FARMBOT — OPEN-SOURCE CNC FARMING ROBOT
A three-axis gantry that plants, waters and weeds a raised bed, controlled from a web app you design like a strategy game.
by FarmBot Inc.
GardenRobotics
Built withRaspberry Pi
- difficulty
- ●●●●○
- time
- a week-plus
- license
- MIT
- repo
- repo ACTIVE1,173 stars
●●●●○ · a week-plus · MIT · 1,173 stars · repo ACTIVE
WHAT YOU’LL NEED
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COMPAREE VERDICT
FarmBot is a Cartesian robot that rides aluminum extrusions over a raised bed, planting seeds with a vacuum needle, watering individual plants, and whacking weeds with a low-powered rotary tool. You design your garden layout in a web application — drag crops into a grid, set spacing and depth — and the robot executes the plan. The entire software stack is MIT-licensed and the hardware CAD is published openly. The catch is scale: this is not a weekend project. You are building a three-axis CNC machine outdoors, running motors and solenoid valves in weather, then working through initial calibration and tuning. The documentation is thorough and the community is real, but you are signing up for a week of assembly, a few evenings of troubleshooting, and ongoing tweaks as plants grow. The single thing most likely to go wrong is underestimating the outdoor side of the build: the bed has to be flat and level, and the docs have dedicated maintenance and winter-storage guides you are expected to follow. If you want a robot garden and you are comfortable with the idea that this is as much an infrastructure project as it is a build, FarmBot delivers. If you want vegetables this season without the engineering, buy seeds.
IN THE REPO
GOOD TO KNOW
- —Full hardware CAD is published in Onshape (free to view, copy and export) and linked from the Genesis docs; the models are CC0.
- —Robot OS (farmbot_os) is MIT-licensed and in active development.
- —Complete documentation site at software.farm.bot and genesis.farm.bot covers assembly and operation.
- —The BOM lives in the Genesis documentation, split by subsystem (extrusions, drivetrain, electronics, plastic parts, fasteners, tubing).
- —FarmBot Inc. sells complete kits commercially; this page covers the open-source build path.
- —License is MIT for the software and CC0 (public domain) for the hardware CAD; FarmBot Inc. also sells complete kits.
Parts to buy
8 itemsFrom our check of the build. Exact quantities and part numbers are in the creator’s BOM.
Can I build this?
Build at your own risk. Projects involve tools, electronics and sometimes mains voltage — follow the creator’s safety notes.
Videos
Official FarmBot introduction to the Genesis kit, from the FarmBot YouTube channel.
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Start here
Navigation into the creator’s own docs — we don’t rewrite the guide, we route you to the source.
- 1.Read the overview at genesis.farm.bot to understand the mechanical design and what you are committing to.(The documentation site is comprehensive; start there before ordering parts.)
- 2.Gather the parts from the BOM section of the Genesis docs, and open the CAD in Onshape if you want to modify or export parts.(Everything hardware-related is on genesis.farm.bot; the GitHub repos cover the software side (OS, web app, Arduino firmware).)
- 3.Build or source a sturdy raised bed; FarmBot needs a flat, level frame to mount the gantry.(The bed is not included in the kit and must be built to the dimensions your gantry will cover.)
- 4.Follow the mechanical assembly guide at genesis.farm.bot, taking your time with extrusion alignment.(Misalignment here will haunt you during calibration.)
- 5.Flash the FarmBot OS to a Raspberry Pi and connect it to your local network, then work through the web app setup.(The web app is where you design your garden; it talks to the Raspberry Pi over your LAN or the internet.)
Resources
Documentation, files and community threads for this build — we link straight to the original sources and never rehost the creator’s files.
KNOWN ISSUES
- Skipping maintenance: the docs have dedicated pages for track, gantry, tool mount and winter storage. FarmBot is rainproof but not waterproof, and very humid locations need extra precautions.
- Skipping bed preparation: the raised bed must be dead flat and the soil must be consistent. An uneven bed will throw off the Z-axis and ruin seeding depth.
- Buying the wrong extrusion lengths: the gantry spans your bed; measure twice, order once. Standard sizes do not fit all garden layouts.
- Expecting plug-and-play: initial calibration is manual and involves teaching the robot where the bed edges are, tuning motor speeds, and verifying tool offsets. Budget an afternoon.
- Ignoring the community: FarmBot has an active forum and years of troubleshooting history. If you hit a wall, someone else already documented the fix.
- Overloading the first season: start with a simple crop layout to learn the system, then scale up. A full grid of plants will surface every tuning issue at once.
Can I build this if I have never worked with a Raspberry Pi?
Yes. FarmBot OS is a pre-built image you flash to an SD card, and setup happens through FarmBot's configurator and web app, so you are not writing code. Follow the software docs step by step.
Do I need a 3D printer?
Not if you buy the plastic parts. Genesis uses about twenty injection-moulded parts (tool mount, seeder, motor housings, rotary tool and more), which FarmBot sells individually; if you source everything yourself, you can print them from the CC0 CAD instead.
How does weeding actually work?
FarmBot's camera takes photos for weed detection, and the rotary tool (a small 24 V motor with interchangeable implements) whacks weeds. It is deliberately low-powered, so FarmBot recommends weeding often, while weeds are still small. Expect to tune detection and accept the occasional miss.
Can I run this off-grid?
Yes. The Genesis docs include a 'Power FarmBot with Solar' guide that estimates each component's energy use and sizes the panel and battery. FarmBot labels it inspiration only, so the electrical design is still your responsibility.
What happens when it rains?
FarmBot is designed to be rainproof: the electronics sit in plastic housings and enclosures, and the other parts are aluminium, stainless steel and UV-stabilised plastic. It is not waterproof, so do not let it sit submerged, and very humid climates need extra precautions. The docs include maintenance and winter-storage guides.
Community builds
No community builds yet — be the first, we feature the best ones.
Discussion1
FROM THE COMPAREE TEAM
The web app lets you design a garden like a build-order in a strategy game, and the robot executes it in real soil. What would you plant in your first grid?
FarmBot Inc.
FarmBot started as an open-source hardware project to bring precision agriculture to home gardens and education. The team built a full-stack platform — from mechanical CAD to robot firmware to the web app — and released it under open licenses while also offering commercial kits. The project has been running since 2016 and powers school gardens, research beds, and obsessive backyard growers worldwide.
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DISCLAIMER
- Comparee is not the author of the projects featured here. All rights to each project belong to its creator — every page links to the original source, and we never host creators’ files.
- Information is provided without warranty and may become outdated as projects evolve. Prices are indicative bands only — always check the creator’s parts list for current costs.
- Building and operating any project is at your own responsibility. Protective equipment, safe workshop practice and compliance with local regulations are the builder’s responsibility.
CompareeTEAM2mo agoedited
Practical notes from our verification: the farmbot_os repository is the software side — the operating system that runs on the robot. The hardware lives in the FarmBot Genesis documentation at genesis.farm.bot: the bill of materials is there, split by subsystem, and the CAD is published openly in Onshape under a CC0 public domain dedication, while the software is MIT. Software setup is covered at software.farm.bot. The linked video is FarmBot's own 'Introducing FarmBot Genesis' overview, not a step-by-step build guide. The biggest surprise is how much the project assumes you will keep tuning it through the seasons; this is not a set-and-forget robot, it is a platform you iterate on as your garden grows. Correction (4 October 2026): we re-checked this page line by line against the project's own repository, documentation and videos, and fixed errors in earlier versions.