I keep one calendar of every robotics event I can find, and every event is checked by hand before it goes on. November has 20 of them, in 10 countries. That's a lot to choose from, so here's the whole month at a glance, then the ones I'd plan around and why.
November at a glance
The big four
Humanoid Europe
If humanoids are your world, this is the one. Two days on taking humanoid robots from the lab to the market, with Europe and China in the same room: supply chains, safety and the commercial case. The speakers include Boston Dynamics, Unitree, Agibot, Galbot and PAL Robotics alongside Audi, Bosch and Fraunhofer, and there are live humanoid demos on the exhibition floor. It runs alongside the AES Europe automotive Ethernet summit, so expect plenty of carmakers' engineers in the corridors.
CoRL: the Conference on Robot Learning
Single-track and tightly focused, which is exactly why it matters: it's where the labs working on learned policies and embodied AI show their work, and where a lot of the field's benchmarks get argued over. Past keynotes include Russ Tedrake, Fei-Fei Li and Wolfram Burgard, and recent editions have drawn more than 670 paper submissions. If you're hiring robot learning people, a lot of them will be in Austin that week.
SPS: Smart Production Solutions
The big one for industrial automation: around 1,000 exhibitors and 56,000 visitors across 15 halls. It isn't a robotics show as such. It's drives, controls, sensors and the software that ties a factory together, which is where most robots end up working. This year leans heavily on industrial AI. Go with a list of stands, or you'll spend three days walking.
ROBOTWORLD
One of Asia's biggest robot shows, combining an exhibition, a competition and a conference, with the International Symposium on Robotics (ISR Asia) alongside. Industrial and service robots, logistics automation and drones: a good window on Korean manufacturing and the companies that supply it.
For researchers
Besides CoRL, three research meetings this month:
ISRR
The flagship symposium of the International Foundation of Robotics Research, running since 1983 and held every two years. Around 40 papers in a single track, half of them invited, and attendance is deliberately kept small. If you can get in, it's one of the best rooms of the year.
IEEE Conference on Telepresence
A focused research conference, now in its third year, on telerobotics, haptics and operating a robot from a distance, with a multi-robot search-and-rescue competition alongside. Katherine J. Kuchenbecker and Julie A. Adams are among the speakers.
IEEE LARS / LARC
The Latin American Robotics Symposium and Competition, together: the region's main academic meeting for intelligent robotics, with a student competition running alongside.
For the people putting robots to work
International Robot Safety Conference
The longest-running robot safety conference in North America, more than 35 years old. Two tracks on risk assessment, the standards (ISO 10218 and ANSI/RIA R15.06), functional safety, cybersecurity and AI safety. The speakers come from FANUC, Universal Robots, ABB, Yaskawa, Boston Dynamics, Agility Robotics, Amazon Robotics, NVIDIA, OpenAI and OSHA. If you sign off on robot cells, or are about to, this is your week.
Groundworks
A new one-day summit on robots in construction and infrastructure, at UCL's Here East, with real machines in a live test area. Six tracks, from megaprojects to data centres, the grid and defence. Boris Sofman of Bedrock Robotics, which raised $600M on 26 October, is speaking, alongside FieldAI, Monumental, Hilti, VINCI, HS2 and the Construction Leadership Council.
FUSE San Francisco
A one-day conference on location technology for physical AI: keeping robots and autonomous machines accurately positioned outside the lab, including when satellite signals drop. Niche, and very practical. Speakers include Brian Schimpf of Anduril, Ali Agha of FieldAI, Adrian Macneil of Foxglove, Angus Pacala of Ouster and Satya Mallick of OpenCV.
ICT&Logistiek
A Dutch logistics technology show, on one ticket with Logistica Next: around 300 exhibitors across the two, and three themes: supply chain software, warehouse automation and robotics, and labour shortages. Dematic, KNAPP, Sereact and German Bionic are among the exhibitors.
Autonomous Vehicles & AI Europe
The fifth edition of a European conference on autonomous and connected vehicles: sensors and sensor fusion, scaling production, AI in vehicle automation and the regulation around it, with speakers from TÜV Rheinland, the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles.
NexTech Week Tokyo
Seven technology shows under one roof at Makuhari Messe, two of them for us: the Humanoid Robot Expo and the Physical AI Expo. Expect 35,000 to 40,000 visitors and more than 300 exhibitors.
National days
Swiss Robotics Day
Switzerland's robotics community in one hall, now in its 17th year: research talks in the morning, then workshops, startup pitches and demos. ETH Zurich and EPFL are out in force (Marco Hutter, Aude Billard, Roland Siegwart), with Xingxing Wang of Unitree, Zhaopeng Chen of Agile Robots, and speakers from Disney Research and Skydio. The RAI Institute, Hexagon Robotics and Skydio are among the exhibitors.
ROSCon Belgium
The first ROSCon in Belgium, part of the series that has run since 2012: two days of ROS 2 development, tooling and deployment stories, in English, with 38 speakers on the programme.
Robotics Innovation Showcase
A one-day robotics showcase, 9am to 4.30pm, worth a look if you're in the North of England.
Evenings out
If you're job hunting or new to the industry, this is where I'd start. These are small, cheap or free, and built around talking to people.
STIQRobotics #12
An informal evening for the UK robotics industry, with a panel and short startup pitches. Previous editions have drawn 100 to 140 people: investors, startups, end users and postgraduate students.
ROBIB Meetup #3: Robots in motion
Belgium's robotics community meetup, third edition: talks from Francis Wyffels (Ghent University), Scott Walter (RoboStrategy) and Herbert ten Have, then networking.
Consumer Robotics Show & Tell
An evening of working home and personal robots at a hardware makerspace: demos rather than slides.
Robotex International
A robotics competition and festival for youth and student teams, and Robotex's first edition outside Estonia. If you know a teenager who builds robots, this is their weekend.
How I'd choose
- Job hunting? Go to the evenings and the national days: engineers and founders, in a room built for talking. It matters more than ever, because most robotics job ads are for senior people.
- Selling into factories or warehouses? SPS and ICT&Logistiek.
- Building humanoids? Humanoid Europe, then NexTech Week's Humanoid Robot Expo if you're in Asia.
- Doing research? CoRL, and ISRR if you can get in.
- Working on robots outdoors? Groundworks and FUSE.
Every event has its own page on the site, with dates, the speakers and the exhibitors where we have them, and a button to put it in your calendar. See the full calendar.
Know one I've missed? Tell me and I'll add it. And if you're going to any of these, I'd love to know which.
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