery store robot is built for a job, not a store. The useful way to sort them is by what they do on the shop floor, and the biggest split is between robots that see and robots that do.
- Robots that see photograph shelves and floors and turn what they find into tasks: an empty facing, a wrong price label, a spill in aisle 7.[4][5][6] A person still fixes each one.
- Robots that do move product or clean: they scrub floors, carry orders, pick items into totes, or put stock on the shelf.[7][9][12][1]
The jobs that take the most hours on a shop floor, restocking, rotating stock and picking orders, are physical. That is why the newest category, humanoid robots that work in stores as they are built, pairs shelf intelligence with physical action: it sees what is wrong on the shelf and fixes it.[1]
The six types compared
Each type described on the same six criteria. Scroll the table sideways on a phone; open a type for its strengths, limits and sources.
| Type | Job on the shop floor | Where it works | Moves product? | Works around shoppers? | Where it stands today | Main limit |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Humanoid restockers | Restocks shelves, rotates stock by date, picks online orders, and checks the shelf as it works | Sales floor, backroom and stockroom of existing stores, from hypermarkets to convenience stores and drugstores | Yes: puts product on the shelf and takes it off | Designed to share aisles built for people; ask to see it during trading hours | Early: in-person private previews (Theseus); retail pilots announced, Seven-Eleven Japan targets 2029 | Few long-running store deployments are public yet, so speed and reliability must be seen in person |
| Shelf scanners | Finds out-of-stocks, wrong prices and misplaced products | Sales floor aisles, on a schedule | No: it reports; people fix | Yes, slowly; widely used during opening hours | Commercial, sold by several vendors | Finds problems but does not fix them; value depends on staff acting on the alerts |
| Floor cleaners | Scrubs floors on a route; spots spills and debris | Open floor areas, aisles, often before or after opening | No | Yes, though many stores run them when it is quiet | Commercial; among the most widely used robots in stores | Still needs people to fill, empty, maintain it and clean what it can't reach |
| Delivery and pickup | Carries orders from store to door, or hands them over at the store | Sidewalks and campuses near the store; pickup points at the store | Moves packed orders, not shelf stock | Yes, on public sidewalks at walking pace | Commercial in some cities, including UK grocery deliveries since 2018 | Small loads, short distances, and it does nothing inside the store |
| In-store pickers | Picks online orders from the store's shelves; some restock | Sales floor aisles | Yes, within the reach of one arm on a wheeled base | Must share aisles; check whether it works in opening hours | Emerging; most in-store picking is still done by people | Reach, grasp and speed across a full grocery range |
| Micro-fulfilment | Stores stock in a dense grid and brings it to a station for order picking | A dedicated area behind or beside the store, or a separate fulfilment centre | Yes, inside its own grid; not on the sales floor | No: fenced off from shoppers | Commercial at large scale; licensed to grocers on several continents | Needs space and construction, fixed capacity, and does nothing for the shelves shoppers see |
Read the full guide: types of grocery store robots, with the strengths and limits of each.
The jobs they do
Sorted by the job, not the vendor. Best fit listed first.
Restocking shelves
Getting product from the backroom onto the shelf, faced and in the right place.
Robots: Humanoid restockers, In-store pickers
What automating it involves →Stock rotation and freshness
Moving older dates to the front and pulling expired product, so fresh food sells before it spoils.
Robots: Humanoid restockers
What automating it involves →Order picking for online grocery
Collecting the items for online orders, from the store's shelves or from a dedicated store of stock.
Robots: Humanoid restockers, In-store pickers, Micro-fulfilment
What automating it involves →Shelf availability checks
Finding gaps, wrong prices and misplaced products before shoppers do.
Robots: Humanoid restockers, Shelf scanners
What automating it involves →Where each stands today
- Humanoid restocking, stock rotation and order picking. Theseus Robotics builds humanoids for exactly these three jobs and shows them to store operators in in-person private previews.[1][2] Seven-Eleven Japan and Telexistence announced a humanoid partnership in September 2025, targeting store deployment in 2029.[10]
- Shelf scanners. Sold today by Simbe, Badger Technologies and Brain Corp.[4][5][7] Walmart tested Bossa Nova's scanners in 50 stores from 2017, added 300 robots in 2019 and ended the contract in late 2020.[3]
- Floor cleaners and spill spotters. Autonomous scrubbers run on Brain Corp's BrainOS; Badger's robot flags spills and keeps a record of each clean-up.[7][6]
- Delivery robots. Starship has delivered for Co-op and Tesco in Milton Keynes since April 2018.[9]
- In-store pickers. Brain Corp announces an autonomous mobile manipulator for stocking and picking; independent pick-rate figures are not yet public.[7]
- Micro-fulfilment. AutoStore lists grocery as a core industry; Ocado licenses its automated platform to Kroger, Sobeys, Coles and Casino.[12][11]
What they can't do yet
- A report doesn't fill a shelf. Scanners and spill spotters hand work to people; the saving depends on staff having time to act.[5][6]
- A full grocery range is hard to handle. Eggs, bagged salad and a case of water need different grips. Ask which categories a robot handles today.
