The Evolution of Digit: How Agility Robotics Went from Cassie to Digit 5

Agility Robotics has spent more than a decade developing its Digit humanoid, producing five distinct versions along the way.

The company began in Oregon State University's Dynamic Robotics Lab and has since grown to three offices, more than 400 employees, and a factory capable of building up to 10,000 robots a year.

With Digit 5 now released, Jonathan Hurst, Agility's co-founder and chief robot officer, told The Robot Report that the newest versions are designed around the realities of doing real work inside partner facilities.

Agility's story began with Cassie, a bipedal robot built for speed, which took its first steps in 2016. Hurst describes Cassie as representing the company's R&D phase.

Cassie's ostrich-like legs became a signature feature of Agility robots through Digit 5. Hurst said reaching a bird-like leg configuration was "entirely coincidental, but promising and encouraging," noting that ostriches can run 40 mph and keep going all day — the same goal the team pursued.

Cassie kept setting records even after Agility stopped iterating on it. In 2022 it ran 100 meters without falling in 24.73 seconds at OSU's Whyte Track and Field Center, earning a Guinness World Record for the fastest 100 meters by a bipedal robot.

Agility released the first Digit in 2017, making it an early entrant into what is now a crowded humanoid market.

Hurst said the first Digit marked the start of the company's proof-of-concept era, and Agility noted the initial version was built for researchers.

By the time Digit 3 arrived in 2019, Agility was ready to commercialize the robot for the first time, focusing on delivering packages to customers' doors and stacking boxes in warehouses.

Digit's legs gave it an edge over other delivery robots that typically cannot bring packages all the way to the front door. Digit 3 could pick up and stack boxes weighing up to 40 lb. (18 kg).

That same year, Agility sold its first two production-line robots to Ford, which planned to explore placing Digit in self-driving delivery vans.