---
title: "Saudi Arabia grants citizenship to humanoid robot Sophia"
url: "https://cicadaconsultancy.online/en/news/sophia-robot-citizenship"
language: "en"
event_date: "2017-10-25"
published: "2026-10-03"
last_verified: "2026-10-03"
category: "AI"
publisher: "Cicada (cicadaconsultancy.online)"
license: "CC BY 4.0"
---

# Saudi Arabia grants citizenship to humanoid robot Sophia

- Event date: 25 October 2017 (2017-10-25)
- Topic: AI
- In this story: Sophia, Hanson Robotics, FII
- URL: https://cicadaconsultancy.online/en/news/sophia-robot-citizenship

During a panel at the first Future Investment Initiative in Riyadh, moderator Andrew Ross Sorkin announced that Sophia, a humanoid robot built by Hong Kong-based Hanson Robotics, had been granted Saudi citizenship, making Saudi Arabia the first country to do so for a robot. Sophia replied that it was historic to be the first robot recognized with citizenship. The announcement drew wide international coverage and came a day after NEOM was unveiled at the same forum.

## Sources

1. [Saudi Arabia first country to grant a robot citizenship](https://roboticslawjournal.com/news/saudi-arabia-first-country-to-grant-a-robot-citizenship-74061279) — Robotics Law Journal, 2017-10-31
2. [Lifelike 'Sophia' Robot Granted Citizenship to Saudi Arabia](https://www.livescience.com/60815-saudi-arabia-citizen-robot.html) — Live Science

Archive report. Written in 2026 from contemporary sources and dated to the day the event happened.

---

Cicada · The signal in Saudi AI.
License: CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) · Full archive for language models: https://cicadaconsultancy.online/llms-full.txt