--- title: "Amazon Robots Struggling to Keep Up With Human Workers" description: "Amazon uses over 750,000 robots that are impressive in some respects, but also struggle to perform simple tasks that a human could easily do." date: "2024-11-20" modified: "2024-11-20" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/amazon-warehouse-robots-struggle" categories: - "Robotics" - "Robots and Machines" tags: - "Amazon" - "automation" - "robots" - "the digest" --- # Amazon Robots Struggling to Keep Up With Human Workers ![Amazon uses over 750,000 robots that are impressive in some respects, but also struggle to perform simple tasks that a human could easily do.]() *TOPSHOT - Bipedal robots in testing phase move containers during a mobile-manipulation demonstration at Amazon's "Delivering the Future" event at the company's BFI1 Fulfillment Center, Robotics Research and Development Hub in Sumner, Washington on October 18, 2023. (Photo by Jason Redmond / AFP) (Photo by JASON REDMOND/AFP via Getty Images) \Image: JASON REDMOND/AFP via Getty Images\* ## Mike Mulligan Autonomous robots are filling up Amazon warehouses, where they're sorting, loading, and unloading packages with impressive efficiency. But it sounds like they're still outmatched by humans when it comes to many essential tasks. The e-commerce giant's robotic arm Sparrow, for example, excels at what's called "top-picking," or picking up an item at the top of a storage container. It can even manipulate over 200 million items of varying sizes and weights, Amazon claims. But it struggles at "targeted picking," which involves having to search through a container to pluck out an item hidden by other stuff. It's a common task that any able human employee could do. For robots to do the same, however, will require nothing short of a breakthrough in the field. "That's a really hard job," Tye Brady, chief technologist at Amazon Robotics, [told *The New York Times*](). "I'm not saying it's impossible," he added, but that level of functionality would be "kind of the next frontier." ## Stretched Win Even with their incipient capabilities, Amazon warehouses are already heavily relying on on robots, especially if their sheer quantity is any indication. The company has over 750,000 of the machines in use overall, per the *NYT*, or about half of its 1.55 million human workers. In many cases, the robots do excel. A mobile robotic arm mounted on top of a wheeled platform called [Stretch](), created by Boston Dynamics, deftly unloads packages from the back of a truck and places them on a conveyor belt. According to Sally Miller, global chief information officer at the shipping giant DHL, Stretch can unload around twice as many boxes per hour as humans, who might earn something like $17 an hour for the job. She did not say how much the robot cost, but gloated about its advantages over pesky human workers. "It doesn't call in sick, and it can work for several hours," Miller told the *NYT*. "It's a great solution." Meanwhile, Brady claimed that one of Amazon's new warehouses uses an automated inventory management system called Sequoia, boosting the speed of package processing by 25 percent compared to older ones, while being 25 percent cheaper. ## Machine Churning The encroachment of the machines is a grim prospect for human warehouse workers, who may fear for their jobs. Fulfillment centers have high rates of employee turnover — jargon for people either getting fired or quitting the job a lot — because it's often grueling work for menial wages. Because companies like Amazon [will do anything to avoid paying their employees more](), automation is seen as a way to make up for the shortfall. Nonetheless, robot advocates say that automation will actually be good for workers. "Menial, mundane, repetitive tasks will be replaced by automation," Brady told the *NYT*. "That may freak people out, but it's going to allow people to focus more on what matters." Another argument is that the deployment of robots will necessitate new jobs to oversee the technology, but a manager at one of Amazon's fulfillment centers told the *NYT* there were only around 100 such jobs out of the 2,500 who worked there. **More on robots:** *[Robot Dog Spotted Guarding Mar-a-Lago]()* ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()