What bomb squads pay for robots: the public receipts

Price per robot

💣 Bomb-disposal robots 11 receipts

🛡️ Tactical robots for SWAT and standoffs 3 receipts

What the paperwork shows

1. Size sets the price: about 40× from smallest to largest.

   Throwable and small tactical robots: $13,304–$18,794 each. Compact, man-portable bomb robots: $48,500–$210,293 each. Full-size EOD vehicles with a heavy arm: $250,000–$540,144. Ask which size the job needs before you compare quotes.

   Receipts: DFW Airport 2026 · Olathe 2026 · Jacksonville 2026 · NYPD 2025 · Fort Lauderdale 2024 · Austin 2023 · Austin 2022 · Sacramento 2019 · Phoenix 2019 · Austin 2017 · Phoenix 2021 · Pittsburgh 2021

2. They wear out, and support ends.

   5 of these 14 orders replace older robots. Sacramento was replacing an 18-year-old robot; DFW Airport says its fleet "aged out" and the vendor no longer services it. Ask for a written support and parts period.

   Receipts: DFW Airport 2026 · Olathe 2026 · Austin 2023 · Austin 2023 · Sacramento 2019

3. Grants pay for many of them.

   4 receipts name a Homeland Security grant as a funding source. Jacksonville's grant covered USD 220,551 of USD 294,068; Austin's Spot order is USD 250,000 grant plus USD 54,619 from the police budget.

   Receipts: Jacksonville 2026 · Austin 2023 · Austin 2017 · Austin 2025

4. At least 8 of 14 skipped an open bid.

   4 went through an existing cooperative or GSA contract and 4 were sole source or had bidding suspended (the other receipts don't say how the robot was bought). That is fast, but it leaves no rival quote on the record. If you can, get one.

   Receipts: DFW Airport 2026 · Austin 2023 · Austin 2022 · Austin 2025 · Sacramento 2019 · Phoenix 2019 · Austin 2017 · Phoenix 2021

5. A request is not a price.

   8 of these 14 receipts are a request to council or a proposed maximum; we did not see the final approval. We label each one and add a new row when the final figure is published.

   Receipts: DFW Airport 2026 · NYPD 2025 · Austin 2023 · Austin 2023 · Austin 2022 · Sacramento 2019 · Austin 2017 · Austin 2025

Before you sign: five questions

1. What size does the job need? A throwable robot for looking into a room and a full-size EOD vehicle that lifts and disrupts are different purchases. The receipts here differ by more than 10× in price per robot.
2. What is in the price? Accessories, camera repeaters, training and warranties are often in the order total. Ask for a line-item quote.
3. How long will the maker support it? Ask for a written support and parts period. Several of these orders replace robots that were no longer serviced.
4. Is there a second quote? Cooperative contracts and sole-source buys are quick but leave no rival price. One more quote is cheap insurance.
5. Who pays after the grant? Grants often cover the purchase but not batteries, repairs or the next replacement. Budget the years after.

Also see: bomb disposal robots and police tactical robots (providers and every price), what airports pay for robots, how to write a robot quote request.

How this page is built

• Rows: prices in our dataset for the bomb-disposal and police tactical robot jobs where the buyer is a US public agency. Each row is tagged by hand (buyer, robot, count, size, status, how it was bought, who paid) after reading the source.
• Status is what the document shows: approved (vote or approval seen), approved ceiling (not-to-exceed), requested (council agenda; we did not see the vote) or proposed maximum. Drone programs are not on this page.
• “Per robot” is the order total divided by the robot count in the same source, marked “our arithmetic”. Nothing is estimated or converted.
• Size buckets are ours, from the source's description of the robot.
• Our price history is append-only: when a final figure is published we add a row and keep the old one.
• Know a public bomb-squad robot purchase we missed? Send the link.