I researched 7 Skild AI alternatives in 2025: What works for business today

I’ve spent the last few weeks in a rabbit hole of advanced AI, and honestly, it’s been a wild ride. It all started when I stumbled upon a video from Skild AI showing a robot learning and adapting on the fly. This whole idea of an "omni-bodied" brain that can jump into any machine and just know how to operate it feels like something straight out of a movie.

But then, I had to snap back to reality. While that technology is mind-bending, it's not going to solve my problems today. Most of us aren't trying to teach a robot how to use a power tool; we're just trying to keep our heads above water with an overflowing customer support queue.

That got me searching for the best Skild AI alternatives you can actually use in 2025. My journey started with the pioneers of physical robotics but led me to a much more practical discovery: AI platforms that use that same "brain-like" intelligence to solve the digital problems businesses are dealing with right now.

What is a robotics foundation model?

Before we dive into the alternatives, let’s quickly unpack what Skild AI is actually building. A robotics foundation model is a huge, flexible AI that’s been trained on a staggering amount of data, think countless simulations, videos, and real-world interactions. The end goal is to create one AI that can handle a massive range of physical jobs across many different types of robots.

This is where their "omni-bodied brain" idea comes into play. Instead of building one AI for a dog-like robot, another for a humanoid one, and a third for a factory arm, they’re building a single intelligence that can run all of them. It’s a huge leap toward creating robots that can adapt to messy, unpredictable places, from a busy warehouse to a disaster zone.

It got me thinking, though. This concept of a central, adaptable "brain" isn't just for the physical world. The same idea is already being used to automate knowledge work and communication online, and that’s something we can all benefit from today.

Our criteria for the best Skild AI alternatives

Since we're straddling two different worlds here, physical robotics and digital operations, the criteria for a good alternative have to be a bit flexible. To make sense of it all, I broke things down by asking a few key questions:

• Domain: Is the AI built for the physical world of robots or the digital world of business?

• Time to Value: How fast can you actually see results? Are we talking years of research and development, or can you get set up in minutes?

• Core Application: What’s the main problem it solves? Is it about moving things around physically or automating customer support digitally?

• Adaptability: How well does the AI learn from new information within its specific area?

• Accessibility: Is this a top-secret project for researchers, or a self-serve tool that anyone can sign up for and start using immediately?

Comparison of top Skild AI alternatives in 2025

Here’s a quick table to show how the different options stack up at a glance.

Feature	Figure AI	Sanctuary AI	Physical Intelligence	eesel AI	ServiceNow	Intercom
Primary Focus	Humanoid Robotics	General-Purpose Robots	Embodied AI	AI for Customer Support	Enterprise AI Suite	AI Chatbot Platform
Domain	Physical	Physical	Physical	Digital	Digital	Digital
Time to Value	5+ Years	5+ Years	3-5 Years	Minutes	Months	Weeks
Self-Serve?	No	No	No	Yes	No	Yes, but limited
Pricing Model	N/A (R&D)	N/A (R&D)	N/A (R&D)	Flat, predictable tiers	Custom enterprise contracts	Per-resolution/chat
Best For	Future of manual labor	Human-like task automation	Advanced robotics R&D	Instant support automation	Complex, custom workflows	Simple website chat

The 7 best Skild AI alternatives for the future (and for today)

Let's start with the visionaries building the robots of tomorrow, then switch gears to the tools that can make a real difference for your business today.

The pioneers of physical AI: Direct Skild AI alternatives

These companies are the true, direct Skild AI alternatives. They’re pushing the boundaries of what’s possible with robots and embodied AI. If you want a peek into the future of the physical world, these are the ones to keep an eye on.

1. Figure AI

Figure AI is betting big on building autonomous humanoid robots that can work alongside people, helping to fill labor gaps and take on jobs that are too dangerous for humans. Their demos are seriously impressive, and they have a clear goal of getting these robots into the commercial workforce.

• Pros: They have strong funding, clear business goals, and some very cool hardware demos.

• Cons: This is a long-term play. You can't just go out and buy one of their robots today. They still have huge technical and safety challenges to solve.

• Pricing: Not applicable. Figure AI is deep in the R&D phase, so there's no product on the market yet.

2. Sanctuary AI

Sanctuary AI is all about creating "human-like intelligence in general-purpose robots." What's interesting about them is their focus on their Phoenix™ robot and their AI control system, Carbon™. They're essentially trying to build a robot that can think and learn like a person.

• Pros: Their AI control system is incredibly sophisticated. They’re really focused on the cognitive side of things, not just the hardware.

• Cons: Their approach is very complex and academic. For now, the practical uses are still mostly theoretical.

• Pricing: None. Just like the other pioneers in this space, Sanctuary AI is focused on research, not selling a product.

3. Physical Intelligence

Physical Intelligence is another direct competitor working on AI models that allow robots to understand and interact with the physical world. They take a software-first approach, really hammering home that the "brain" is the most important part of the machine.

• Pros: They share Skild AI’s core mission of building the intelligence behind the robot, which is arguably the hardest part of the equation.

• Cons: They’re a bit quieter than Figure or Sanctuary, so it’s tougher to gauge their progress. It's anyone's guess when their tech might become a commercial product.

• Pricing: Not available, since they are a research-focused company.

