Cobots vs Industrial Robots for Welding and Palletising: Which Do You Need?

Oct 5

3 min read

Collaborative robots, or cobots, have made automation far more accessible. They're light, easy to program and can often work with less guarding than a traditional robot. That has led many people to assume a cobot is the obvious first robot. Sometimes it is. Often, an industrial robot is the better buy. Here's how to tell the difference.

The key differences

	Collaborative robot	Industrial robot
Typical payload	3 to 30 kg	3 kg to over 1,000 kg
Speed in production	Limited when people are nearby	Full speed inside guarding
Guarding	Reduced, based on risk assessment	Fencing, light curtains or scanners
Programming	Hand-guiding and simple interfaces	Pendant or offline programming, more capable
Footprint and portability	Small, often on a mobile base	Fixed installation
Robustness	Lighter duty	Built for 24/7 heavy industrial use
Robot cost	Similar or lower	Similar to much higher, by size

"Collaborative" describes the application, not the robot

This is the most misunderstood point. A cobot isn't automatically safe. What matters is whether the whole application, including the tool, the part and the process, is safe for people nearby. The 2025 revision of ISO 10218 now covers collaborative applications directly and requires a risk assessment like any other robot cell.

A cobot carrying a welding torch is still running an arc, with UV, fume, spatter and a hot torch. A cobot moving a sharp sheet-metal blank can still cut someone. Many cobot welding and palletising cells end up with screens, scanners or fencing anyway, which removes much of the space and cost advantage.

Cobots for welding

Where cobots work well:

Short to medium batches of small to medium parts.
Shops new to automation that want welders to program jobs themselves.
A mobile cart that moves between benches or is wheeled out of the way.

Where industrial robots win:

High volumes, where full-speed moves between welds cut cycle time.
Large or heavy parts needing positioners and tracks under coordinated control.
Advanced processes, seam tracking and multi-robot cells.
Two-station layouts where the robot never waits for loading.

Cobots for palletising

Cobot palletisers suit low-rate lines, typically up to around 6 to 10 cases per minute with light cartons, and they fit where space is tight. Above that rate, with heavier products, or for bags and layers, an industrial palletising robot is faster, reaches higher stacks and handles far more weight.

Cobots for machine tending

Machine tending is one of the best cobot applications: light parts, modest speeds, and easy redeployment between machines. For heavy parts, short cycle times or one robot serving two machines, an industrial robot is usually the better choice.

How to decide

Ask four questions:

What's the payload, including the gripper or torch?
What rate do you need at peak?
Will people really work alongside it, or will it be fenced off anyway?
Will it stay in one place for years, or move between jobs?

If the answers are light, slow, shared and mobile, a cobot fits. If they're heavy, fast, fenced and fixed, go industrial.

Unbiased advice from DPAC

DPAC Robotics & Automation works with both collaborative and industrial robots, so we recommend what suits the job rather than what we happen to sell. Every cell, cobot or not, is designed and validated with a full risk assessment by our TÜV-certified functional safety engineer.

Not sure which robot fits your application? Tell us what you need to weld, stack or load, and we'll recommend the right robot.