- Fixed systems hold fixed capacity. A micro-fulfilment grid is a building project that does nothing for the shelves shoppers see, and concentrates risk: a 2019 fire at Ocado's Andover centre took it out until 2021.[11]
- Delivery robots carry a basket, not a weekly shop. Starship's robots carry up to about 9 kg over short distances.[9]
- Independent numbers are scarce. Most performance figures are the vendor's own. Ask for the study behind them, and time the robot in your own store.[4][8]
Worked examples
Three common situations, worked through with the questions that decide them. Put your own figures in; this guide doesn't invent any.
1. A supermarket with gaps in its fast-moving lines
First, find the cause. Audit the same aisles by hand at three times of day. If the stock is in the backroom but not on the shelf, it is a restocking problem. If it isn't in the building, it is an ordering problem, and no robot on the floor fixes that.
A shelf scanner will find the gaps faster and more often.[4] Work out who fills them: alerts per day × minutes to fill each = staff hours you need to find.
A humanoid restocker closes the loop: it sees the gap and fills it from backroom stock.[1] Time it on your own shelves before you decide.
2. A convenience store with a short overnight restock
Chilled drinks and fast sellers need refilling every day in a small space. Single-purpose robots exist: Telexistence runs a beverage restocking robot, Ghost.[10] A humanoid can cover the drinks fridge and the rest of the store, rotating dated stock as it goes.[1]
Ask: can it work with shoppers in the store, or only when it's closed? Which shelf heights and products can it handle? See it in a store of your format.
3. A grocer growing online orders
There are two routes. Pick from the shelves with people, mobile pickers or humanoids: no new building, but pickers share aisles with shoppers.[7][1] Pick from a grid built in or next to the store: dense and fast for packaged goods, but a construction project with fixed capacity.[12]
Ask: how many orders a day will you fill in three years? What share of your range can a grid hold? What happens to orders if the system is down?
How to judge one
Before trusting any robot, humanoid or not, get answers to six things: does it fit your store format, is it safe with shoppers in the aisle, does its shelf intelligence lead to action, what happens to your staff and their hours, what does it record, and have you seen it work in a real store?[18][15]
Open the full buyer's checklist → · Model the payback →
Glossary
- On-shelf availability
- Whether a product is on the shelf where shoppers expect it, when they look for it.
- Out-of-stock (OOS)
- A product with no units on the shelf. It may still be in the backroom, which is a restocking problem rather than a supply one.
- Planogram
- The plan for which product goes where on each shelf, and how many facings it gets.
- Facing
- One product's front-row position on the shelf. Facing up means pulling items forward so the shelf looks full.
- Stock rotation (FIFO / FEFO)
- Putting older stock in front so it sells first: first in, first out, or first expired, first out.
- Shelf intelligence
- Data on what is on each shelf right now: gaps, prices, positions. Useful only when someone, or something, acts on it.[1][7]
- Mobile manipulator
- A wheeled robot with an arm that can pick things up.[7]
- Humanoid robot
- A robot with a roughly human body plan (torso, two arms, a head and legs or a wheeled base) so it can work in spaces built for people.[13][1]
- Micro-fulfilment centre (MFC)
- A small automated storage and picking system in or near a store, used to fill online orders.[12]
- Customer fulfilment centre (CFC)
- A large automated warehouse that fills online grocery orders for a whole region.[11]
- AS/RS
- Automated storage and retrieval system: robots store and fetch bins or totes in a dense grid.[12]
- Robot-as-a-Service (RaaS)
- Paying for a robot as a subscription that includes service, rather than buying it outright.[13]
- Teleoperation
- A person controlling a robot remotely, often as a fallback when its autonomy can't finish a task.[9]
- Shrink
- Stock lost to theft, damage, waste or error before it is sold.
- Payback period
- How long a robot's net savings take to cover what it cost.
Questions people ask
What are grocery store robots?
Machines that do a specific job in a supermarket or convenience store without a person driving them: scanning shelves for gaps and wrong prices, cleaning floors, delivering orders, picking online orders, storing stock in an automated grid, or restocking shelves and rotating stock.[4][7][8][12][1]
Which grocery stores use robots?
Walmart tested shelf-scanning robots in 50 stores from 2017 before ending the contract in 2020; Co-op and Tesco have used Starship delivery robots in Milton Keynes since 2018; grocers including Kroger, Sobeys and Coles license Ocado's automated fulfilment platform; and Seven-Eleven Japan plans to deploy Telexistence's humanoid in stores from 2029. Vendors list their current retail customers on their own sites.[3][9][11][10]
Can robots restock grocery shelves?
