Franka Emika (Germany) Franka Emika Panda (1)

Franka Emika (Germany) Franka Emika Panda (2)

Was €9,900 (2016 pre-order)IEEE Spectrum reported a yet-to-be-confirmed €9,900 (~$10,500) pre-order price, versus $29,000 for Sawyer and $35,000 for a UR5 at the time.

Discontinued · used/leftover onlyPython from a laptop7-DOFTorque sensingResearch iconReplaced by FR3

Possibly ≤ 1 weekShipping: Used market. No longer sold new; used Panda arms are resold by labs and on the secondary market, but support for older firmware is limited.

Remote control: libfranka/franka_ros from a real-time Linux PC over Ethernet; the Desk UI runs in any browser.

IEEE Spectrum (2017) ↗libfranka ↗Sami Haddadin (Wikipedia) ↗

Overview

The arm that brought torque-controlled 7-DOF manipulation to ordinary labs at a fraction of the KUKA iiwa's cost, designed by Sami Haddadin's team and named one of Time's best inventions of 2018. Thousands of papers and datasets were built on it. It was succeeded by the Franka Research 3 around 2022, and the company went through insolvency in 2023 before its acquisition by Agile Robots.

Specifications

Category	Robot arms · Industrial & legacy
Released	2017
Availability	Discontinued · used/leftover only
Programmability	Full SDK
Best for	Professionals & labs
Vision sensors	No vision sensors
Actuators	Brushless / direct-drive motors
Audio	No audio
Compute type	Proprietary / undisclosed
Remote control	Python from a laptop
DOF	7
Reach	855 mm
Payload	3 kg
Repeatability	<±0.1 mm
Weight	About 18 kg (maker datasheet)
Controller	External Control unit; Desk web UI; FCI 1 kHz interface
Sensors	Torque sensors in all 7 joints (13-bit), 'more than a hundred sensors' per Franka
SDK	libfranka (C++), franka_ros; older libfranka releases for Panda firmware