A coffee shop in Beijing is run by a single humanoid robot. It made 202 coffees in an hour and broke a world record

The debate about robots and artificial intelligence usually revolves around factories and warehouses. China has now moved it directly behind the coffee shop counter: a business has launched in Beijing where coffee is ground, brewed, and served by a single humanoid robot – and a world record was broken right at the premiere.

How does the robotic coffee shop work?

Behind the project is the 7Fresh Coffee brand, operated by Chinese internet giant JD.com. The establishment in Beijing’s Galaxy SOHO building opened on Sunday, and its operator calls it the very first 24/7 automated coffee shop in the world. You place your order via a touch kiosk or mobile app, and the robot behind the glass wall takes care of the rest.

A 24-hour coffee shop run entirely by a single robot opened in Beijing on Sunday, offering coffee with an average wait time of less than 30 seconds per cup.

On its opening day, the shop served 202 cups of coffee in one hour, setting a Guinness World Record for the most cups of… pic.twitter.com/kenGNAgiJ7

— CBS News (@CBSNews) August 16, 2026

According to the operator, the machine handles the entire process itself – it grinds the coffee, extracts espresso, mixes the drink, and places the finished cup into the dispensing slot. One drink is ready in 20 to 30 seconds, and the line can prepare seven to eight of them simultaneously. In addition to coffee, it also offers tea, sparkling water, or probiotic juice, for 15 to 20 yuan, which is roughly 47 to 63 Czech crowns.

The establishment clearly also considers sharing the experience online. Before ordering, you can adjust the sweetness and strength of the coffee from 1 to 100 percent, name the drink, and have a custom social media card generated for it. The operator also promises a feature that is supposedly to recommend the amount of caffeine based on the customer’s health – how it will work in practice remains to be seen.

202 coffees per hour. Will baristas lose their jobs?

The record was set even before the grand opening: the robot prepared 202 coffees in a single hour, and the Guinness committee recognized it as a world record. The operator expects automation to solve the perennial pains of coffee shops – fluctuating quality, high labor costs, and limited opening hours.

Does this mean the end of the barista profession? Economists are not that far yet. According to them, humanoid robots mainly handle routine and repetitive tasks, but hospitality also relies on human interaction, which a machine can hardly replace. According to experts, automation thus threatens administrative and office positions more than a person behind a coffee machine. While Morgan Stanley estimates that robots could replace tens of millions of jobs in the US by 2050, it also adds that this is not a prediction of mass unemployment.

Would you have coffee from a robot, or do you insist on a flesh-and-blood barista?

Sources: Global Times, news.com.au, South China Morning Post