What work can robots do?

Advances in large language models have raised the possibility of automating large swaths of work. But many jobs are physical. AI’s impact on the economy will in part depend on robotics.¹

Predicting the pace of robot advances is difficult, but enumerating capabilities today, we argue, can give insight into the coming years. We develop a measure of job exposure to robots, using Claude to assess how well present-day robots can perform work tasks. A job is more exposed when robots can do more of its tasks in less controlled environments. A robot is cost-competitive when it can do the same task for cheaper than a human worker.

We find that robots can already perform 74% of physical tasks in the US, making up 34% of working hours. Robots and LLMs together expose all but one-fifth of employment.

It’s difficult to predict exactly how these efforts will affect jobs and productivity. A ranking of occupations by current robot task coverage suggests where the impacts will appear first. Robots should affect jobs that they can already do before jobs they could do only with new technology and, in some cases, accommodating regulations. Current capabilities are also concrete and measurable, while forecasts of future capabilities must bet on which technologies will succeed.⁷ Robots still in development support our focus on current exposure: firms are testing humanoids in car factories and warehouses, structured environments where robots are already common.⁸

Figure 2 gives examples of task ratings, along with fuller descriptions of each exposure tier from our exposure prompt and a robot cited to support each rating. We also calculate the share of physical tasks in each tier: here and throughout, each task is weighted by the number of workers who do it, and by the fraction of working time they spend on it, which we estimate with Claude.¹⁹

But we also find significant barriers to adoption: most robots require highly structured environments, and are cost-competitive with people for just 0.3% of work. If robot price declines follow past trends, it will take 40 years for that share to reach just 10%. After cost, the main barrier is capability, such as the dexterity needed to untangle wires. Human preferences and regulations further limit robot adoption for a significant share of tasks.

Our core premise is that jobs are more likely to be impacted when robots can already do their work today. A backtest across 50 years validates this approach: from 1977 to today, jobs that were more exposed to existing robots experienced wage and employment declines in later decades.

If the past is any guide, taxi drivers and warehouse packers will see changes sooner than nurses and mechanics. We expect that physical work will first be automated where robots have a foothold today.