Modernizing Livestock Operations: Smart Feedlot Technologies and Their Impact

Smart feedlots are increasingly adopting Precision Livestock Farming technologies to enable continuous, individual-animal monitoring and more proactive management in intensive beef production systems. This narrative review synthesises evidence from approximately 350 academic publications, of which 117 are formally cited, complemented by industry deployments and the authors’ experience in smart feedlot system development. We cover enabling digital infrastructure (power, sensing networks, wireless connectivity, and gateways), animal identification and sensing (RFID, automated weighing, wearables, and pen-side sensors), machine vision (RGB, thermal, and multispectral imaging from fixed and mobile platforms), and AI-based analytics and decision support for health, welfare, performance, and environmental management. Across the literature, key components have progressed beyond proof-of-concept toward operation under commercial constraints. Reported outcomes include reduced reliance on routine pen-rider observation and yard handling, earlier triage of emerging morbidity risk and behavioural change, and more standardised welfare auditing. Vision-based methods are repeatedly validated against trained human scorers in both on-farm and abattoir contexts, while automated weighing and image-based liveweight estimation support higher-frequency growth monitoring with low single-digit percentage error in representative studies. Precision feeding and targeted supplementation are associated with improved feed utilisation and reduced resource wastage, although effectiveness and adoption vary across animal classes and production stages. We identify priorities for robust, scalable deployment: resilient communications in harsh environments, appropriate edge–cloud partitioning under intermittent connectivity, and interoperable multi-sensor data fusion to deliver trustworthy alerts and actionable insights. Persistent barriers remain cost, durability, maintenance burden, integration and interoperability, data governance, and workforce capability.