Comparative Analysis of Underwater Positioning and Navigation Systems

Underwater navigation is essential and widely deployed in underwater machines such as submarines and un-manned underwater vehicles. Such machines are used for many purposes including fish farms management, defense, research, and exploration. In the last decade, there has been an advancement in underwater sensing and energy harvesting technologies. This resulted in improvements in underwater positioning and navigation systems and also in novel underwater positioning and navigation systems. This paper surveys and categorizes underwater positioning and navigation systems. Then, it analyzes and compares each category’s characteristics and performance. Moreover, it reviews the advantages and disadvantages of the different categories of underwater positioning and navigation systems. Also, it suggests the ecosystems that fit each category the most. In this paper, navigation and positioning systems are categorized into the following categories: acoustic, multi-sensory, GPS buoys, vision-based, SLAM, and cooperative.