Install Gazebo on Mac (using homebrew)

Gazebo and several of its dependencies can be compiled on OS X with Homebrew using the osrf/simulation tap. Gazebo is straightforward to install on Mac OS X 10.9 (Mavericks) or higher. Installation on older versions requires changing the default standard library and rebuilding dependencies due to the use of c++11. For purposes of this tutorial, I will assume OS X 10.9 or greater is in use.

Default installation: one-liner

1. Install

   curl -ssL http://get.gazebosim.org | sh
   

2. Run

   gazebo
   

Alternative installation: step-by-step

1. Install homebrew, which should also prompt you to install the XCode command-line tools:

   ruby -e "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install)"
   

2. Install XQuartz, which provides X11 support and is required by Gazebo and OGRE

3. Run the following commands:

   brew tap osrf/simulation
   brew install gazebo8
   gazebo
   

Optional dependencies

The Gazebo formula has several optional dependencies: the Bullet and Simbody physics engines. To install with these physics engines:

    brew install gazebo8 --with-bullet --with-simbody

The DART physics engine can be used as well, though it must be installed using the following procedure prior to installing Gazebo.

    brew tap dartsim/dart
    brew install dartsim --core-only
    # Gazebo will be built with DART (autodetected), bullet and simbody
    brew install gazebo8 --with-bullet --with-simbody

Versions

The formula currently installs version 8.0 of Gazebo. Version 2.2 can be installed using the gazebo2 formula, Gazebo 5 using gazebo5 and Gazebo 7 using gazebo7. To install the latest version of Gazebo's default branch:

    brew install gazebo8 --HEAD