1X NEO opens pre-orders: $20,000 outright or $499 a month for a home humanoid

August 4, 2026

1X NEO is the first home humanoid you can actually give money for: $20,000 Early Access with a $200 deposit and priority US delivery in 2026, or a $499/month subscription with delivery later. International expansion is promised from 2027.

Two honest caveats belong next to that headline. First, NEO learns household tasks partly through teleoperation — in the early period, some of what your robot does will be a human operator doing it remotely. 1X is upfront about this; buyers should be too. Second, “priority delivery in 2026” is a pre-order promise, not inventory in a warehouse.

Still, the pricing structure matters more than the caveats. At $499/month, 1X is pricing a humanoid like a car lease rather than lab equipment — a psychological line no other maker has crossed. Compare Tesla Optimus: the $20k–30k figure everyone quotes is a long-term target with no sales channel, no waitlist and analyst consensus pointing to 2028–2029 for consumer sales.

One of these is a product with a checkout page; the other is a demo with a price rumor. Our index labels them accordingly.