Humanoid Robots and the Polish Labor Market

Poland today has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the European Union (3.4% in July 2026 according to Eurostat, second-lowest in the EU — Polskie Radio; registered unemployment per GUS was 5.8% in August 2026 — money.pl), yet in many physical sectors (logistics, manufacturing, elder care) employers have for years been unable to find enough workers. That backdrop changes how humanoid robots should be discussed in the context of the Polish labor market: "will they take jobs?" is a less fitting question than "will they fill a gap that people cannot fill?"

A Worker Shortage, Not a Surplus of Hands

The Capgemini Research Institute report "Physical AI: Taking human-robot collaboration to the next level" (April 2026, a survey of 1,678 executives in 15 industries), described by the daily "Rzeczpospolita" (rp.pl), names labor shortages (74% of mentions) and rising labor costs (69%) as the most frequently cited expected benefits of deploying physical AI (Capgemini). In the same survey 67% of executives believe humanoid robots will ultimately transform their industry, but the average expected timeline to scale humanoid deployments is seven years. This is a significant difference from the debate in, say, the United States, where fear of job losses is louder. In Poland, the starting point for many employers is more often "who will do this work if we have no one to hire?" than "whom do we lay off?"

The demographic outlook reinforces this direction: according to the GUS population forecast for 2023-2060, Poland's working-age population will fall from 22.2 million in 2022 to 13.3-16.6 million in 2060, a drop of 25-40% depending on the scenario (GUS; discussed by Forsal), alongside continued demand for physical labor in warehouses, on construction sites and in caring for an aging society.

How Much Work in Poland Could Theoretically Be Automated

The McKinsey report "Ramię w ramię z robotem" ("Side by side with the robot"; McKinsey, published in 2019) estimates that activities taking up 49% of working time in Poland, roughly the equivalent of 7.3 million jobs, could be automated by 2030 with existing technologies. That does not mean 7.3 million layoffs, only that many full-time equivalents of tasks are technically suited to automation. The same report says Polish GDP could be 15% higher in 2030 thanks to automation, and average annual growth over 2020-2030 more than 1 percentage point higher. The report predates humanoid robots and concerns automation in general.

It pays to keep some distance from these figures: they are probabilistic models, an estimate of technical potential and not a firm forecast of what will happen. The pace of real deployments depends on factors that are hard to predict in advance: robot prices (see our article on the TCO calculation for a humanoid robot), availability of service in Poland, regulation, and the ordinary caution of companies investing in a new, still-maturing technology.

Skeptical Voices: Not Everything a Demo Shows Works on the Factory Floor

Some industry commentators temper the enthusiasm around humanoid robots, pointing to the gap between impressive media shows and real performance in production conditions. In an interview published by xyz.pl, the interviewee says the humanoid direction "looks good in marketing" and recalls that many impressive demos turned out to be remotely operated by a person, which shows how far we still are from full autonomy. This is an important caveat for any forecast: the current generation of humanoid robots handles repetitive, predictable tasks well and does worse in situations that call for improvisation.

Which Jobs Change First

The order of deployment suggested by pilots around the world so far (including UBTech in automotive factories, described in our article on Chinese humanoid robots) points to three groups of tasks that reach robots first:

• simple, repetitive physical tasks: carrying, sorting and packing in warehouses and on assembly lines;
• work in hazardous or monotonous environments: quality control in harsh conditions, operating machines amid noise or high temperatures;
• care tasks that assist staff: help in care facilities with physical chores (for example transporting and lifting), not replacing contact with the patient.

At the same time, demand is growing for new roles: technicians supervising robots, programmers integrating robotic systems with existing infrastructure, and specialists responsible for safety and compliance with standards. Automation therefore shifts employment from simple physical work toward operating, programming and maintaining systems. Manual workers do not disappear from the market, but the nature of their duties changes.

How Unions and Workers React

Experience from other countries shows that the mere announcement of robots in a workplace can unsettle the workforce, even when the real scope of automation is still small. For a Polish employer, the takeaway is practical: communicating with the workforce before a pilot, explaining clearly which tasks the robot will take over and why, and what the future holds for the employees who did them until now, reduces the risk of conflict more than the technology itself reduces the risk of error.

The Role of Regulation and Industrial Policy

The pace of deployments in Poland will also depend on the regulatory and tax environment, not just on the maturity of the technology. Poland's robotization tax relief (ulga na robotyzację), in force since 2022, lets companies deduct an additional amount of up to 50% of qualifying robotization costs from their tax base. On 27 August 2026 a draft law (UD461) was entered in the government's legislative work list that would extend it by another 10 tax years with the deduction unchanged (MDDP); at the time of publication this had not yet been enacted. An instrument like this lowers the real entry threshold for smaller companies that would otherwise put off their first deployment. At the same time, requirements are growing for workplace safety around robots that work alongside people and, for machines fitted with cameras, obligations under the GDPR, which we cover separately in our article on data security and robots with cameras.

What This Means for Polish Companies Today

A company considering its first pilot with a humanoid robot in Poland should treat it as a project to supplement staff where recruitment has been failing for months, not as a headcount-reduction program. That direction is both more realistic for the business (current technology will not fully replace an experienced worker in complex tasks) and easier to communicate to the workforce without needless tension. Keep in mind, too, that deploying a first robot carries the investment costs described in our guide to the TCO calculation. The decision is best made on the calculated profitability of a specific task, not on a simple wish to keep up with the trend.