Simbody
- Software
- Simulators
- Library
Simbody is an open-source C++ toolkit for simulating articulated rigid-body mechanisms such as skeletons, robots, vehicles and machines.
Made by Simbody Project.
Source on GitHub: github.com/simbody/simbody (opens in a new tab). Facts read at commit 04f6297 (opens in a new tab).
Licenses
- Code
- Apache-2.0 (opens in a new tab)
Read by Robotheca from LICENSE.txt (opens in a new tab) (Apache-2.0) at commit 04f6297 (opens in a new tab), on 16 Oct 2026.
- Commercial use
- Yes
What it does
- Provides a multibody dynamics library that models motion in generalized coordinates in O(n) time, sometimes called a Featherstone-style physics engine.
- Offers a wide range of joints, constraints and forces, and lets users add their own.
- Supports forward, inverse and mixed dynamics, with motion driven by forces or prescribed motion.
- Includes contact models (Hertz, Hunt and Crossley), several numerical integrators with error control, and gradient descent, interior point and CMA optimizers.
- Includes an optional OpenGL-based visualizer.
- Is used by OpenSim, Gazebo and the MacroMoleculeBuilder biomolecular tool, among others.
Written by Robotheca from the project's README (opens in a new tab) at commit 04f6297.
Getting started
- Difficulty
- Advanced
- How to start
- The project's website (opens in a new tab)
Maintenance
- Status
- Active: a commit in the last 90 days
- Newest commit
- 28 Sept 2026 on master
- Latest release
- Simbody release 3.8 (18 May 2025)
Checked on GitHub on 16 Oct 2026.
Links
Robots that can run 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.