Meet Microduck: A Rollerskating Robot You Can Actually Buy

Hugging Face, a company known for making AI tools widely available to regular people, has just launched something genuinely fun: the Microduck. It's a small robot — less than 10 inches tall — shaped like a cute duck with one eye, and it comes in four colors: cream, graphite, lavender, and sky blue.

So what can this little robot actually do? Videos show it picking up everyday items like socks and markers, kicking a ball around, and zooming across the floor on tiny rollerskates. You can control it using a game controller (like you would a video game), or you can let it move around on its own. The robot can also react to things around it — for example, it will chase a laser pointer if you point one at it.

The Microduck's software is open-source, which is a fancy way of saying the instructions that make it work are freely available for anyone to study, modify, or improve. This means hobbyists and developers can customize how their robot behaves. You can preorder one right now for $399, and Hugging Face says they plan to start shipping them before Christmas 2026.

While this might seem like just a cute toy, it's part of a bigger trend: making robots more affordable and accessible to everyday people, not just large companies or researchers.