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Hugging Face introduces a robotic duck with wheels

Pollen Robotics has opened pre-orders for Microduck, a 25cm bipedal robot that can walk, fall, stand up, pick up socks with its beak and fly on wheels. The first batches are expected to be delivered by the new year.

Hugging Face has unveiled a robotic duck with wheels.

Hugging Face and its subsidiary Pollen Robotics have jointly unveiled the Microduck, a small, two-legged, one-eyed duck-shaped robot.

Pre-orders for the robot will begin on August 27, 2026. The price is $399, excluding taxes and shipping. The first batches, which will be delivered by the end of the year, are intended for the North American and European markets.

Microduck is not just a soft-bodied voice assistant. It is designed as an affordable platform for physical artificial intelligence (physical AI). Its movements are trained in a simulator and then uploaded to the robot itself.

**Appearance and capabilities:** The robot is 25 cm tall, 14 cm wide, and weighs less than 800 grams. It has no arms, but 15 servomotors power its legs, neck, head, and articulated jaws. In a video demonstration, the duck can waddle, sit, kick a ball, pick up a sock or marker, and get back up after falling.

The box comes with seven pre-built scenarios and a gamepad. Wheels, a ball, a laser pointer, and NFC tags are sold separately for about $39. The robot comes in Cream, Graphite, Lavender, and Sky colors. Each duck generates a unique set of sounds when it’s first turned on, and that sound is associated with that particular robot.

**Inside:** The robot is equipped with a Rockchip RK3566 processor with an artificial intelligence accelerator, 1 GB of RAM, 32 GB of permanent memory. There is also a front camera with an indicator showing the shooting process, a compact LiDAR, two inertial sensors, microphones, a speaker, NFC, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth modules in the head and muzzle. The removable NP-F550 battery provides about an hour of autonomous operation.

**Market and risks:** Previously, Hugging Face sold the Reachy Mini desktop robot. Microduck is not a domestic helper, as its height is not suitable for household chores. Target audience: programmers and technology enthusiasts.

The presentation of the robot coincided with the rise of rumors that Nvidia is buying Hugging Face for about $ 13 billion.

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