Motion Planning

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Overview

Motion planning determines how a robot or vehicle can move from a starting state to a goal while avoiding obstacles and respecting limits on dynamics, sensing, and interaction with others. Classical approaches include sampling-based planners such as RRT and PRM, graph search and motion primitives, and trajectory optimization methods such as model predictive control and convex optimization. Learning-based methods, including imitation learning, diffusion models, and learned world models, increasingly propose or refine plans, often alongside geometric checks, reachability analysis, and control barrier functions for safety. A central challenge is balancing speed, solution quality, and formal reliability in uncertain, dynamic, high-dimensional settings, especially when plans must transfer from simulation to physical execution.

Latest papers

CardsList

414 papers60 papers in the last four weeks, up 11% on the four weeks before. 0.3% of all new papers.

  1. ScanDP: Generalizable 3D Scanning with Diffusion Policy

    Mar 11, 2026Itsuki Hirako, Ryo Hakoda, Yubin Liu +3Occupancy Grid Mapping3D Reconstruction

    Institute of Industrial Science, The University of Tokyo, Japan · Kyoto University of Advanced Science, Kyoto, Japan

  2. TiPToP: A Modular Open-Vocabulary Robot Manipulation System That Plans

    Mar 10, 2026William Shen, Nishanth Kumar, Sahit Chintalapudi +8Robotic ManipulationRobot Task Planning

    MIT CSAIL · University of Pennsylvania

  3. WESPR: Wind-adaptive Energy-Efficient Safe Perception & Planning for Robust Flight with Quadrotors

    Mar 10, 2026Khuzema Habib, Pranav Deshakulkarni Manjunath, Kasra Torshizi +2Quadrotor ControlMotion Planning

    University of Maryland, College Park.

  4. Hierarchical Multi-Modal Planning for Fixed-Altitude Sparse Target Search and Sampling

    Mar 9, 2026Lingpeng Chen, Yuchen Zheng, Apple Pui-Yi Chui +2Informative Path PlanningUnderwater Robotics

  5. Perceptive Variable-Timing Footstep Planning for Humanoid Locomotion on Disconnected Footholds

    Mar 8, 2026Zhaoyang Xiang, Upama Pant, Ayonga HereidHumanoid Robot LocomotionTerrain-Aware Robot Locomotion

    Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 43210, USA.

  6. LIPP: Load-Aware Informative Path Planning with Physical Sampling

    Mar 6, 2026Hojune Kim, Guangyao Shi, Gaurav S. SukhatmeInformative Path PlanningConstrained Optimization

    School of Electrical and Computer Engineering University of Southern California Los Angeles, California · School of Computer Science University of Southern California Los Angeles, California

  7. Stability-Guided Exploration for Diverse Motion Generation

    Mar 6, 2026Eckart Cobo-Briesewitz, Tilman Burghoff, Denis Shcherba +2Robot Motion GenerationLong-Horizon Robotic Manipulation

    Technische Universität Berlin · LAAS-CNRS · Robotics Institute Germany (RIG)

  8. STL-SVPIO: Signal Temporal Logic guided Stein Variational Path Integral Optimization

    Mar 6, 2026Hongrui Zheng, Zirui Zang, Ahmad Amine +2STL Motion PlanningTrajectory Optimization

    Department of Electrical and Systems Engineering, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, USA. · Mechanical Engineering and Mechanics Department, Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA, USA.

  9. Direct Contact-Tolerant Motion Planning With Vision Language Models

    Mar 5, 2026He Li, Jian Sun, Chengyang Li +4Contact-Aware Motion PlanningRobot Navigation

    State Key Laboratory of Internet of Things for Smart City (SKL-IOTSC), University of Macau, Macau, China. · Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China. · Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology (SIAT), Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen, China.

  10. U-OBCA: Uncertainty-Aware Optimization-Based Collision Avoidance via Wasserstein Distributionally Robust Chance Constraints

    Mar 5, 2026Zehao Wang, Yuxuan Tang, Han Zhang +2Chance-Constrained Motion PlanningCollision Avoidance

    School of Automation and Intelligent Sensing, Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Institute of Medical Robotics, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai 200240, China. · Key Laboratory of System Control and Information Processing, Ministry of Education of China, and Shanghai Engineering Research Center of Intelligent Control and Management, Shanghai 200240, China.

  11. Perception-Aware Time-Optimal Planning for Quadrotor Waypoint Flight

    Mar 4, 2026Chao Qin, Jiaxu Xing, Rudolf Reiter +4UAV Trajectory OptimizationMotion Planning

    Authors are with the University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies (UTIAS), Canada

  12. Large-Language-Model-Guided State Estimation for Partially Observable Task and Motion Planning

    Mar 4, 2026Yoonwoo Kim, Raghav Arora, Roberto Martín-Martín +3Motion PlanningRobot State Estimation

    The University of Texas at Austin · Nanyang Technological University

  13. Sampling-Based Motion Planning with Scene Graphs Under Perception Constraints

    Mar 3, 2026Qingxi Meng, Emiliano Flores, Thai Duong +2Scene GraphsMotion Planning

    Department of Computer Science, Rice University, Houston, TX 77005 USA · the Department of Computer Science, Rice University, Houston, TX 77005 USA, and also with Ken Kennedy Institute, Rice University, Houston, TX 77005 USA.

  14. CASSR: Continuous A-Star Search through Reachability for real time footstep planning

    Mar 3, 2026Jiayi Wang, Steve TonneauMotion PlanningConstrained Motion Planning

    State Key Laboratory of General Artificial Intelligence, BIGAI, Beijing 100080, China · University of Edinburgh, IPAB, Edinburgh EH8 9YL, U.K.

