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Software

r2r

By Sequence Planner, from github.com/sequenceplanner/r2r (opens in a new tab)

  • Middleware
  • Library
  • MIT AND Apache-2.0

Rust bindings for ROS2 that build with cargo alone, without hooking into the ROS2 build system. They offer async APIs based on futures and streams.

Open on GitHub (opens in a new tab)

Facts

GitHub stars
443read on 6 Nov 2026
Last update
13 Sept 2026Newest commit on master
Maintenance
Activea commit in the last 90 days
Difficulty
Intermediate

Checked on GitHub on 6 Nov 2026.

Licenses

Code
MIT (opens in a new tab) AND Apache-2.0 (opens in a new tab)

Read by Robotheca from LICENSE (opens in a new tab) (Apache-2.0) at commit 653167a (opens in a new tab), on 16 Oct 2026. A person at Robotheca set it on 9 Nov 2026.

Commercial use
Yes

Overview

What it does: Robotheca's summary

  • Generates Rust message types from the C introspection libraries of the ROS2 installation, so no separate .msg/.idl build step is needed.
  • Supports publish/subscribe, services, actions, and parameter handling.
  • Uses Rust futures and streams instead of synchronous callbacks, and does not pick an async runtime, leaving task spawning to the user.
  • Can limit which message packages are built with the IDL_PACKAGE_FILTER environment variable to reduce build time.
  • Tracks recent ROS2 distributions, from Foxy through Jazzy and Lyrical.
  • Works with simulated time when rosgraph_msgs is sourced at build time.

Written by Robotheca from the project's README (opens in a new tab) at commit 653167a, not by its creator.

The README

The creator's own README, copied as written: README.md by Sequence Planner, at commit 653167a, under MIT AND Apache-2.0 (opens in a new tab). The original on GitHub (opens in a new tab).

Read the README here

R2R - Easy to use, runtime-agnostic, async rust bindings for ROS2.

Easy to use bindings for ROS2 that do not require hooking in to the ROS2 build infrastructure -- cargo build is all you need. Convenience Rust types are created by calling into the c introspection libraries. This circumvents the ROS2 .msg/.idl pipeline by relying on already generated C code. By default, the behavior is to build bindings to the RCL and all message types that can be found in the currently sourced ros environment, but it is possible to be more specific to save on build time (see note below).

When integration with the colcon build system is desired, a CMakeLists.txt file can be used to limit the generation of bindings to only include specific (idl) dependencies. This is done through additional environment variables. A minimal example of the colcon integration is available here: https://github.com/m-dahl/r2r_minimal_node (opens in a new tab).

This library differ a bit in style from rclpy and rclcpp as it eliminates all synchronous callbacks in favor of rust futures and streams. Coupled with the rust await syntax, this makes it very pleasant to work with ROS services and actions, even in a single threaded setup (see service.rs example). The library purposefully does not chose an async runtime -- this means that the user needs to take care of any task spawning. This also limits the API to what futures-rs provides.

Documentation can be found on docs.rs: https://docs.rs/r2r/latest/r2r (opens in a new tab).

These bindings are being written organically when things are needed by me and others so please be aware that the API will change. As of now I have no intention of wrapping all of the RCL just for the sake of completeness. However, if you need some specific functionality, feel free to open an issue or a PR!

How to use
  1. Make sure you have libclang installed. (e.g. libclang-dev on ubuntu)
  2. Depend on this package in Cargo.toml: r2r = "0.9.7"
  3. You need to source your ROS2 installation before building/running.
  4. The bindings will rebuild automatically if/when you source your workspace(s).
  5. If you make changes to existing message types, run cargo clean -p r2r_msg_gen to force recompilation of the rust message types on the next build.

Examples of how to use the crate are included in examples/

. /opt/ros/humble/setup.sh
cargo build
cargo run --example subscriber
# In other shell
ros2 topic pub /topic std_msgs/msg/String "data: 'Hello, world'"
A note on build times

Since the default behavior is to build all sourced message types, build time can quickly become a problem for larger workspaces. To avoid building everything, it is possible to declare only the message packages needed using the environment variable IDL_PACKAGE_FILTER. Setting this can be done in .cargo/config.toml for convenience, e.g. https://github.com/m-dahl/r2r_minimal_node/blob/master/r2r_minimal_node/.cargo/config.toml (opens in a new tab). Note there is no automatic dependency resolution done for nested message types, so all used message packages need to be explicitly included.

What works?
  • Up to date with ROS2 Dashing Eloquent Foxy Galactic Humble Iron Jazzy Lyrical
  • Building Rust types
  • Publish/subscribe
  • Services
  • Actions
  • Parameter handling
  • Simulated time (make sure rosgraph_msgs is sourced when building to enable)
  • Runs on Linux, OSX, and Windows.
Changelog
[Unreleased]
[0.9.7] - 2026-09-13
[0.9.6] - 2025-06-04
  • rcl_timer_init wrapper to compile for Foxy Galactic Humble Iron Jazzy and Lyrical
[0.9.5] - 2025-04-22
[0.9.4] - 2024-11-21
[0.9.3] - 2024-11-09
[0.9.2] - 2024-10-13
[0.9.1] - 2024-10-12
[0.9.0] - 2024-05-17
[0.8.4] - 2024-03-19
[0.8.3] - 2024-01-14
[0.8.2] - 2023-12-11
[0.8.1] - 2023-11-30
[0.8.0] - 2023-10-05
[0.7.5] - 2023-06-27
[0.7.4] - 2023-06-26
[0.7.3] - 2023-06-20
  • Fix mistake in docs generation.
[0.7.2] - 2023-06-20
[0.7.1] - 2023-05-21
[0.7.0] - 2023-03-21
[0.6.7] - 2023-02-20
TODO
  • Documentation is lacking. (For now, look at the examples.)
LICENSING

All code is under the MIT licence unless another license is specified in the source files. Some parts from the rclrust (https://github.com/rclrust/rclrust (opens in a new tab)) package are included in this repo and these are licensed under Apache 2.0.

Image: rosin_logo (opens in a new tab) (opens in a new tab)

Supported by ROSIN - ROS-Industrial Quality-Assured Robot Software Components. More information: rosin-project.eu (opens in a new tab)

Image: eu_flag (opens in a new tab)

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 732287.

Files and versions

Facts read at commit 653167a

Robotheca never hosts the code: each link goes to the creator's own page.

Use it

How to install it, in the creator's words: The project's README (opens in a new tab)

Robotheca doesn't review code. Read it before running it.

Robotheca lists software as a reference: nothing is hosted or run here, and every fact links to where it was read.