Robotics Research Pulse: What 1732 arXiv Robotics Papers Say Researchers Are Working On (2026-06-10 → 2026-07-09)
The short answer: of the 1732 robotics papers submitted to arXiv cs.RO that our pipeline aggregated over the last 30 days (2026-06-10 → 2026-07-09), the busiest research theme was manipulation & grasping — 243 papers (14% of the month's titles) — ahead of llms / vlms / language models (230) and navigation & path planning (164).
About this tracker
The Robotics Research Pulse is a monthly, dated snapshot of what robotics research is trending, counted over the arXiv cs.RO (Robotics) submissions our aggregation pipeline collected in the stated window. Every figure is a direct count — nothing is estimated, weighted or extrapolated. A paper counts toward a topic when the topic's term appears in the paper title (whole-word/phrase match; the exact patterns are published below, so anyone with the same titles can reproduce every number). Topics are not exclusive — one paper can match several. Honest limitations: the sample is our pipeline's capture of arXiv cs.RO (brief outages can drop items, so treat totals as ≥ floor values); title-only matching undercounts papers that express a theme only in the abstract. This is the first edition — month-over-month trend deltas start next edition (our corpus begins 2026-06-11). Last reviewed 2026-07-10.
At a glance
- 1732 arXiv cs.RO papers aggregated in 30 days (2026-06-10 → 2026-07-09)
- #1 theme: Manipulation & grasping — 243 papers, 14% of titles
- 18-topic fixed taxonomy, title-level whole-word matching, CC BY 4.0 data downloads
Research topic ranking (papers matching in title, last 30 days)
| # | Topic | Papers | % of titles |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Manipulation & grasping | 243 | 14% |
| 2 | LLMs / VLMs / language models | 230 | 13.3% |
| 3 | Navigation & path planning | 164 | 9.5% |
| 4 | Reinforcement learning | 105 | 6.1% |
| 5 | Sim-to-real & simulation | 83 | 4.8% |
| 6 | Multi-robot & swarms | 76 | 4.4% |
| 7 | Aerial robots & UAVs | 73 | 4.2% |
| 8 | SLAM & localization | 70 | 4% |
| 9 | Humanoid robots | 61 | 3.5% |
| 10 | Tactile & force sensing | 57 | 3.3% |
| 11 | Legged locomotion & quadrupeds | 53 | 3.1% |
| 12 | Autonomous driving | 51 | 2.9% |
| 13 | Diffusion models | 41 | 2.4% |
| 14 | Imitation & demonstration learning | 21 | 1.2% |
| 15 | Underwater & marine robots | 18 | 1% |
| 16 | Soft robotics | 12 | 0.7% |
| 17 | Teleoperation | 12 | 0.7% |
| 18 | Surgical & medical robots | 11 | 0.6% |
Weekly submission volume (our capture)
| Week starting | Papers aggregated |
|---|---|
| 2026-06-08 | 166 |
| 2026-06-15 | 500 |
| 2026-06-22 | 232 |
| 2026-06-29 | 470 |
| 2026-07-06 | 364 |
Matching patterns (reproducibility)
Case-insensitive regular expressions over paper titles (PostgreSQL ~*, \m/\M = word boundaries):
- Manipulation & grasping:
manipulat|grasp - LLMs / VLMs / language models:
language model|\mLLM|\mVLM|vision-language|\mVLA\M - Navigation & path planning:
navigat|path plan|motion plan - Reinforcement learning:
reinforcement learning|\mRL\M - Sim-to-real & simulation:
sim-to-real|sim2real|simulat - Multi-robot & swarms:
multi-robot|multi-agent|swarm - Aerial robots & UAVs:
\mUAV|\mdrone|aerial - SLAM & localization:
\mSLAM\M|localization|mapping - Humanoid robots:
humanoid - Tactile & force sensing:
tactile|force sensing|haptic - Legged locomotion & quadrupeds:
legged|locomotion|quadruped|biped - Autonomous driving:
autonomous driving|self-driving|autonomous vehicle - Diffusion models:
diffusion - Imitation & demonstration learning:
imitation learning|learning from demonstration - Underwater & marine robots:
underwater|marine|\mAUV\M - Soft robotics:
soft robot - Teleoperation:
teleoperat - Surgical & medical robots:
surgic|medical robot|rehabilitat
Download the data
Free to reuse with attribution (CC BY 4.0): CSV · JSON. Columns: rank, topic, papers, share_pct, pattern, window_start, window_end.
Cite this tracker
Robos News, Robotics Research Pulse (1732 arXiv cs.RO papers, 2026-06-10–2026-07-09), robos.news/robotics-research-pulse/, reviewed 2026-07-10. CC BY 4.0.
