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In 1920, Czech writer Karel Čapek published a play titled R.U.R. Those initials stood for "Rossum's Universal Robots," which was the name of a fictional company that manufactured human-like machines designed to perform hard, dull, dangerous work for people. The machines in the play eventually grew to resent their jobs and rebelled—with disastrous results for humans. During the writing of his play, Čapek consulted with his brother, the painter and writer Josef Čapek, who suggested the name robot for these machines, from the Czech word robota, which means "forced labor." Robot made its way into our language in 1922 when R.U.R. was translated into English.
Examples of robot in a Sentence
Mrigakshi Dixit, Interesting Engineering, 29 Oct. 2025
Purchasing the robot requires a $200 deposit.
—Michelle Del Rey, USA Today, 29 Oct. 2025
Just as news outlets shared leaked Amazon documents suggesting the company could replace half a million warehouse jobs with robots, the e-commerce giant pulled the rug out and laid off 14,000 middle managers instead.
—Eva Roytburg, Fortune, 29 Oct. 2025
More often than not, the towel catches on the edge of the basket and the robot freezes.
—Dominique Mosbergen, Time, 16 Oct. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Robot.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/robot. Accessed 4 Nov. 2025.
Copy CitationKids Definition
robot
noun
from Czech robot "a machine that looks human and performs dull or dangerous work," from robota "forced labor, work"
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