Current Research Status and Key Technological Advances of Refueling Robots

With the growing global fleet of motor vehicles and rising demand for unmanned services, enhancing the efficiency and intelligence of refueling operations at gas stations has become a critical industry priority. This review focuses on refueling robots as its core research subject, providing a systematic review of its developmental history and system architecture. Building upon this foundation, this review conducts an in-depth analysis and synthesis of three key enabling technologies: (1) the end effector—integrating multi-degree-of-freedom actuators and sensor modules to precisely control fuel tank lid actuation and fuel nozzle insertion/removal; (2) refueling interface identification—enabling vehicle-type classification, refueling interface location extraction, and recognition of refueling interface features; and (3) refueling interface localization—determining the 6 DoF pose of the refueling interface relative to the robot. Through this technical analysis, it is shown that refueling robots have attained an initial level of intelligence; however, significant challenges remain in achieving high precision and robust performance, ensuring safety and reliability, and establishing standardization and broad interoperability. Future research efforts should therefore prioritize improving environmental adaptability—particularly in complex, unstructured settings—advancing autonomous decision-making capabilities, and enhancing product universality, thereby accelerating the commercial deployment of refueling robots.