BattleBots

BattleBots is an American robot combat television series and company. BattleBots is a series of competitions in which competitors design and operate remote-controlled armed and armored machines designed to fight in an arena combat elimination tournament. As a show, BattleBots aired for five seasons on Comedy Central (2000–2002), returning with two seasons on ABC (2015–2016) and five more on Discovery Channel (2018–2023), in addition to several spin-offs.

BattleBots was inspired by untelevised American Robot Wars competitions (1994–1997), created by Marc Thorpe. Thorpe's competitions also inspired the British TV program Robot Wars (1998–2004, 2016–2018), which acquired the name's television rights in 1995. Starting in 1997, Marc Thorpe's ability to continue his Robot Wars competitions came under legal threat from his former sponsor. In response, competitors Greg Munson and Trey Roski put together a new company, BattleBots, as an unofficial continuation of the American competitions. The first official BattleBots event was hosted at the Long Beach Pyramid in Long Beach, California, in August 1999, while a second event in Las Vegas was used to pitch the competition to television networks.

For five seasons, BattleBots aired on the American Comedy Central and was hosted by Bil Dwyer, Sean Salisbury, and Tim Green. Comedy Central's first season premiered on August 23, 2000, and its fifth and last season ended on December 21, 2002. While small untelevised competitions continued to be run under the BattleBots name since 2002, the show was on hiatus until it was revived on ABC in 2015.

A six-episode revival series premiered on ABC on June 21, 2015, to generally favorable reviews and ratings. Additionally, ABC renewed BattleBots for a seventh season, which premiered on June 23, 2016. In February 2018, Discovery Channel and Science picked up the show for an eighth season, which premiered on May 11, 2018. A ninth season of BattleBots premiered on Discovery Channel on June 7, 2019, the tenth season premiered on December 3, 2020, the eleventh season on January 6, 2022, and the twelfth season on January 5, 2023.

Two spin-off competitions have debuted on Discovery+. The first spin-off, BattleBots: Bounty Hunters, premiered on January 4, 2021, on Discovery+. A second spin-off premiered on August 5, 2022, under the name BattleBots: Champions.