Jensen Huang walked onto the GTC Berlin stage and introduced a flock of small, waddling machines. Within a day, those Microduck robots had turned a keynote demonstration into a preorder surge of more than 20,000 units, according to Clem Delangue, a figure at Hugging Face.
A demo that spread fast
The video of Huang’s demonstration circulated widely after it appeared earlier this week. The clip showed the diminutive robots responding to spoken instructions, and the reaction was immediate enough that preorders crossed the 20,000 mark by the following day.
What the robots actually do
Microducks are not intended as industrial machines. They are small robot toys that obey voice commands, and their repertoire includes sitting, taking a nap, and performing a somersault. When they move, they emit noises reminiscent of R2-D2. Promotional footage places them in the hands of adults rather than children, framing them as playful devices rather than strictly kids’ products.
Shipping before the holidays
Buyers who placed early orders can expect delivery before Christmas, according to the timeline outlined alongside the preorder announcement. Delangue went further in his assessment of the product’s commercial trajectory, suggesting the Microduck could end the year as the best-selling robot. That claim has not been independently verified, and the brief does not include pricing or full technical specifications.
The ownership chain behind the duck
The company producing Microducks is Pollen Robotics, which Hugging Face acquired in 2025. Hugging Face itself was acquired by Nvidia in September. The corporate lineage matters for understanding how a small robot duck ended up on an Nvidia keynote stage: the device sits at the intersection of three organizations with different roles in the AI and robotics space.
Microducks are Hugging Face’s second robot. The first was Reachy Mini, which preceded the duck in the company’s hardware lineup.
Trained in simulation, shared by owners
The basic tricks that ship with each Microduck were taught in simulation using Nvidia’s technology stack, a process the company promoted under the banner of simulation-to-real-world training with its RTX Spark. That approach allows behaviors learned in a virtual environment to transfer to physical devices.
What happens after purchase is where the open-source nature of the product becomes relevant. Microducks are open source, and owners are not limited to the factory-installed commands. They can train new tricks themselves and share those tricks with the broader community. Pollen Robotics has confirmed this capability, which turns each robot into a small platform for experimentation rather than a fixed toy.
A light story with a serious backdrop
The enthusiasm around a waddling robot duck stands in contrast to the broader news cycle, which has recently included reports of AI-related cyberattacks. For a moment, the conversation around artificial intelligence shifted from security concerns to a stage demonstration and a preorder counter.
Whether the Microduck fulfills Delangue’s best-seller prediction will depend on factors not yet disclosed, including final pricing and production capacity. What is clear is that a brief appearance at GTC Berlin converted curiosity into more than 20,000 orders, and that the devices are expected to reach customers before the holiday season.
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