  15. Self-Evolutionary Replanning for Failure-Aware Motion Planning

    Mar 3, 2026Guoliang Li, Ruihua Han, Chengyang Li +5Motion PlanningRobot Motion Planning

    Department of Computer and Information Science, University of Macau · Department of Computer Science, University of Hong Kong · SIAT, Chinese Academy of Sciences +2

  16. MMH-Planner: Multi-Mode Hybrid Trajectory Planning Method for UAV Efficient Flight Based on Real-Time Spatial Awareness

    Mar 3, 2026Yinghao Zhao, Chenguang Dai, Liang Lyu +3Motion PlanningRobot Motion Planning

    School of Surveying and Mapping, Information Engineering University, Zhengzhou, 450001, China · School of Geodesy and Geomatics, Hubei Luojia Laboratory, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430079, China

  17. UPath: Universal Planner Across Topological Heterogeneity For Grid-Based Pathfinding

    Feb 27, 2026Aleksandr Ananikian, Daniil Drozdov, Konstantin YakovlevMotion PlanningOOD Generalization

    Saint-Petersburg University

  18. SCOPE: Skeleton Graph-Based Computation-Efficient Framework for Autonomous UAV Exploration

    Feb 26, 2026Kai Li, Shengtao Zheng, Linkun Xiu +4Autonomous Robot ExplorationRobot Navigation

    Shenzhen International Graduate School, Tsinghua University, Shenzhen 518055, China · School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore 639956

  19. Hierarchical Trajectory Planning of Floating-Base Multi-Link Robot for Maneuvering in Confined Environments

    Feb 25, 2026Yicheng Chen, Jinjie Li, Haokun Liu +3Robot Motion PlanningMotion Planning

    Department of Mechanical Engineering, The University of Tokyo, Tokyo 113-8656, Japan

  20. Trajectory Generation with Endpoint Regulation and Momentum-Aware Dynamics for Visually Impaired Scenarios

    Feb 25, 2026Yuting Zeng, Manping Fan, You Zhou +5Visually Impaired Navigation AssistanceTrajectory Generation

    School of Information and Software Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 610054, Sichuan, P.R. China. · School of Medicine, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, Sichuan, China. · Sichuan Provincial Key Laboratory for Human Disease Gene Study, Sichuan Academy of Medical Sciences & Sichuan Provincial People’s Hospital, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, Sichuan, China.

  21. Efficient Hierarchical Any-Angle Path Planning on Multi-Resolution 3D Grids

    Feb 24, 2026Victor Reijgwart, Cesar Cadena, Roland Siegwart +1Motion Planning

    Autonomous Systems Lab, ETH Zürich, Switzerland

  22. Path planning for unmanned surface vehicle based on predictive artificial potential field. International Journal of Advanced Robotic Systems

    Feb 22, 2026Jia Song, Ce Hao, Jiangcheng SuMotion PlanningRobot Motion Planning

    School of Astronautics, Beihang University, Beijing, China · Department of Mechanical Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA

  23. Temporal-Logic-Aware Frontier-Based Exploration

    Feb 21, 2026Azizollah Taheri, Derya AksaraySTL Motion PlanningMotion Planning

    Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Northeastern University.

  24. GenPlanner: From Noise to Plans -- Emergent Reasoning in Flow Matching and Diffusion Models

    Feb 21, 2026Agnieszka Polowczyk, Alicja Polowczyk, Michał WieczorekDiffusion-Based PlanningMotion Planning

    Silesian University of Technology, Faculty of Applied Mathematics, Gliwice, 44-100, Poland

  25. Hybrid System Planning using a Mixed-Integer ADMM Heuristic and Hybrid Zonotopes

    Feb 19, 2026Joshua A. Robbins, Andrew F. Thompson, Jonah J. Glunt +1Motion PlanningAlternating Direction Method of Multipliers

    Department of Mechanical Engineering, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802 USA

  26. RRTη^η: Sampling-based Motion Planning and Control from STL Specifications using Arithmetic-Geometric Mean Robustness

    Feb 18, 2026Ahmad Ahmad, Shuo Liu, Roberto Tron +1STL Motion PlanningMotion Planning

    Division of Systems Engineering, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA. · Department of Mechanical Engineering, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA. · Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the Department of Computer Science at the University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA.

  27. The Impact of Class Uncertainty Propagation in Perception-Based Motion Planning

    Feb 17, 2026Jibran Iqbal Shah, Andrei Ivanovic, Kelly Zhu +4Autonomous Driving PlanningMotion Planning

    Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto. · Toyota Research Institute.

  28. FC-Vision: Real-Time Visibility-Aware Replanning for Occlusion-Free Aerial Target Structure Scanning in Unknown Environments

    Feb 14, 2026Chen Feng, Yang Xu, Shaojie ShenNext-Best-View PlanningUAV Navigation

    Dept. of Electronic and Computer Engineering, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Hong Kong, China.

  29. Schur-MI: Fast Mutual Information for Robotic Information Gathering

    Feb 12, 2026Kalvik Jakkala, Jason O'Kane, Srinivas AkellaRobotic Data CollectionInformative Path Planning

    Texas A&M University · University of North Carolina at Charlotte

  30. H-WM: Robotic Task and Motion Planning Guided by Hierarchical World Model

    Feb 11, 2026Jinbang Huang, Wenyuan Chen, Zhiyuan Li +9Long-Horizon Robotic ManipulationWorld Models for Robotics

    Huawei Noah’s Ark Lab · University of Toronto · University of British Columbia +1