Elon Musk’s forecast: “There will be 1 billion robots in the world in 10 years, 10 billion in 20 years”

Artificial intelligence and humanoid robots, in Elon Musk’s view, could reshape not only individual industries but also the way people think about work, education and everyday life in the coming decades. In an interview with China Media Group (CMG), the entrepreneur shared his assessment of AI development in China and offered sweeping predictions about the future of robotics.

In an interview given Tuesday at Tesla’s engineering headquarters in Silicon Valley, California, Musk said Chinese AI models were demonstrating strong performance, particularly considering the limited computing resources available to Chinese AI companies.

“Chinese AI models are generally quite excellent. You can see this in the intelligence rankings, especially given the limited computing power available to Chinese AI companies — their performance is excellent. China is probably showing the best performance per unit of computing resources. And as I’ve said publicly, I think China will solve the problem of limited computing capacity faster than many expect. In my rough estimation, China will solve its computing constraints through lithography and chip manufacturing in about two to three years,” Musk said.

The entrepreneur also highlighted the rapid growth of interest in humanoid robots and outlined his vision for their future applications. He predicted that around one billion humanoid robots could exist worldwide within the next decade.

“I think there will be at least a billion humanoid robots within 10 years, and probably more. I think their numbers will continue to grow. If you assume their number roughly doubles every year, that means a tenfold increase every three to four years. Suppose there are 10 billion robots in 15 years, and 100 billion in 20 years,” Musk said.

He compared the potential future to the world of “Star Wars,” where robots such as C-3PO and R2-D2 serve as friendly and useful companions to humans. “Imagine ‘Star Wars,’ where there were C-3PO and R2-D2, friendly and useful robots. Wouldn’t it be great if everyone had their own personal C-3PO and R2-D2? But it would be even better to have more productive robots that could care for elderly parents, serve as caregivers, look after children, be teachers or personal tutors for your child, and perform any job you can imagine,” he said.

According to Musk, the widespread adoption of robots and AI could significantly increase individual productivity. He suggested that in the future, one person could manage hundreds or even thousands of physical and digital robots, potentially leading to a society with broadly high levels of income.

“I think everyone would want to live in a future where everyone has their own personal robot. And then, I think, we’ll see many companies where one person manages hundreds, perhaps thousands, of robots, both physical and digital, so that the productivity of one person increases dramatically. And I predict that in the future there will effectively be universal high income. In fact, I’m not even sure whether money will matter in the future,” Musk continued.

Asked about the role of humans in a world where machines could perform a large share of work, Musk emphasized the importance of broad education and general knowledge. In his view, people will need a wide range of knowledge to formulate effective requests for AI and make full use of emerging technologies.

“My recommendation for education is to get as broad an education as possible, including arts and sciences, engineering and extensive general knowledge. To know what to ask robots, you need to be able to formulate questions. With the broadest possible general knowledge, you’ll be better able to formulate questions, or what is sometimes called ‘prompt engineering.’ But you have to convey your wishes to the robot,” Musk said.

As reported by CCTV+, Elon Musk predicts rapid advances in artificial intelligence and humanoid robotics that, in his view, could significantly transform work, education and everyday human life.