The practical Skild AI alternatives: AI for your digital operations

While the companies above are building an incredible future, your business has problems that need solving right now. The same idea of an adaptable, centralized AI "brain" is already making waves in the digital world, especially in how companies manage their knowledge and communicate with customers. Here are the platforms that deliver on that promise today.

4. eesel AI

This is where the whole AI brain concept becomes immediately useful. eesel AI acts as an AI "brain" for your business's collective knowledge. Instead of learning to navigate a factory, it learns from your old Zendesk tickets, Confluence pages, Google Docs, and Slack messages to automate customer support and answer internal questions.

• Pros:

  • You can get it running in minutes: It's genuinely self-serve. You connect your help desk with one click and get going, no sales calls or mandatory demos required.

  • It pulls together all your knowledge: It connects to all the different places your team's knowledge is scattered and even trains on your past support tickets to automatically pick up your brand's voice.

  • Risk-free simulation: You can test the AI on thousands of your past tickets to see exactly how it would have performed. This gives you a real-world resolution rate before it ever interacts with a live customer.

  • Transparent pricing: The pricing is flat and predictable. You don’t get stung with a huge bill just because you had a busy support month.

• Cons: It’s focused on digital knowledge and communication, so it won’t be stacking boxes in your warehouse anytime soon.

• Pricing: eesel AI keeps it simple with straightforward plans. The Team plan is $299/month, or $239/month if you pay annually. The Business plan, which adds features like training on past tickets and AI actions, is $799/month, or $639/month annually. There are no sneaky per-resolution fees.

While Skild AI is building a brain for a robot's body, eesel AI builds one for your company's knowledge, and you can start using it today.

5. ServiceNow

ServiceNow is a beast of an AI platform built for large enterprises. It can run incredibly complex, custom workflows and automate processes across IT, HR, and customer service. It's the kind of tool that can manage an entire corporation's internal operations.

• Pros: Extremely powerful and can be customized for just about any enterprise workflow you can dream up.

• Cons: It’s the polar opposite of a simple, self-serve tool. Getting it set up takes months, a team of developers, and a very long sales process. It's a massive commitment.

• Pricing: ServiceNow doesn't list its prices online. You have to go through their sales team for a custom quote, which is typical for enterprise software and usually hints at a starting price in the high five or even six figures per year.

6. Intercom

Intercom is a well-known customer service platform, famous for its messenger and its AI agent, Fin. It's built to automate conversations and offer support directly on your website or inside your app.

• Pros: It’s a familiar name and is relatively easy to get started with for basic chat features.

• Cons: The pricing model can be a real headache. They charge a per-resolution fee, which means the more successful your AI is, the more you pay. A busy month can lead to a surprisingly large bill. You also get less fine-tuned control over what gets automated.

• Pricing: Intercom’s pricing has a few layers. There's a per-seat cost starting at $29/seat/month (paid annually) for the Essential plan. On top of that, you pay $0.99 for every single resolution their AI, Fin, handles. This "success tax" can make your costs unpredictable and hard to budget for.

7. Zendesk AI

Zendesk is one of the biggest players in customer support, and they have their own built-in AI. It’s designed to work smoothly within the Zendesk ecosystem, deflecting common questions and helping out human agents.

• Pros: Since it’s built-in, the integration with the Zendesk help desk is flawless. No setup required.

• Cons: It’s a classic "walled garden." Zendesk AI can only learn from information that’s already inside Zendesk. It can't tap into your company's real brain living in Google Docs, Confluence, or other tools. This really limits how helpful it can be and often makes it less capable than dedicated AI platforms.

• Pricing: Zendesk's AI features are bundled into their Suite plans, which start at $55/agent/month (annually). But here's the catch: these plans include a tiny number of "automated resolutions." For the Suite Team plan, you only get 5 free resolutions per agent each month. After that, you pay a steep $2.00 per resolution, making it even pricier than Intercom if you have a lot of volume.

How to choose the right Skild AI alternatives for your business needs

The decision here isn't about which AI is "smarter" in an abstract sense, but about which one actually solves the problems you have.

To figure that out, just ask yourself a few simple questions:

1. Is your problem physical or digital? This is the big one. Do you need to move boxes, or do you need to answer emails?

2. What’s your timeline? Are you looking for a fix this quarter, or are you investing in research for 2030?

3. What resources can you commit? Do you want a tool you can set up yourself this afternoon, or do you have an engineering team ready for a six-month integration project?

4. How important is your current workflow? Do you need an AI that fits into the tools you already use, like Zendesk and Slack, or are you willing to overhaul your entire system?

My advice? Start with the easy wins. For 99% of businesses, that means automating repetitive digital tasks and getting your company knowledge in one place, not deploying a humanoid robot.

Skild AI alternatives: Build your future, starting today

It’s impossible not to be impressed by what Skild AI and its robotics alternatives are doing. Their work is absolutely going to shape the future, and it’s exciting to watch.

But the core ideas powering that future, adaptable and constantly learning AI models, are already here and ready to use. You don't have to wait a decade to get the benefits of AI.

Platforms like eesel AI bring that power to the digital world where your business operates every single day. It gives you a central brain for your company's knowledge that can automate support, help your agents, and find answers in an instant. While robotics AI is still learning to walk, you can put an AI to work that's ready to run your support workflows today.

Ready to see what an AI brain can do for your business knowledge? Start your free trial of eesel AI and get set up in just a few minutes.