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Microduck: a tiny robot duck that walks using AI-trained moves
This is the brain code for Pollen Robotics' small duck robot, which walks, rolls, and gets back up after falling, following movements it was trained on with AI. Without the physical robot, you can run the same code in a simulator on your own machine.
A 50 Hz control program that drives 15 tiny motors on the duck, following movements trained by trial and error (reinforcement learning) and loaded as an ONNX file (a trained-model format).
When it helps
Useful if you own a Microduck robot (sold separately) or want to try robotics via simulator without buying hardware; skip it if you're after an agent or vibe-coding tool — this is the internals of a real device.
Pros
- Run it in a MuJoCo simulator without buying a robot
- Open code for everything: motion control to firmware updates
- The robot does a lot: walks, rolls, grabs with its beak, stands back up
- An honest intro to real robotics without needing your own lab
Cons
- Without the physical robot, you can't go beyond the simulator
- Not an agent or a vibe-coding tool
- Hardware is sold separately from this code
How to set it up — step by step
- 1Open the repository on GitHub: https://github.com/pollen-robotics/microduck
- 2Send the agent the text from the block below.
- 3Let the agent install dependencies per the README and launch the MuJoCo simulator (scripts/duck-sim).
- 4Check the window that opens — see how the virtual duck reacts to keyboard or gamepad commands.
- 5If you like it, check pollen-robotics.com/microduck to see how to get a real robot.
Text for your agent
Copy this and send it to your agent — Claude Code, Codex, any of them:
Set up the Microduck simulator from https://github.com/pollen-robotics/microduck — I don't have the real robot, install the dependencies per the README, run the MuJoCo simulator (scripts/duck-sim), and show me how the virtual duck responds to keyboard or gamepad commands.
This isn't laptop software, it's the brain of a real robot — the hardware itself is sold separately on Pollen Robotics' site. Without the robot you can only run the same programs in the MuJoCo simulator on a regular computer; the real duck needs only its own onboard board, not your laptop.
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