A comprehensive survey on RGB-D-based human action recognition: algorithms, datasets, and popular applications

Abstract Due to the rapid advances in computer vision and deep learning, human action recognition has become one of the most important representative tasks for video understanding. Especially for human action recognition based on RGB-D data, a promising research direction, there has been a number of...

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Main Authors: Yumin Zhang, Yanyong Wang
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: SpringerOpen 2025-08-01
Series:EURASIP Journal on Image and Video Processing
Subjects:
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1186/s13640-025-00677-0
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author Yumin Zhang
Yanyong Wang
author_facet Yumin Zhang
Yanyong Wang
author_sort Yumin Zhang
collection DOAJ
description Abstract Due to the rapid advances in computer vision and deep learning, human action recognition has become one of the most important representative tasks for video understanding. Especially for human action recognition based on RGB-D data, a promising research direction, there has been a number of researchers to work on. In particular, convolutional neural networks (CNNs) are capable of image classification tasks, recurrent neural networks (RNNs) are skilled in sequence-based problems, and Transformer is good at global modeling. In this survey, we introduce a number of algorithms based on CNNs, RNNs and Transformer for RGB-D based human action recognition, which could be categorized into four parts: RGB-based, depth-based, skeleton-based and RGB-D based. As a survey focusing on the RGB-D based human action recognition, we thoroughly represent the algorithms, datasets and popular applications for it. What’s more, we give some possible future research directions for this field in the last part.
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institution Kabale University
issn 1687-5281
language English
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series EURASIP Journal on Image and Video Processing
spelling doaj-art-030aed2123e24a8b888ea486dc19d7c22025-08-20T03:43:15ZengSpringerOpenEURASIP Journal on Image and Video Processing1687-52812025-08-012025116510.1186/s13640-025-00677-0A comprehensive survey on RGB-D-based human action recognition: algorithms, datasets, and popular applicationsYumin Zhang0Yanyong Wang1Department of Weapon Control System, China North Vehicle Research InstituteDepartment of Weapon Control System, China North Vehicle Research InstituteAbstract Due to the rapid advances in computer vision and deep learning, human action recognition has become one of the most important representative tasks for video understanding. Especially for human action recognition based on RGB-D data, a promising research direction, there has been a number of researchers to work on. In particular, convolutional neural networks (CNNs) are capable of image classification tasks, recurrent neural networks (RNNs) are skilled in sequence-based problems, and Transformer is good at global modeling. In this survey, we introduce a number of algorithms based on CNNs, RNNs and Transformer for RGB-D based human action recognition, which could be categorized into four parts: RGB-based, depth-based, skeleton-based and RGB-D based. As a survey focusing on the RGB-D based human action recognition, we thoroughly represent the algorithms, datasets and popular applications for it. What’s more, we give some possible future research directions for this field in the last part.https://doi.org/10.1186/s13640-025-00677-0Human action recognitionConvolutional neural networksRGB-D dataTransformerRecurrent neural networks
spellingShingle Yumin Zhang
Yanyong Wang
A comprehensive survey on RGB-D-based human action recognition: algorithms, datasets, and popular applications
EURASIP Journal on Image and Video Processing
Human action recognition
Convolutional neural networks
RGB-D data
Transformer
Recurrent neural networks
title A comprehensive survey on RGB-D-based human action recognition: algorithms, datasets, and popular applications
title_full A comprehensive survey on RGB-D-based human action recognition: algorithms, datasets, and popular applications
title_fullStr A comprehensive survey on RGB-D-based human action recognition: algorithms, datasets, and popular applications
title_full_unstemmed A comprehensive survey on RGB-D-based human action recognition: algorithms, datasets, and popular applications
title_short A comprehensive survey on RGB-D-based human action recognition: algorithms, datasets, and popular applications
title_sort comprehensive survey on rgb d based human action recognition algorithms datasets and popular applications
topic Human action recognition
Convolutional neural networks
RGB-D data
Transformer
Recurrent neural networks
url https://doi.org/10.1186/s13640-025-00677-0
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AT yuminzhang comprehensivesurveyonrgbdbasedhumanactionrecognitionalgorithmsdatasetsandpopularapplications
AT yanyongwang comprehensivesurveyonrgbdbasedhumanactionrecognitionalgorithmsdatasetsandpopularapplications