Boffins have unveiled the world’s first robot that sheds tears when it experiences sad moments.
Unlike traditional robots with stiff, expressionless features, this next-generation android uses advanced sensory hardware to sob during sensitive conversations.
The creators said the crying droid opens a new era of emotional companionship between people and machines.
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Yanxi Technology, based in Ningbo City, China, unveiled their Yansyn-X2 robot at the company’s official opening in Qianwan New Area at the end of April.
The bot autonomously triggers hyper-realistic tears using a high-precision capillary microfluidic system and biomimetic tear fluid that leaves wet eye sockets and tear tracks on its silicone face.
An advanced emotional interaction system analyses tone, language and context to detect sadness, then triggers tears of varying intensity.
It also uses and neck movements for lifelike empathy, as reported by Need To Know.
The robot’s ‘brain-cerebellum’ architecture combines multi-layer memory and autonomous emotion models with 3D self-supervised learning to convert feelings into precise facial movements.
Company founder Zhang Kai, a former Alibaba product manager with a psychology degree from Jilin University, said the face is “a person’s display”.
He pointed out that non-verbal communication is 13 times more important than words.
He added: “Emotional expression in silent form has an impact that far surpasses language when conveying empathy.”
Zhang wants to see humanoid robots move beyond being mere tools to become emotionally human-like, creating “a huge family-end commercial entrance”.
Core team members hail from Alibaba, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Xi’an Jiao Tong University and the University of California in Berkeley, with research partnerships including Fudan University and the Yangtze River Delta National Innovation Centre.
The firm, founded in August 2025 and backed by Zili Venture Capital, has secured multiple core patents and won Ningbo talent funding totalling £1.2m (CNY 11m).
Industry observers predict the global bionic expression components market will hit £2.3b by 2030, with Chinese firms already supplying 75 percent of worldwide shipments.
Yanxi Technology plans mass production of the model this year, followed by variable-pupil technology by the end of 2026 and hybrid motor-plus-artificial-muscle drives in 2027.
A short video of the Yansyn-X2 in action, showed the robot’s eyes welling up as it responded to a user’s emotional tone.
Analysts said the device addresses the need of China’s 400 million elderly population for emotional support.
It also positions the firm as a potential global leader in empathetic robotics.
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