Precision livestock farming and farm animal welfare: a scientometric analysis of research trends and technological innovations

Precision Livestock Farming (PLF) is increasingly recognized for its potential to improve the health and welfare of farm animals, their productivity, and environmental sustainability. Nevertheless, the critical transition of PLF from a theoretical research concept to practical field implementation remains essential for realizing its full potential. This study undertakes a scientometric review of PLF and its application in the monitoring of farm animal welfare, covering the period from 2006 to 2025. The study employs a mixed-corpus scientometric approach to concurrently assess trends in PLF publications (n = 1,594) and patents (n = 3,239), revealing a strong co-evolutionary relationship (r = 0.913, 95% CI 0.79–0.97, p < 0.001) between academic and industrial PLF activity, with annual growth rates of 32.2% and 20.2%, respectively. The analysis identifies key research subfields and traces the evolution of PLF themes across three overlapping phases: a hardware validation phase (2006–2015), a welfare outcome validation phase (2016–2020), and an artificial intelligence integration phase (2021–2025). The study underscores the importance of integrating scientific literature and patent data for comprehensive insights into PLF’s role in enhancing farm animal welfare and highlights persistent gaps between proof-of-concept research and commercially deployed, welfare-validated systems.