The World Robot Olympiad (WRO) is a global robotics competition for young people. The World Robot Olympiad competition uses Lego Mindstorms manufactured by LEGO Education.First held in 2004 in Singapore, it now attracts more than 70,000 students from more than 95 countries.
The competition consists of 4 different categories: RoboMission, RoboSports, Future Innovators, Future Engineers. and for the RoboMission and Future Innovators categories, it consists of three different age groups: Elementary, Junior High and Senior High. Participants below the age of 13 are considered as Elementary, participants from ages 11 until 15 years old are considered Junior High, and participants between 14 and 19 are considered Senior High.
WRO was formally established in 2003, with the first international WRO final organized in 2004. Organizations from China, Japan, Singapore and Korea are considered the founding countries. In 2004, teams from China, Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Russia, Singapore and Thailand took part in the first international final, held in Singapore.
In 2003, the four founding countries established the international WRO Committee (now known as the WRO Advisory Council), which decided to establish a new and permanent robotics organisation, based on the idea that students from all over the world should have the opportunity to meet with other students to fulfil the new mission statement:
“To bring together young people all over the world to develop their creativity, design & problem solving skills through challenging & educational robot competitions and activities”
The WRO Committee decided on the new name World Robot Olympiad, and new WRO logos were developed.
Finally the WRO statutes and a set of general rules were worked out to ensure a sound and safe future for WRO. One of the major decisions, which appears in the Statutes, was that the international WRO event should be hosted by a new country each year and the WRO Committee should elect a chairman.
In 2017, the host country of WRO was Costa Rica. This was the first time the competition was held outside the Asia Region and the first time it came to the Americas.
In 2023, the world finals were hosted by Panama City.
In 2024, the world finals were hosted by Izmir, Turkey.
The WRO 2025 International Final will be hosted in Singapore.
