Nori Robotics launches a $1,688 bimanual robot for developers
Nori Robotics, a startup from Y Combinator's S26 batch, launched its Nori A3 robot on Hacker News. Founder Antonio Li describes it as a $1,688 bimanual mobile robot, assembled in San Francisco for robotics developers and researchers. Li started the project during robotics research at Columbia, where he taught robots through human demonstrations. He said the difficulty of getting affordable hardware there motivated the company: most labs have only one or two expensive robots, which makes it hard to collect large datasets. The Nori A3 has 19 degrees of freedom in total, including two arms with 7+1 degrees of freedom each and a payload of 1.5kg per arm, plus a 55kg telescoping lift. It moves on a wheeled base rather than legs, which Li said was one of the main choices made to keep the cost down, along with using high-ratio servos instead of quasi-direct-drive motors. The robot carries four 720p RGB cameras (up to 30fps) mounted on the grippers, head and neck, a 2D lidar with 12m range and 8 to 12Hz scanning frequency, a dual-microphone array for full-duplex voice communication, and a 432Wh battery rated for 6 to 8 hours of use. Onboard compute is a Raspberry Pi 5 with 4GB of RAM. Nori provides a laptop app called Nori Lab for training and operating the robot, plus a Skills Marketplace where users can train skills at home and share them. Li said the company makes money by selling the hardware at $1,688, with optional paid software on top. He listed an open SDK on GitHub, a browser-based simulator and an open hardware paper as available resources. Capabilities mentioned in the launch include basic cleaning tasks, opening drawers, restocking shelves and pouring beverages, alongside kitchen tasks, tidying, fetching from the fridge, loading dishes, and folding clothes shown on the product page. The robot is listed at full price with no deposit required, shipping in fall 2026.
Key facts
- Nori Robotics (YC S26) is selling the Nori A3, a bimanual wheeled robot, for $1,688, assembled in San Francisco.
- The robot has 19 degrees of freedom total: two 7+1-DOF arms carrying 1.5kg payload each, plus a 55kg telescoping lift.
- It runs on a Raspberry Pi 5 with 4GB RAM, a 432Wh battery rated for 6 to 8 hours, four 720p RGB cameras, and a 12m-range 2D lidar.
- Founder Antonio Li began the project during robotics research at Columbia and cited the scarcity of affordable lab hardware as the motivation.
- The company sells the hardware itself plus optional paid software, and offers an open SDK, a browser simulator and a hardware paper; shipping starts fall 2026.
Why it matters
Humanoid and bimanual robot platforms for research have typically been expensive, so most labs own only one or two units and struggle to collect the large, varied datasets that robot-learning research needs. Nori Robotics is pricing its Nori A3 at $1,688, well below that range, specifically to let developers and researchers own more units and generate more data.
Who it affects
The stated audience is robotics developers and researchers rather than general consumers, even though the product page also shows home tasks like tidying, fetching from the fridge and folding clothes. Founder Antonio Li frames the company around his own experience as a robotics researcher at Columbia, where limited access to hardware capped how much demonstration data he could collect.
How to use it
The Nori A3 can be ordered now at full price with no deposit, for delivery in fall 2026. Nori provides a laptop app, Nori Lab, for training and operating the robot, and a Skills Marketplace for training skills at home and sharing them. The company's business model is hardware sales at $1,688 per unit plus optional paid software; developers also get an open SDK on GitHub, a browser-based simulator, and an open hardware paper.
How solid is it
The specifications come directly from the company's own product page and the founder's launch comment on Hacker News, both first-party sources, and the two are broadly consistent on hardware details. That said, the robot has not yet shipped: it is listed for fall 2026 delivery, so none of the performance or reliability claims have been tested by outside users or reviewers yet.
Risks and caveats
The source does not disclose any funding amount, valuation, team size or company founding date. Neither the product page nor the founder's comment states whether the demonstration videos of kitchen tasks and folding clothes show teleoperated or fully autonomous operation, or whether they are sped up. No overall height, weight or dimensions are given beyond the arm and lift specs, and the company itself makes no comparison to competitor robots such as Unitree's G1; any such comparisons in the Hacker News discussion are commenters' opinions, not company claims.
“getting my hands on affordable hardware was difficult. Most labs have one or two expensive robots, which makes it hard to collect large datasets.”
— Antonio Li, founder, Nori Robotics