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arXiv · 2505.20783

FM-Planner: Foundation Model Guided Path Planning for Autonomous Drone Navigation

Jiaping Xiao·Cheng Wen Tsao·Yuhang Zhang·Mir Feroskhan
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Abstract

Path planning is a critical component in autonomous drone operations, enabling safe and efficient navigation through complex environments. Recent advances in foundation models, particularly large language models (LLMs) and vision-language models (VLMs), have opened new opportunities for enhanced perception and intelligent decision-making in robotics. However, their practical applicability and effectiveness in global path planning remain relatively unexplored. This paper proposes foundation model-guided path planners (FM-Planner) and presents a comprehensive benchmarking study and practical validation for drone path planning. Specifically, we first systematically evaluate eight representative LLM and VLM approaches using standardized simulation scenarios. To enable effective real-time navigation, we then design an integrated LLM-Vision planner that combines semantic reasoning with visual perception. Furthermore, we deploy and validate the proposed path planner through real-world experiments under multiple configurations. Our findings provide valuable insights into the strengths, limitations, and feasibility of deploying foundation models in real-world drone applications and providing practical implementations in autonomous flight. Project site: https://github.com/NTU-ICG/FM-Planner.

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Jiaping Xiao, Cheng Wen Tsao, Yuhang Zhang, Mir Feroskhan. 2025-05-27. FM-Planner: Foundation Model Guided Path Planning for Autonomous Drone Navigation. https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.20783

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