IFA 2026 Robots Expand to Beds, Gardens and Pools

A flat robot that taps a bed as it moves, a tracked device that cuts grass and a machine that scoops leaves from a pool’s surface took the same stage. At the IFA 2026 “Robot Runway” in Berlin, Germany, purpose-built robots for cleaning beds, gardens and pools, and filming were unveiled. Rather than replicating the entire job of one person, these products aim to complete one specific task in a defined environment.

Gardens are changing the fastest. Existing robotic lawn mowers required users to bury wires along the boundaries or install a separate positioning device, but products that use cameras and LiDAR (a sensor that detects terrain and boundaries) to read obstacles and spaces appeared at the show. Anker’s eufy maps gardens in 3D and moves without buried boundary wires or a separate base station, while Segway Navimow cuts right up to the edges with a cutting mechanism on the side of the main body. ANSbot combined four tasks—mowing, shredding, collecting and sweeping grass—into one device.

Tasks have also been divided up in pools. Aiper’s Scuba series cleans the floor, walls and waterline, while EcoSurfer collects leaves and debris from the water’s surface. WYBOT uses cameras to identify contaminants and maps the inside of the pool. For beds, China’s Creatolize has moved the autonomous-navigation structure of a floor-cleaning robot onto a mattress with its X1 Pro. It taps and vacuums bedding while also performing UV-C sterilization, operating after being placed on the bed.

The jobs robots take over are not limited to housework. HoverAir’s VERSA becomes a handheld camera with a 3-axis gimbal, or a filming device that follows users when combined with a flight module. XbotGo’s Falcon uses AI to recognize more than 10 sports, follows players and the flow of a match, records 4K video with a 360-degree rotating gimbal, then automatically selects and edits key moments. Its role is becoming clearer for travel, family filming and solo content creation, where finding a separate camera operator can be difficult.

The concrete change lies less in the robots’ shapes than in the completeness of their tasks. China’s xLean TR1 handles repetitive floor cleaning autonomously, then transforms into a handheld vacuum in one second when it encounters large debris or an area the user wants to clean directly. Households with gardens can reduce the work of finishing edges and collecting leaves, while people cleaning beds can avoid repetitive pushing. In factories, robots combining wheeled platforms with two arms could handle logistics and assembly instead of walking humanoids. eufy began European sales in May, and the X1 Pro entered early sales last month on Japan’s Makuake, but exhibition demonstrations and manufacturer claims alone are not enough to conclude that the performance of the entire product lineup has been verified.