Edge AI is Exploding: A Deep Dive into the Smart Glasses, Humanoid Robots, and On-Device AI Dominating 2025

Key Points

The year 2025 marks “Year One of Edge AI,” signifying a major shift from cloud-based AI to powerful, on-device intelligence within gadgets.
AI Smart Glasses are a key battleground, with devices like Alibaba’s Quark AI Glasses, XREAL One Pro (featuring a 57° field of view and 3ms latency), and Rokid Glasses, which have garnered 250,000 pre-orders.
Embodied AI and Humanoid Robots are rapidly advancing, with companies like JD.com building ecosystem strategies and Tencent introducing open platforms like “Tairos” for sophisticated human-robot interaction.
An “army” of new robots was showcased at WAIC 2025, including Keenon Robotics’ bipedal service robot, Unitree Robotics’ G1 fighting robot, and Zhiyuan Robotics’ announcement of the “Zhiyuan Lingqu (智元灵渠) OS” open-source plan.
On-device AI in smartphones continues to evolve, with Honor’s open-sourced MagicGUI achieving 91.5% accuracy in phone operations, and OPPO enabling processing of ultra-long texts (128k tokens) directly on devices.

The explosion of Edge AI is here, and it’s no longer just hype.

2025 is being called the “Year One of Edge AI” for a reason.

We’re seeing a massive shift from cloud-based AI to powerful, on-device intelligence that lives directly inside our gadgets.

At the 2025 World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC), the sheer volume of new hardware was staggering.

We’re talking everything from hotly contested AI smart glasses and intelligent robots to the next generation of AI-native smartphones and PCs.

For investors, founders, and techies, this isn’t just a trend—it’s a tidal wave of opportunity.

Let’s break down the most important hardware and platforms that are defining the future of AI on the edge.

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A collage of Edge AI devices including smart glasses, smartphones, and robots.

Key Edge AI Device Categories & Examples (WAIC 2025)
Category	Device/Platform Example	Key Feature/Contribution
AI Smart Glasses	Alibaba Quark AI Glasses	Deep integration with Alibaba ecosystem (e.g., Alipay, Taobao)
AI Smart Glasses	XREAL One Pro	57° field of view, 3ms latency
AI Smart Glasses	Rokid Glasses	250,000 pre-orders
Embodied AI/Robots	JD.com JoyInside	Ecosystem strategy for various robots (chess, quadruped, service)
Embodied AI/Robots	Tencent Tairos	Open platform for embodied intelligence, advanced human-robot interaction
Embodied AI/Robots	Zhiyuan Lingqu OS	Open-source reference framework for embodied intelligence OS (“Android for Robots”)
On-device AI (Smartphones)	Honor MagicGUI	Open-sourced 7B parameter multi-modal LLM, 91.5% accuracy in phone ops
On-device AI (Smartphones)	OPPO On-device LLM	200 tokens/sec generation, 128k ultra-long text processing

AI Smart Glasses: The Newest Battleground for Big Tech

The race to own the real estate in front of your eyes is heating up, with major players dropping some seriously impressive tech.

Leading AI Smart Glasses Comparison (WAIC 2025)
Company	Product	Key Differentiator	Highlight Feature
Alibaba	Quark AI Glasses	Ecosystem Integration	Powered by Tongyi Qianwen, integrated with Alipay, Taobao, Gaode Navigation
XREAL	XREAL One Pro	Optical & Processing Innovation	World’s first X Prism optical engine (57° FOV), X1 chip (3ms latency)
Rokid	Rokid Glasses	Market Traction & Practical Use	250,000 pre-orders, demonstrated as teleprompter for singers

Alibaba’s Ecosystem Play with Quark AI Glasses

Alibaba (Alibaba 阿里巴巴) just dropped its first self-developed Quark (KuaKe 夸克) AI Glasses.

This isn’t just a piece of hardware; it’s a gateway to their entire ecosystem.

Deep Integration: These glasses are powered by Alibaba’s Tongyi Qianwen (Tongyi Qianwen 通义千问) large model and Quark’s latest AI features.
Real-World Utility: They’re seamlessly connected to services like Gaode Navigation (Gaode Daohang 高德导航), Alipay (Zhifubao 支付宝) “Scan to Pay,” Taobao (Taobao 淘宝) price comparison, and even Fliggy (Feizhu 飞猪) travel reminders.

