---
title: Motion Planning
description: This topic focuses on algorithms that enable robots to find collision-free paths from a starting point to a destination. Learners will understand configuration spaces, grid-based search, sampling-based planners, and trajectory optimization.
category: engineering
subcategory: robotics
difficulty: beginner, intermediate, advanced
url: /subject/motion-planning
---

# Motion Planning

This topic focuses on algorithms that enable robots to find collision-free paths from a starting point to a destination. Learners will understand configuration spaces, grid-based search, sampling-based planners, and trajectory optimization.

## Available Resources

1 Books • 1 Courses • 5 Websites

## Websites

### 1. MoveIt

Open-source motion planning framework for ROS robot arms, with documentation and step-by-step tutorials. Covers setting up a robot's configuration, planning collision-free trajectories, inverse kinematics, grasping, and executing motions in simulation or on real manipulators.

**Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://moveit.ros.org/

**Tags:** moveit, ros, motion-planning, robot-manipulation, inverse-kinematics

### 2. OMPL

Free C++ library from Rice University's Kavraki Lab implementing sampling-based motion planners such as PRM, RRT, and their variants. The site provides documentation, tutorials, and demos showing how to define state spaces, validity checkers, and planning problems.

**Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://ompl.kavrakilab.org/

**Tags:** ompl, sampling-based-planning, motion-planning, cpp, robotics

### 3. Planning Algorithms

Steven LaValle's official page for his 842-page planning textbook, with the entire book free to read online plus errata and a full BibTeX reference list. Readers can study configuration spaces, sampling-based planners, and planning under uncertainty without buying the print edition.

**Difficulty:** Beginner | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://lavalle.pl/planning

**Tags:** motion-planning, planning-algorithms, robotics, configuration-space, textbook

### 4. theconstructsim.com

The Construct is an online learning platform offering hands-on ROS tutorials and courses, featuring Gazebo-based simulations and practical projects to teach ROS fundamentals, ROS 2, and robotics programming.

**Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://www.theconstruct.ai/

**Tags:** websites, engineering-manufacturing, robotics

### 5. ros.org

ROS.org is the official portal for the Robot Operating System, a flexible, open-source framework for building robot software. It provides comprehensive documentation, tutorials, API references, distribution releases, and community resources to help learners and developers build and deploy robotics applications.

**Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://ros.org

**Tags:** websites, engineering-manufacturing, mechanical-engineering

## Courses

### 1. Underactuated Robotics (MIT 6.832)

**Author:** Russell Tedrake

Nonlinear dynamics and control of underactuated systems such as walkers, swimmers and flyers: motion planning, partial feedback linearization, energy shaping, optimal control and reinforcement learning. Includes 23 lecture videos, problem sets with solutions and projects, preparing learners to design controllers that exploit natural dynamics.

**Difficulty:** Advanced | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/6-832-underactuated-robotics-spring-2009/

**Tags:** underactuated-robotics, nonlinear-control, optimal-control, reinforcement-learning, legged-locomotion, motion-planning

## Books

### 1. Modern Robotics: Mechanics, Planning, and Control

**Author:** Kevin M. Lynch and Frank C. Park

Northwestern and Seoul National University textbook built around screw theory and the product-of-exponentials formula. Covers configuration space, rigid-body motions, forward and inverse kinematics, dynamics, trajectory generation, motion planning, and robot control, with accompanying free software and video lectures.

**Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid

**Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/1107156300?tag=edmonddante07-20

**Tags:** books, engineering-manufacturing, robotics

---

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