🎮Playground Benchmark

MuJoCo Playground PPO Benchmark Results

SLM Lab v5.3 validates PPO on MuJoCo Playground — Google DeepMind's GPU-accelerated simulation platform. MuJoCo Playground uses the MJWarp backend (Warp-accelerated MJX) for physics, enabling massively parallel training with 2048 environments on GPU.

SLM Lab wraps Playground environments as gymnasium.VectorEnv with DLPack zero-copy JAX→PyTorch transfer. All 54 environments use the playground/ prefix in specs.

Results below are from March 2026 benchmark runs. All trained models and metrics are publicly available on HuggingFace.

Methodology

Results show Trial-level performance:

1. Trial = 4 Sessions with different random seeds

2. Session = One complete training run

3. Score = Final 100-checkpoint moving average (total_reward_ma)

The trial score is the mean across 4 sessions.

Standardized Settings

Category	num_envs	max_frame	log_frequency
Playground	2048	100e6	10000

Spec File

Spec file: ppo_playground.yaml — all envs via -s env=playground/ENV

Running Benchmarks

# Requires: uv sync --group playground (JAX + MuJoCo Playground + MJWarp)

source .env && slm-lab run-remote --gpu \
  slm_lab/spec/benchmark_arc/ppo/ppo_playground.yaml SPEC_NAME train \
  -s env=playground/ENV -s max_frame=100000000 -n NAME

Installation

uv sync --group playground

This adds JAX, MuJoCo Playground, and MJWarp dependencies. Requires a CUDA GPU.

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Phase 5.1: DM Control Suite (25 envs)

Classic control and locomotion tasks from the DeepMind Control Suite, ported to MJWarp GPU simulation.

ENV	MA	SPEC_NAME	HF Data
playground/AcrobotSwingup	253.24	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_acrobotswingup_2026_03_12_175809
playground/AcrobotSwingupSparse	146.98	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_vnorm_acrobotswingupsparse_2026_03_14_161212
playground/BallInCup	942.44	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_ballincup_2026_03_12_105443
playground/CartpoleBalance	968.23	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_cartpolebalance_2026_03_12_141924
playground/CartpoleBalanceSparse	995.34	ppo_playground_constlr	ppo_playground_constlr_cartpolebalancesparse_2026_03_14_000352
playground/CartpoleSwingup	729.09	ppo_playground_constlr	ppo_playground_constlr_cartpoleswingup_2026_03_17_041102
playground/CartpoleSwingupSparse	521.98	ppo_playground_constlr	ppo_playground_constlr_cartpoleswingupsparse_2026_03_13_233449
playground/CheetahRun	883.44	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_vnorm_cheetahrun_2026_03_14_161211
playground/FingerSpin	713.35	ppo_playground_fingerspin	ppo_playground_fingerspin_fingerspin_2026_03_13_033911
playground/FingerTurnEasy	663.58	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_fingerturneasy_2026_03_12_175835
playground/FingerTurnHard	590.43	ppo_playground_vnorm_constlr	ppo_playground_vnorm_constlr_fingerturnhard_2026_03_16_234509
playground/FishSwim	580.57	ppo_playground_vnorm_constlr_clip03	ppo_playground_vnorm_constlr_clip03_fishswim_2026_03_14_002112
playground/HopperHop	22.00	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_hopperhop_2026_03_12_110855
playground/HopperStand	237.15	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_vnorm_hopperstand_2026_03_14_095438
playground/HumanoidRun	18.83	ppo_playground_humanoid	ppo_playground_humanoid_humanoidrun_2026_03_14_115522
playground/HumanoidStand	114.86	ppo_playground_humanoid	ppo_playground_humanoid_humanoidstand_2026_03_14_115516
playground/HumanoidWalk	47.01	ppo_playground_humanoid	ppo_playground_humanoid_humanoidwalk_2026_03_14_172235
playground/PendulumSwingup	637.46	ppo_playground_pendulum	ppo_playground_pendulum_pendulumswingup_2026_03_13_033818
playground/PointMass	868.09	ppo_playground_vnorm_constlr	ppo_playground_vnorm_constlr_pointmass_2026_03_14_095452
playground/ReacherEasy	955.08	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_reachereasy_2026_03_12_122115
playground/ReacherHard	946.99	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_reacherhard_2026_03_12_123226
playground/SwimmerSwimmer6	591.13	ppo_playground_vnorm_constlr	ppo_playground_vnorm_constlr_swimmerswimmer6_2026_03_14_000406
playground/WalkerRun	759.71	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_vnorm_walkerrun_2026_03_14_161354
playground/WalkerStand	948.35	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_vnorm_walkerstand_2026_03_14_161415
playground/WalkerWalk	945.31	ppo_playground_vnorm	ppo_playground_vnorm_walkerwalk_2026_03_14_161338

