Robot Parkour is Unbelievably Real

Boston Dynamics Atlas is blowing people's minds — again

Atlas takes a giant leap (Credit: Boston Dynamics)

A pair of humanoid robots run, leap over obstacles, dash across an incline, backflip, and pat themselves on the back.

“They are fake,” insists one viewer on TikTok.

“It’s CGI,” he adds.

I’d posted a brief clip of Boston Dynamic’s Atlas robots’ latest demonstration of speed and agility on the social media platform, and quickly explained in comments that what we’re seeing here is real.

I get it, robots moving with the fluidity of humans is both unbelievable and slightly unnerving but if you've been paying attention to Boston Dynamics (now owned by Hyundai Motors after years under Google’s robo-roof) over the years, you know that this is the culmination (or continuation) of years of development and that Atlas’s robo moves haven’t always been so smooth.

Six years ago, I covered the DARPA Robotics Challenge in Pomona, California. The task for 24 robots and their developer teams was to traverse a…