Webots — The Complete Guide: A Free, Easy-to-Use Robot Simulator for Students and Engineers
Webots was developed by the Swiss company Cyberbotics and released as open source (Apache 2.0). It stands out for a complete graphical interface — world editor, 3D view and console — which makes it an especially good entry point for courses and final-year projects.
Webots
Cyberbotics
Approachable robot simulator with a library of ready robots and environments, common in teaching.
Get it from the vendorWhat you get
- Robot library — industrial arms, mobile robots, drones and walking robots, ready to use.
- Controllers in any language — Python, C, C++, Java and MATLAB.
- Sensors and actuators — cameras, LiDAR, distance sensors, motors and grippers.
- ROS 2 interface — the webots_ros2 package for full integration.
- Recording and sharing — export a simulation as a video or an interactive web page.
Webots or Gazebo
Webots is easier to start with and convenient for teaching. Gazebo is more common in large ROS 2 projects and in industry. Both are free, and it is worth trying both on the same robot.
Related tools
For the robot software — ROS 2. For reinforcement learning and fast contacts — MuJoCo. For a real microcontroller — Arduino IDE.
Gazebo
Open Robotics
3D robotics simulator with physics and simulated sensors, integrated with ROS.
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ROS (Robot Operating System)
Open Robotics
The standard middleware for building robot software.
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MuJoCo
Google DeepMind
A fast physics engine for robotics, biomechanics and machine learning.
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Arduino IDE
Arduino
The official IDE for Arduino boards — write code, upload it to the board and watch sensors on the serial monitor.
Get it from the vendorThe bottom line
Webots is the fastest way to see a robot move on screen: completely free, friendly and full of examples.