Yes, and it is the newest category. Humanoid robots from Theseus Robotics restock shelves, rotate stock and pick orders, and operators can see them in in-person private previews. Telexistence already runs a beverage restocking robot, Ghost. Most robots in stores today still only report gaps for staff to fill.[1][2][10]
Are grocery store robots safe around shoppers?
They are designed to slow down, stop and give way, and standards such as ISO 13482 for service robots and ISO/TS 15066 for collaborative robots set requirements for working near people. In the EU, the Machinery Regulation applies from 14 January 2027. Ask any vendor which standards its robot is certified to, and watch it work during trading hours.[18][19][14]
Do grocery store robots record shoppers?
Robots that see the shelf use cameras, and a camera in an aisle can capture people. Under the GDPR, images of identifiable people are personal data. Ask whether the robot blurs or discards people in its images, how long images are kept, and where they are stored.[15][16]
More questions: safety, shoppers, Europe and privacy →
See humanoid restocking in person
Theseus Robotics shows its humanoids restocking shelves, rotating stock and picking orders in in-person private previews for operators of hypermarkets, supermarkets, discounters, convenience stores and drugstores.[2]
Book a private preview at theseus.botSources
Every numbered claim on this page links here. Open the source to check it.
- Automating the last 30 metres of retail fulfilment (Theseus Robotics)Humanoids for shelf restocking, stock rotation and order picking; real-time shelf intelligence acted on; Zürich and San Francisco; backed by Y Combinator.
- Book a private preview (Theseus Robotics)Previews are in person; the request form covers hypermarkets, supermarkets, discounters, convenience stores and drugstores, from 1–10 stores to more than 1,000.
- Bossa Nova Robotics (Wikipedia)Shelf-scanning robots tested by Walmart in 50 stores from 2017, 300 more added in 2019; Walmart ended the contract in late 2020.
- Simbe: physical AI and robotics for retail store intelligence (Simbe Robotics)Tally autonomous inventory robot, Tally Spot fixed sensors and Tally RFID; inventory, pricing and planogram checks with task lists for store teams. Performance figures on the page are the vendor's own.
- Retail automation (Badger Technologies)Robot detects out-of-stocks and pricing discrepancies, prioritises restocking, sends tasks to a mobile app, and detects spills and hazards.
- Hazard mitigation (Badger Technologies)Robot identifies spills, shrink wrap, produce and coffee beans on the floor and archives records and images of each spill and clean-up.
- Robots, AI and autonomous technology for smarter operations (Brain Corp)BrainOS autonomy for commercial floor cleaning and shelf scanning; announces an autonomous mobile manipulator for stocking and picking.
- Autonomous robot delivery (Starship Technologies)Sidewalk delivery robots for groceries, hot food and industrial supplies; delivery counts on the page are the company's own.
- Starship Technologies (Wikipedia)Milton Keynes service with Co-op and Tesco from April 2018; robots travel at pedestrian speed (up to 6 km/h), carry up to about 9 kg and can be remote-controlled when autonomy fails.
- Seven-Eleven Japan and Telexistence partner to pioneer humanoid robots with generative AI (Telexistence)Partnership announced September 2025 to develop the Astra humanoid, with deployment in Seven-Eleven stores targeted for 2029; Telexistence already runs a beverage restocking robot, Ghost.
- Ocado (Wikipedia)Ocado Smart Platform licensed to Casino, Sobeys, Kroger and Coles; 2019 fire at the Andover fulfilment centre caused by a fault in a battery charging unit.
- AutoStore: grocery and retail automated storage and retrieval (AutoStore)Cube storage system of robots on a grid, with grocery as a listed industry, a multi-temperature option and robotic picking at ports.
- Agility Robotics (Wikipedia)Humanoid robot Digit used for bulk material handling in logistics since 2021; Robot-as-a-Service contract with GXO announced 2024.
- Regulation (EU) 2023/1230 on machinery (EUR-Lex)The EU Machinery Regulation; it applies from 14 January 2027 and replaces the Machinery Directive.
- General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) (gdpr-info.eu)Full text of the GDPR, which covers images of identifiable people captured by store cameras, including cameras on robots.
- Guidelines 3/2019 on processing of personal data through video devices (European Data Protection Board)How GDPR applies to video capture: purpose, retention, signage and the rights of people filmed.
- ISO 13482: Robots and robotic devices — Safety requirements for personal care robots (ISO)Safety standard for service robots that work close to people, including mobile servant robots.
- ISO/TS 15066: Robots and robotic devices — Collaborative robots (ISO)Technical specification on robots working in shared space with people, including contact limits.