Robot duck sales surge to 20,000 after viral keynote clip

Hugging Face announced on Thursday that preorders for its Microduck robot reached 20,000 units. The spike followed a video clip that circulated widely earlier this week. The clip showed Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang interacting with a group of the small robots during his keynote address at the GTC Berlin conference. The footage captured the devices walking, sitting, and performing somersaults on voice commands.

Clem Delangue, the head of Hugging Face, confirmed the preorder total in a post on social media. He noted that the devices are now a shared asset of two major tech firms. Hugging Face acquired Pollen Robotics, the manufacturer of the Microduck, in 2025. Nvidia subsequently purchased Hugging Face in September. The Microduck is the second robot product from the company, following the Reachy Mini.

The robots are built on open source hardware. Developers at Pollen Robotics trained the devices using Nvidia’s technology stack. The training process involved running simulations to teach the ducks basic movements like walking and standing. These default behaviors are programmed into the units before they ship. Owners can also teach their specific robots new tricks and share the new movements with the community.

Pollen Robotics expects to deliver the Microducks in time for the Christmas holiday season. Delangue suggested the device could become the best-selling robot of the year. He pointed out that the promotional materials feature adults playing with the robots, indicating a market beyond children. The product launch comes during a week of heightened scrutiny on artificial intelligence in the industry.