RoboCup Soccer is the core league of the RoboCup initiative, where autonomous robots play soccer under standardized rules.
The objective of the RoboCup Soccer leagues is to promote research and development in robotics and artificial intelligence through competitive, fully autonomous robot soccer matches.
RoboCupSoccer
Soccer League Divisions
RoboCup Soccer consists of multiple autonomous robot soccer leagues, each with its own rules, field configurations, and research focus, including Small Size, Middle Size, Humanoid Soccer League, and the Soccer Simulation (2D and 3D) leagues.
Humanoid Soccer League
RoboCup is preparing a new unified humanoid soccer league for 2026.
According to the official RoboCup announcement, the Standard Platform League and the Humanoid League KidSize are undergoing a merger process to form a single league. The final name and competition structure will be announced by the RoboCup Federation.
The new league focuses on fully autonomous humanoid robots playing soccer using onboard perception, locomotion, and decision-making, addressing key research challenges such as balance, vision, self-localization, and team coordination.
Middle Size
Small Size
The RoboCup Small Size League is one of the oldest RoboCup Soccer leagues. It is focused on intelligent multi-agent coordination and control in a highly dynamic environment. Teams currently compete in 11 vs. 11 soccer matches (6 vs. 6 in division B) with an orange golf ball. The robots are built by the teams and have to conform to certain dimensions and constraints, as defined in the rules. All objects on the field are tracked by a central vision system – called SSL-Vision – which is maintained by the SSL community. Off-field computers for each team are used for the processing required for coordination and control of the robots. Communication is wireless and uses dedicated commercial radio transmitter/receiver units.
Simulation