Bitcraze :: Open-Source, Nano-Sized Quadcopters & Supporting Ecosystems

Bitcraze is a Swedish robotics company founded in 2011 and headquartered in Malmö, Sweden. It specializes in developing open-source, nano-sized quadcopters and supporting ecosystems primarily for research, education, and development in aerial robotics. The company’s mission is to create accessible, flexible, and fully open platforms that enable users worldwide to explore, innovate, and experiment with flying robotics without proprietary restrictions. Bitcraze emphasizes transparency, community collaboration, and education, with all hardware designs, firmware, and software hosted on GitHub.

The company’s flagship product is the Crazyflie series — one of the smallest and most versatile research quadcopters available. It is widely used by universities (MIT, Carnegie Mellon, TU Berlin, etc.), research labs, and developers for swarm robotics, control algorithms, autonomous navigation, multi-robot systems, and embodied AI experiments. Its small size (allowing safe indoor testing), robustness, and open architecture make it ideal for space-constrained environments and large-scale swarm research.

Key robot-based products:

• Crazyflie 2.1 Brushless (latest model): Features powerful brushless motors for higher payload capacity, enhanced agility, improved endurance, and greater robustness compared to previous brushed versions. It offers excellent stability and flexibility for advanced research.
• Crazyflie 2.1+: The core platform with modular design, supporting a wide range of expansion decks for sensors, cameras, AI processing, and more.
• Positioning Systems: Lighthouse (SteamVR-based), Loco (UWB), and other technologies for precise indoor positioning and autonomous flight. These systems support swarming and work with other robots as well.
• Expansion Decks & Accessories: A rich ecosystem including flow decks (for optical flow), LED decks, AI decks, multi-ranger sensors, and more, allowing users to customize the Crazyflie for specific experiments.
• Software Ecosystem: Fully open-source firmware, client software (Python, C++, ROS/ROS 2 support), simulation tools, and development environments that enable rapid prototyping and customization.

Bitcraze platforms stand out for their safety (small and lightweight), extensibility, active community support, and proven use in cutting-edge research areas such as swarm intelligence, failure recovery, path planning, and modular robotics. The company also supports education by helping students learn control systems, embedded programming, and robotics through hands-on experimentation.