By Nisha Gopalan

File photo: LONG WEI / Feature China / Future Publishing via Getty Images

Tesla (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk has long touted humanoid robots as key to the electric vehicle maker's future. Now he's putting a number on its value. 

In a post on his X social media platform Monday, Musk said "~80% of Tesla's value will be Optimus" humanoid robots.  He didn't state when he expects that to happen in the post, made soon after the company published its latest "Master Plan," which featured Optimus for the first time.

Optimus "is changing not only the perception of labor itself but its availability and capability," Tesla said in its "Master Plan Part IV," though the robots have yet to be sold to customers.

Musk has previously suggested the robots, which are expected to cost between $20,000 and $30,000, could be sold to other companies as soon as next year, with sales to consumers set to follow after that.

The robots are already performing some "simple factory tasks" for Tesla, according to the CEO, who has said he expects "thousands" of Optimus robots working in Tesla factories by the end of 2025, and that the company could produce 1 million robots a year by 2030. During the company's second-quarter earnings call in July, Musk said "it'll probably be prototypes of Optimus 3 end of this year and then scale production next year," according to a transcript provided by AlphaSense.

Meanwhile, Tesla's core EV business continues to struggle. Its second-quarter revenue dropped 12% year-over-year to $22.5 billion, worse than expected, and Musk warned the company could have a "few rough quarters" ahead, with the expiration of EV tax credits later this month likely to weigh on demand, after President Trump signed the "One Big Beautiful Bill" into law in July.

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Tesla shares were about 2% lower in recent trading, amid broader declines in U.S. stocks as uncertainty about tariffs weighed on markets. With Tuesday's slide, they've lost nearly a fifth of their value since the start of the year.

Source: Investopedia