Humanoid & robot atlas
LEMUR 3 (Freeclimber)
Photo: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory (official image), from www-robotics.jpl.nasa.gov. Image policy
ResearchUnited StatesSupervised

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory · legged machine

LEMUR 3

Freeclimber

The third robot in JPL's LEMUR (Legged Excursion Mechanical Utility Robot) line, built to walk, crawl and climb in extreme terrain for possible Mars, Moon and small-body missions. Each of its four limbs has seven degrees of freedom.

Price
—Not published
Height
—Not published
Weight
—Not published
Payload
—Not published
Speed
—Not published
Battery
—Not published
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Why it matters

A four-limbed climbing robot that grips rock with microspine grippers made of thousands of tiny hooks.

Real-world use

NASA research

Timeline

First shown
2011-12
Released
Not yet
Listed by JPL as in development since 2011

Maker

NASA Jet Propulsion LaboratoryGovernment lab · Pasadena, California, USA

NASA; DARPA (RoboSimian)

How it stacks up

Against other legged & novel that publish the figure. Pick a measure.

  1. CharlieDFKI Robotics Innovation Center · 201236
  2. LEMUR 3 (Freeclimber)NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory · 201128
  3. LAURON VFZI Research Center for Information Technology · 201328
  4. MantisMicromagic Systems (Matt Denton) · 201318
  5. DaisyHEBI Robotics · 201718
  6. Salamandra robotica IIEPFL Biorobotics Laboratory (Auke Ijspeert) · 201312
  7. Salto / Salto-1PUC Berkeley Biomimetic Millisystems Lab (Justin Yim, Ronald Fearing) · 20164
  8. DASH (Dynamic Autonomous Sprawled Hexapod)UC Berkeley Biomimetic Millisystems Lab · 20092

LEMUR 3 (Freeclimber) has more joints than 81% of the 16 other legged & novel that publish a joints. Bars show the 7 closest in date.

Joints 28 242 #3 of 17 · more joints than 81%

Not published by the maker: height, weight, speed, payload, battery, price.

Public attention

How much public attention LEMUR 3 (Freeclimber) gets, from open data.

  • No Wikipedia article of its own yet
  • No recent press stories listed yet

Measures how much people read and write about a robot, not how good it is. Measured 2026-10-14; same method for every robot. How it is measured

What’s inside

The parts the company has talked about publicly.

Movement
Walks on legs · 28 joints
How it runs
Supervised. In field tests researchers set a target point and it chose its own climbing path with lidar, anchored by a safety cable.
Actuators & motors
Four limbs with seven DoF each.
Hands
Microspine grippers using thousands of small hooks to grip rough rock.
Sensors & vision
JPL lists seven sets of stereo cameras and a lidar (the page appears to share this text with RoboSimian).
Other details
Crawls, walks and climbs; aimed at cliffs and caves on Mars, the Moon and small bodies. Sponsored by NASA's Science Mission Directorate.

Lineage

Every NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory machine in order.

  1. ATHLETE (All-Terrain Hex-Limbed Extra-Terrestrial Explorer)ATHLETE (All-Terrain Hex-Limbed Extra-Terrestrial Explorer)2005Research
  2. Tri-ATHLETE (ATHLETE second generation)Tri-ATHLETE (ATHLETE second generation)2009Research
  3. LEMUR 3 (Freeclimber)LEMUR 3 (Freeclimber)2011Research
  4. RoboSimianRoboSimian2013Retired
  5. EELS (Exobiology Extant Life Surveyor)EELS (Exobiology Extant Life Surveyor)2022Research

Watch LEMUR 3 (Freeclimber)

Video: Aaron Parness on YouTube. Plays from youtube-nocookie.com when you press play.

Made, sold and where

Unit counts are usually company figures; analysts often disagree.

Price
Not published
How to get one
No official buying page found
Built
Research robot
Sold or delivered
not sold
Where it is sold or used
NASA JPL, Pasadena, California
Customers and pilots
NASA research

Sources

Figures come from the maker. Every link below backs something on this page.

NASA JPL Freeclimber: LEMUR 3 NASA Tech Briefs Rotary tool on retractable foot of walking robot (LEMUR) jpl.nasa.gov LEMUR 3 (Freeclimber): how it is operated

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