---

Phase 5.2: Locomotion Robots (19 envs)

Real-world robot locomotion — quadrupeds (Go1, Spot, Barkour) and humanoids (H1, G1, T1, Op3, Apollo, BerkeleyHumanoid) on flat and rough terrain.

ENV	MA	SPEC_NAME	HF Data
playground/ApolloJoystickFlatTerrain	17.44	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_apollojoystickflatterrain_2026_03_14_210939
playground/BarkourJoystick	0.0	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_barkourjoystick_2026_03_14_194525
playground/BerkeleyHumanoidJoystickFlatTerrain	32.29	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_berkeleyhumanoidjoystickflatterrain_2026_03_14_213019
playground/BerkeleyHumanoidJoystickRoughTerrain	21.25	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_berkeleyhumanoidjoystickroughterrain_2026_03_15_150211
playground/G1JoystickFlatTerrain	1.85	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_g1joystickflatterrain_2026_03_15_150219
playground/G1JoystickRoughTerrain	-2.75	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_g1joystickroughterrain_2026_03_19_015137
playground/Go1Footstand	23.48	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_go1footstand_2026_03_16_174009
playground/Go1Getup	18.16	ppo_playground_loco_go1	ppo_playground_loco_go1_go1getup_2026_03_16_132801
playground/Go1Handstand	17.88	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_go1handstand_2026_03_16_155437
playground/Go1JoystickFlatTerrain	0.0	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_go1joystickflatterrain_2026_03_14_204658
playground/Go1JoystickRoughTerrain	0.00	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_go1joystickroughterrain_2026_03_15_150321
playground/H1InplaceGaitTracking	11.95	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_h1inplacegaittracking_2026_03_16_170327
playground/H1JoystickGaitTracking	31.11	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_h1joystickgaittracking_2026_03_16_170412
playground/Op3Joystick	0.00	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_op3joystick_2026_03_15_150120
playground/SpotFlatTerrainJoystick	48.58	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_spotflatterrainjoystick_2026_03_16_180747
playground/SpotGetup	19.39	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_spotgetup_2026_03_14_213703
playground/SpotJoystickGaitTracking	36.90	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_spotjoystickgaittracking_2026_03_19_015106
playground/T1JoystickFlatTerrain	13.42	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_t1joystickflatterrain_2026_03_14_220250
playground/T1JoystickRoughTerrain	2.58	ppo_playground_loco_precise	ppo_playground_loco_precise_t1joystickroughterrain_2026_03_15_162332

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Phase 5.3: Manipulation (10 envs)

Robotic manipulation — Panda arm pick/place, Aloha bimanual, Leap dexterous hand, and AeroCube orientation tasks.

ENV	MA	SPEC_NAME	HF Data
playground/AeroCubeRotateZAxis	-3.09	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_aerocuberotatezaxis_2026_03_20_012502
playground/AlohaHandOver	3.65	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_alohahandover_2026_03_15_023712
playground/AlohaSinglePegInsertion	220.93	ppo_playground_manip_aloha_peg	ppo_playground_manip_aloha_peg_alohasinglepeginsertion_2026_03_17_122613
playground/LeapCubeReorient	74.68	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_leapcubereorient_2026_03_15_150420
playground/LeapCubeRotateZAxis	91.65	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_leapcuberotatezaxis_2026_03_15_150334
playground/PandaOpenCabinet	11081.51	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_pandaopencabinet_2026_03_15_150318
playground/PandaPickCube	4586.13	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_pandapickcube_2026_03_15_023744
playground/PandaPickCubeCartesian	10.58	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_pandapickcubecartesian_2026_03_15_023810
playground/PandaPickCubeOrientation	4281.66	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_pandapickcubeorientation_2026_03_19_015108
playground/PandaRobotiqPushCube	1.31	ppo_playground_loco	ppo_playground_loco_pandarobotiqpushcube_2026_03_15_042131