Glossary · Control
Torque control
In brief
Torque control commands joints by the torque they should apply rather than by the position they should reach. Torque-controlled robots can be back-drivable, comply with external forces, and execute physically reasonable motions without fighting their environment.
Position-controlled robots stiffly drive each joint to a target angle and resist any deviation — fine for industrial fences, dangerous for humans nearby. Torque-controlled robots regulate the force the joint applies; the position emerges from the resulting dynamics. This makes them safer around humans and naturally compliant with physical contact.
Most modern humanoids are torque-controlled at the joint level (e.g. via series-elastic actuators, quasi-direct-drive motors with low gear ratios, or current-loop torque estimation). Higher-level controllers may still issue position-style commands, but the underlying loop is torque.
Related terms
See it in the wild
Browse robots and brands using these techniques
Glossary entries are upstream. The catalog is where the implementations live.