XREAL Pushes the Optical Envelope

XREAL (XREAL) came out swinging with its new flagship, the XREAL One Pro.

They’re flexing their technical muscles with a “dual-engine” approach of self-developed chips and optics.

World’s First Optics: They feature a self-developed X Prism optical engine, achieving a massive 57° field of view in a lightweight design.
Ultra-Low Latency: Paired with their X1 spatial computing chip, they’ve hit an insane 3-millisecond latency, which is a game-changer for immersion and responsiveness in AR.

Rokid’s Pre-Order Frenzy

Rokid (Rokid) made a huge statement, both literally with an oversized display model and figuratively with their sales numbers.

CEO Zhu Mingming (Zhu Mingming 祝铭明) confirmed that pre-orders for the Rokid Glasses smart glasses have already hit a whopping 250,000 units.

They even hosted a wild tech concert where a singer used the glasses as a real-time teleprompter, a pianist played with a BrainCo bionic hand, and Unitree robot dogs danced along.

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Embodied AI and Humanoid Robots: Intelligence Takes Physical Form

This is where things get really interesting. “Embodied AI” is the concept of giving AI a physical body to interact with the world, and it’s moving from research labs to consumer living rooms.

JD.com’s “JoyInside” AI Ecosystem Strategy

JD.com (Jingdong 京东) isn’t just building one robot; they’re building the brain for an entire army of them through their JoyInside brand.

Their strategy is to partner with specialized hardware makers and embed their conversational AI directly into the products.

Partnered with Zhongqing Robot (Zhongqing Jiqi Ren 众擎机器人) for the Zhongqing PM01 JD.com Joy Inside Robot.
Co-developed the SenseRobot AI Chess Robot 5-in-1 Edition with SenseTime (Shangtang Keji 商汤科技), which can play five different board games.
Integrated with the Lingtong Nian NIA-F01 (Lingtong Nian NIA-F01 灵童·念 NIA-F01) desktop robot and “Xuanji (Xuanji 璇玑)” egg-shaped robot.
Launched the Magic Atom MagicDog Pro JD.com Joy Inside quadruped robot, the first of its kind that can autonomously express emotions.
Partnered with Borobots (Luobo Zhinen 珞博智能) to power their AI toy, Fuzozo (Fuzai 芙崽).

Tencent’s Open Platform Play with “Tairos”

Tencent (Tengxun 腾讯) is taking a different approach by building an open platform to accelerate development across the industry.

At their booth, they showcased the Tairos embodied intelligence open platform, which will be officially launched during the conference.

A stunning demo showed a robotic arm from DOBOT (Yuejiang 越疆), integrated with Tairos, capable of “making a meal just by talking to the robot.”

The robot could understand intentions, perceive its environment, and even politely decline unreasonable requests—this is a huge leap in human-robot interaction.

The Army of New Robot Models at WAIC 2025

The conference floor was packed with new robots, each showcasing unique skills and capabilities.

New Robot Models Unveiled at WAIC 2025
Company	Robot/Platform	Key Feature/Application
Keenon Robotics	XMAN-F1	Bipedal humanoid service robot, improved efficiency with other robots.
Aushu Intelligent	VIATRIX	Consumer-grade powered exoskeleton, adaptive AI for energy saving.
Mech-Mind Robotics	“Eye-Brain-Hand” technology	Full-stack integration for dual-arm clothing folding, autonomous item retrieval.
Unitree Robotics	G1 Fighting Robot	1.32m tall, 35kg, 29 flexible joints, intelligent balancing for combat.
Zhiyuan Robotics	Zhiyuan Lingqu OS	Open-source reference framework for embodied intelligence OS.
JAKA Robotics	JAKA Lumi	Embodied intelligence platform, 80%+ grasping success with 50 data sets.

Keenon Robotics’ Bipedal Service Robot

Keenon Robotics (Qinglang 擎朗) unveiled the XMAN-F1, a bipedal humanoid service robot designed to work alongside other robots to improve efficiency. It was a star attraction, making popcorn and preparing custom iced drinks for attendees.

Aushu Intelligent’s Consumer-Grdexoskeleton

Aushu Intelligent (Aosha Zhinen 傲鲨智能) revealed the VIATRIX, a consumer-grade powered exoskeleton. It uses an adaptive AI algorithm to help users save energy and enhance performance during activities like hiking or fitness training. Its flexible FLOAT 360 hip joint allows for a full range of motion.

