They look like small vans with a face, but nobody sits behind the wheel. In China, autonomous delivery vehicles are already on the road carrying parcels, groceries and other goods. And the companies behind them have now built fleets of tens of thousands of vehicles.
The orange-and-white carts moving through ordinary traffic make it clear at once why this development stands out. A cargo space on wheels takes over part of the delivery work. While robotaxis grab attention by carrying people, companies such as Neolix and Zelos are building a market for goods that travel from A to B on their own.
Neolix: from 10,000 to around 27,000 vehicles
One of the big players is Neolix. In September 2025 the manufacturer celebrated the delivery of its 10,000th autonomous vehicle. A year later the scale has grown considerably: in a company announcement from September 2026, Neolix cites roughly 27,000 RoboVans deployed worldwide and more than 230 million kilometres driven.
The cargo space is also more serious than the toy-like appearance suggests. According to Neolix’s product specifications, an X3 can carry around 400 to 500 parcels per trip; for the larger X6 the company quotes 800 to 1,000. That makes them attractive for runs between depots, shops and pick-up points.
Zelos is growing fast, with Cainiao on board
Rival Zelos, also known as Zelostech, shows how quickly this market is moving. The company says its fleet grew from 200 vehicles in 2023 to 2,000 in 2024 and more than 20,000 by early 2026. That figure includes the integration of the autonomous delivery vehicle unit of Cainiao, the logistics company within the Alibaba group.
The work goes well beyond dropping off parcels. Zelos also lists fresh food, supermarket distribution and refrigerated pharmaceutical transport. According to the manufacturer, the Z5 offers more than five cubic metres of cargo space and can carry a tonne. So one of these robovans can take a substantial load.
Meituan uses them to deliver groceries
Alongside the specialist manufacturers, delivery platform Meituan is also involved. The company deploys autonomous vehicles it developed itself for fresh groceries and everyday essentials. By the end of 2024, according to Meituan’s sustainability report, they had already completed almost five million deliveries and covered thirteen million autonomous kilometres.
On its technology page, Meituan gives the delivery vehicle a payload of 205 kilograms and a capacity of 1,850 litres, based on data up to December 2025. That is a different use case from a van full of parcels: bringing groceries and daily purchases from a local delivery network to residential areas.
The robot drives, people load and unload
DHL describes its partnership with Zelostech in Singapore to show how this works in practice. An employee loads the goods and sends the vehicle on its way via an app. The vehicle drives itself to the destination, where a colleague takes over the cargo.
On the DHL site, a vehicle like this can carry up to three pallets and 1.5 tonnes per trip. DHL cites an average of forty trips a day. It is precisely this repetitive shuttle work that makes autonomous logistics attractive: the same route, again and again, while people focus on the goods and the customers.
And Europe? Brussels is on the schedule
The move closer to home is already being prepared. In September, Neolix announced a twelve-month trial in Brussels together with Espaces-Mobilités and Stalem. The plan is to run autonomous vehicles between a depot near Brussels-South station and shops on the southern edge of the low-traffic city centre, for deliveries and waste collection.
The planned start is in the fourth quarter of 2026, once the required test permits are in place. The carts will work alongside existing solutions such as cargo bikes. What China already deploys at scale will thus get a practical test closer to home: could part of delivery traffic soon simply do its own rounds?
