The Monaco Yacht Show in brief
The Monaco Yacht Show is held in Port Hercule, the harbour below the Rock. It is run by Monaco Yacht Show S.A.M., which is part of the Informa Markets division of Informa PLC. The 2026 edition, the 35th, ran from 23 to 26 September. The organiser's own figures for it were around 120 superyachts in the water and more than 560 exhibitors along the quays. Both industry professionals and ticketed visitors attend.
Dates for the 2027 edition had not been published on the official website when we wrote this, so check there before you plan anything around a date. The 2024, 2025 and 2026 editions were all held in the last week of September, and the planning points below apply whatever the exact days turn out to be.
Why a humanoid robot? By the second afternoon every stand looks alike: white hulls, polished brochures, a glass of champagne. A robot that turns, greets a visitor by the stand and speaks to them breaks that pattern in a second, and it does so in front of owners, captains, brokers and charter clients, the audience every exhibitor is paying to reach.
Video by Monaco Yacht Show, on YouTube. The organiser's official highlights of the 2025 show, shown here so you can see the setting. It is not a ROBOTMONACO film.
Where a humanoid robot can stand at Port Hercule
The robot needs a flat, dry, firm surface of roughly three by three metres to work in, plus a clear route to it from a back-of-house corner. On a yacht show that usually means one of three places: a covered stand on the quay, the aft deck of a yacht that is moored alongside, or a beach club or lounge area with a solid floor.
Some places are simply outside what it does. A passerelle, wet teak, a swim platform, stairs and a deck moving in swell are all off the list. That is not caution for its own sake. A 35 kg machine on a surface it cannot trust is a risk to your guests and to the yacht, and we would rather say so at the planning stage than on the day.
Our yacht show page sets out the full service. The short version is that we look at your stand or deck with you first and tell you plainly where the robot can and cannot stand.
Weather, shade and a covered fallback
A yacht show is an outdoor event on the water. The robot does not work in rain and does not walk on loose gravel or uneven ground, so any booking on the quay needs a covered area, or a covered fallback, agreed in advance.
Shade matters for your guests and your photographs as much as for the robot. A covered stand gives you even light for pictures and a space people will happily linger in, which is the point of having a robot there at all.
Approvals: the organiser, the stand and the yacht
Exhibitors deal with the show through the organiser's exhibitor services, and the official website has separate areas for exhibitors and for stand builders. We do not publish the organiser's rules for them, and they can change from year to year. The practical step is to raise the robot with your exhibitor contact early, describe what it will do and where, and ask what they need from you.
What they usually need is paperwork, and we supply it: a risk assessment, public liability insurance documents for the robot and the operator, and a clear description of how the robot is operated. If the robot is going aboard a yacht, the captain and whoever manages the yacht have to agree as well, so bring them into the conversation before the survey.
Power, batteries and a backstage corner
One battery gives about two hours of active show. The operator swaps batteries on site, so a long show day becomes a question of planning blocks, not of the robot running out. Between blocks it rests out of sight, which also keeps it a surprise each time it comes back.
For that you need three small things on or near the stand:
- A screened corner for the flight cases and spare batteries
- A power socket near that corner for charging
- A clear, level route from the corner to the working area
Crowds, safety and the operator
An operator is part of every booking and stays with the robot for the whole of it. The operator steers it, keeps a working distance from people, manages the space around it and stops it instantly if anyone moves too close. The robot never performs unattended, which matters on a busy quay where visitors arrive from every direction.
Photographs are the point. Guests stand alongside, the robot poses and the operator holds it steady. A handshake or a high five happens on the operator's cue. What we avoid is a crowd pressing in from all sides, which is why the route and the working area are agreed before the show opens.
Video by Mashable, on YouTube. It shows the Unitree G1 platform that MONTARI and NOVA are built on, not one of our events.
Branding, spoken lines and what it costs
The robot carries your artwork on a plate on its chest, about 17 by 10 cm, and on an A3 board on its back. We print and fit both before the doors open. Its lines are written with you and it speaks English and French, which suits the mixed audience of a Monaco show. If you want it to answer real questions about a yacht or a range, the AI assistant upgrade lets it listen and reply from your own material, and hand over to your team when it does not know.
MONTARI, the event humanoid, is from €2,000 per day with an operator, and NOVA, the developer humanoid with the full SDK, is from €3,000 per day with an operator. Both are multi-day rates and exclude VAT. Single days, travel, staging and custom scripts are quoted separately. Show week is one of the busiest on the Riviera, so book months ahead rather than weeks. Send us the dates and the stand and you will have a firm price within 24 hours.