Mech-Mind Robotics’ “Eye-Brain-Hand” Tech

Mech-Mind Robotics (Meikaman De 梅卡曼德) showed off its full-stack “eye-brain-hand” technology. They demonstrated dual-arm robots folding clothes and humanoid robots from Standard Robots (Siitande 斯坦德) autonomously retrieving items from shelves, showing its versatility across logistics, retail, and home services.

Unitree Robotics’ Fighting Robot

Unitree Robotics (Yushu Jiqi Ren 宇树机器人) brought its G1 fighting robot. Standing 1.32 meters (4’4″) tall and weighing 35 kg (77 lbs), it put on a fighting display, powered by 29 flexible joints and an intelligent balancing algorithm.

Zhiyuan Robotics’ Open-Source Robot OS

Zhiyuan Robotics (Zhiyuan Jiqi Ren 智元机器人) displayed a whole family of robots, including the Yuanzheng A2 (Yuanzheng A2 远征 A2), which performed a synchronized dance.

But the biggest news was the announcement of the “Zhiyuan Lingqu (Zhiyuan Lingqu 智元灵渠) OS” open-source plan.

They’re building the industry’s first reference framework for an embodied intelligence OS, aiming to solve fragmentation and high adaptation costs. Think of it as the “Android for Robots.” The plan will start rolling out in Q4 of this year.

JAKA Robotics Makes Training Easier and Cheaper

Data is the fuel for AI, but training can be expensive. JAKA Robotics (Jieka Jiqi Ren 节卡机器人) tackled this head-on with its JAKA Lumi embodied intelligence platform.

Their proprietary algorithms can boost grasping success rates to over 80% with just 50 additional data sets, dramatically lowering the barrier to entry for developers in various fields.

The “Fuel” for a Smarter Future: New Datasets for Spatial Awareness

Intelligent agents need to understand the world around them.

Qunhe Technology (Qunhe Keji 群核科技) is providing the “spatial brain” for this with its newly released InteriorGS dataset.

It’s a 3D Gaussian semantic dataset containing 1,000 detailed 3D scenes.
It covers over 80 types of indoor environments.
This is potentially the world’s first large-scale 3D dataset designed to help AI agents navigate and understand complex indoor spaces, which is critical for making Sim2Real training effective.

Edge AI in Your Pocket: The Smartphone Revolution Continues

Your phone is still the most personal and powerful edge device you own, and manufacturers are packing it with even more on-device AI.

On-Device AI Smartphone Capabilities (WAIC 2025)

Honor MagicGUI Highlights:
- 7-billion parameter multi-modal large model.
- Open-sourced to accelerate development.
- Achieved 91.5% accuracy in common phone operation tasks.
- 16.4% improvement over other top-tier open-source models.
- Debuted on the Honor Magic V5 phone.
OPPO On-Device AI Breakthroughs:
- Peak text generation speed of 200 tokens/second.
- Support for 128k ultra-long texts (processing documents up to 200,000 characters or ~300 pages).
- Transforms AI phones into powerful, personalized assistants.
- Collaboration with chip manufacturers for these advancements.

Honor’s Open-Source AI Model

Honor (Rongyao 荣耀) released its self-developed MagicGUI, a 7-billion parameter multi-modal large model.

It debuted on the Honor Magic V5 phone and, crucially, is being open-sourced to accelerate development.

It achieved an impressive 91.5% accuracy in common phone operation tasks, a 16.4% improvement over other top-tier open-source models.

OPPO’s Performance Breakthrough

OPPO (OPPO) announced a massive leap in on-device performance.

Working with chip manufacturers, they have achieved staggering speeds and capabilities:

Peak text generation speed of 200 tokens/second.
Support for 128k ultra-long texts, allowing a single device to locally process documents of up to 200,000 characters (around 300 pages of a book).

This transforms AI phones from simple “efficiency tools” into powerful, personalized assistants for professionals in fields like law and medicine.

The message from WAIC 2025 is loud and clear: we’re past the proof-of-concept stage. The hardware, software platforms, and datasets are all maturing at a breakneck pace. The future of powerful, responsive, and increasingly autonomous edge AI is no longer on the horizon—it’s already here.