In 2019, overall robot market revenues experienced negative growth for the first time in many years affected by the global manufacturing downturn and reduced demand in major end industries such as automotive and electronics. However, the collaborative robot market still maintains a high growth rate of more than 30% (32.1% in revenue term and 31.3% in shipment term). With the further development of new application scenarios and breakthroughs in technology bottlenecks, the cobot market is projected to reach $ 5.6 billion in 2027.
The infographic below demonstrates some of the key findings of Interact Analysis’ Collaborative Robot Market report, which provides an updated analysis on the market based on over 30 in-depth interviews and a highly detailed database.
The infographic is also available to download in PDF here.
- In 2018, global collaborative robot revenues totaled $566.9 million, a 56.6% increase of 2017; 19,266 cobots were shipped, up 68.0% year-on-year.
- The market size of cobot will reach $5.6 billion in 2027, accounting for 30.2% of the total robot market.
- Payload <5kg and 5-9 kg cobots will still be the majority of sales in 2023 with a total of 74.1% revenue share and 82.6% shipment share.
- Automotive and electronics are still the largest end-user industries in 2018, however, it is expected that logistics will surpass automotive to become the second-largest user group in the near future.
- Material handling, assembly, and pick & place are forecast to remain the three biggest uses of collaborative robots. These three functions which accounted for 75% of collaborative robot revenues in 2018 will hold a 68.4% share in 2023.
- Mobile cobot market size will reach $208.6 million in 2023, account for 9.7% of the total cobot market; whilst over 7,000 units – 9.4% of total cobot shipments.
- China will remain the biggest market for collaborative robots making up around 1/3 of the total market in shipment terms in 2018, and this will grow to around 1/2 in 2023. In the next five years, the fastest-growing regions for collaborative robot shipments are China, North America, Rest of APAC and then Eastern Europe. All of which are forecast to grow at a CAGR over 30%.
- In 2018, over half of the market revenues(51.6%) are generated by the two largest – Universal Robots and TechMan Robot. More than 80% of collaborative robot suppliers generated less than $10M in revenues in 2017 and 2018.
About the Author

Maya Xiao, Market Research Analyst, Industrial Automation, Interact Analysis
Maya Xiao is a Market Research Analyst, Industrial Automation at Interact Analysis. She is responsible for Interact Analysis’ Chinese industrial automation and NEV research. Maya has an interdisciplinary technical background in system automation, renewable energy, and intelligent connected vehicles.
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