Phobos
- Software
- Simulators
- Tool
Phobos is a Blender add-on and Python CLI tool for building, editing, and exporting robot models in formats such as URDF, SDF, and SMURF for ROS, ROCK, MARS, and Gazebo.
Made by DFKI GmbH, Robotics Innovation Center, Germany (checked on github.com/dfki-ric (opens in a new tab)).
Source on GitHub: github.com/dfki-ric/phobos (opens in a new tab). Facts read at commit a613e31 (opens in a new tab).
Licenses
- Code
- BSD-3-Clause (opens in a new tab)
Read by Robotheca from LICENSE (opens in a new tab) (BSD-3-Clause) at commit a613e31 (opens in a new tab), on 16 Oct 2026.
- Commercial use
- Yes
What it does
- Lets you create WYSIWYG robot models inside Blender by representing links and joints as bone objects with constraints.
- Exports robot models to URDF, SDF, and SMURF, plus mesh formats STL, OBJ, and Collada.
- Can be used as a normal Python package and command line tool, with scripts listed via phobos --help.
- Provides a CI tool to run Phobos headless in a pipeline for automated model processing and maintenance.
- Includes tools for auto-generating collision objects and inertia tensors, batch property editing, and model integrity checks.
- Supports saving and loading model poses and multiple export configurations for the same model.
Written by Robotheca from the project's README (opens in a new tab) at commit a613e31.
Getting started
- Difficulty
- Intermediate
- How to start
- The project's README (opens in a new tab)
Maintenance
- Status
- Maintained: a commit in the last 12 months
- Newest commit
- 14 Jul 2026 on master
- Latest release
- Phobos 2.0.2 "Perilled Pangolin" (13 May 2025)
Checked on GitHub on 16 Oct 2026.
Links
Robots on Robotheca that use it
No robot on Robotheca is linked to it yet. Links come from a robot's robot.yaml, from its dependency files read as text, or from Robotheca's editors.
Robotheca lists software as a reference: nothing is hosted or run here, and every fact links to where it was read.