TabletopGen: Tabletop Scene Generation and Interactive Simulation for Robotic Manipulation

Accepted to ECCV 2026
1School of Artificial Intelligence, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences
2D-Robotics
3State Key Laboratory of Multimodal Artificial Intelligence Systems (MAIS), Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences 4Horizon Robotics
Project Leader    Corresponding author
TabletopGen teaser

We present TabletopGen, a training-free, fully automatic framework for generating tabletop simulation scenes. Given a text description or a single image, TabletopGen produces high-fidelity, detail-rich, instance-level interactive tabletop environments that can be directly used for robotic manipulation tasks. It also supports multimodal data synthesis and scene expansion through in-scene editing or diverse generation under the same description, providing broader simulated environment coverage for large-scale manipulation data synthesis.

Abstract

Simulation provides a low-cost, scalable pathway to large-scale robotic manipulation data collection. However, existing 3D scene generation methods can rarely be applied directly to manipulation data synthesis, as their generated scenes often lack instance-level interactivity and physical plausibility. Focusing on tabletop manipulation, we propose TabletopGen, a training-free and automated tabletop scene generation and interactive simulation engine. Starting from text or a single image, we first obtain independent 3D object models via generative instance extraction. Second, we introduce a novel pose and scale alignment approach that recovers a collision-free scene layout using a Differentiable Rotation Optimizer and a Top-View Spatial Alignment mechanism. Finally, we assemble the generated scene in a physics simulator with collision geometry, yielding a stable, interactable environment for synthesizing multimodal manipulation data. Extensive experiments and user studies demonstrate that TabletopGen achieves state-of-the-art performance in visual fidelity, layout accuracy, and physical plausibility. Furthermore, we validate the executability of the collected trajectories on a real robotic arm via zero-shot real-to-sim-to-real policy transfer, indicating that TabletopGen can serve as a reliable data engine for robotic manipulation data synthesis.

Method

Method Overview

Given a text prompt, first converted into a reference image via Text-to-Image, or a single image, TabletopGen proceeds in three stages. (1) Generative Instance Extraction segments and completes 2D instances, then reconstructs Z-up canonicalized, directly placeable 3D assets. (2) Pose and Scale Alignment recovers a physically feasible layout: the DRO (Differentiable Rotation Optimizer) optimizes rotation with a tri-modal loss, while TSA (Top-view Spatial Alignment) infers translation and scale using a synthesized top-view image, stacking priors, and an anchor object selected by RMA-Score. (3) Interactive Simulation assembles the scene in a physics simulator, performs motion planning for manipulation tasks, and executes collision-free trajectories for multimodal interaction data synthesis.

Interactive Scene Visualization

Click Object: Show Name Left Drag: Rotate Scroll: Zoom Right Drag (or Ctrl+Left): Pan

For smoother web visualization, we reduced the texture resolution of the models. Each scene may take about 10–20 seconds to load (depending on your network speed, possibly longer), so please be patient.

Input Image
Image
Loading...
Scene 1

Select Scene

Manipulation Task Demo

Community

WeChat QR Code

Scan to connect on WeChat and join our community for updates and discussions with the authors.

BibTeX

@article{wang2025tabletopgen,
  title={TabletopGen: Instance-Level Interactive 3D Tabletop Scene Generation from Text or Single Image},
  author={Wang, Ziqian and He, Yonghao and Yang, Licheng and Zou, Wei and Ma, Hongxuan and Liu, Liu and Sui, Wei and Guo, Yuxin and Su, Hu},
  journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:2512.01204},
  year={2025}
}