China drafts one ID code for every robot it makes, capped at three times last year's output

China's industry ministry wants every robot made in the country to carry one lifelong ID code before it leaves the factory. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) posted draft rules for robot product identification codes on Nov. 6, open for comment until Dec. 5. They cover every complete robot manufactured in China, "including industrial robots, service robots and special robots of different structures and forms." Makers would draw their codes from a national platform, and in any year they may "generally" request no more than 300% of their actual output the year before.

That cap makes the scheme more than a safety label. A maker has to file every code it uses within 20 working days, and codes drawn the previous year but still unfiled on Jan. 31 are cancelled. The platform would show MIIT how many robots each company really built, model by model. The statistics bureau publishes robot output only as a total for firms above designated size. A company that wants more than three times last year's codes has to upload output figures to justify the request; a first-time applicant sizes it from its capacity design report.

From 28,000 humanoids to every robot China makes

The model is a humanoid scheme that MIIT's humanoid and embodied-AI standards committee launched on May 22, with a 29-character code in four segments. By then it had coded more than 28,000 robots across more than 200 models from more than 100 companies, China News Service reported. The new draft is far bigger. In September alone, Chinese firms above designated size made 96,752 industrial robots and 1,658,178 service robots, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (our report). At that pace, the platform would take in more than 60 times the humanoid scheme's whole tally every month.

Each code has four parts (manufacturer, product description, serial number and an "other" field) and follows national standard GB/T 48541-2026. Makers must mark every robot in at least three forms: digitally stored, human-readable and machine-readable. The code must stay unchanged for the robot's life and be impossible to erase. Users can look up the records, and city-level industry authorities may push the code into after-sales service, quality tracing, second-hand sales, recycling and safety supervision.

The draft names no penalty and no start date

The strongest case against reading this as a ledger is what the draft leaves out. Its six chapters cover registration, coding and filing, use, and policy support, but none sets a penalty for a maker that stays off the platform. The only bans are on forging codes and on using codes that were never registered and filed. The start date reads "202X." Robots sold before the rules take effect need only their makers' own serial numbers filed, with no new codes. IT Home notes that the national standard behind the code is a recommended GB/T standard, which binds in practice only where an administrative rule cites it. This draft cites it.

The comment period ends Dec. 5. The final text will show whether a maker that ships robots without codes faces anything at all, and that decides whether the 300% cap counts China's robots or only labels the ones whose makers sign up.