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The micromouse challenge was done since the 1980 in the context of university driven robotics research. The Robocup challenge has a similar approach and provides a competition for university students. Today, Robocup soccer is a regularly event which brings robotics to the mainstream. But there is small problem. Both competitions are not attended by amateurs, that means by non-students. The main reason is, that the task of controlling a team of Nao humanoid robots is difficult and costly at the same time. That means, the Nao robot is too expensive for amateurs and they are not overwhelmed by implementing vision, motor control and self-localization at the same time.

On the other a hand, a robotics competition is a great opportunity to learn from mistakes. The same task is done by others and if strategy A is working it can be copied. A robot competition is a great opportunity to learn something and in most cases it helps to form a community.

My question is: are some entry level robotics competitions available which have to do with reaching objective goals against other participants which are open for amateurs? Open means, that the robot is cheap and the task isn't very hard.

Location

Are you looking for competitions anywhere in particular?

A competition can be held in real life, for example in a city. Or it can run online-only, that means the participants have to send their submission over a website from anywhere. I'm not sure, what the better idea is. offline competitions have the advantage, that a video can made from it, while online challenges have a lower price tag because the travel to the location isn't necessary.

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  • $\begingroup$ Are you looking for competitions anywhere in particular? $\endgroup$
    – sempaiscuba
    Jan 14, 2019 at 0:37
  • $\begingroup$ open means accessible or available in the context of your question ..... it does not refer to the level of competition $\endgroup$
    – jsotola
    Jan 15, 2019 at 1:48

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There are some competitions for smaller teams (or individuals), mostly centered around a small RPi-Based robot: FormulaPi if you are interested in Computer Vision and autonomous cars, or PiWars for a larger variety of tasks (including teleoperation, so you don't need a fully autonomous robot).

So searching for "RPi robot competition" could be a good start for you.

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There is Eurobot, which concerns these countries. Usually it is organized by universities but non-student teams are welcomed and people are very friendly. It is not very difficult (so not necessarily expensive - you can reach a nice score with robots containing Arduino boards) and your robot competes against another team on the same field, so depending on your strategy the score can change from a game to another!

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This is more of a hobbyists' competition, but you could take a look at it. https://www.sparkfun.com/avc_2018

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