Automated Storage & Retrieval System (AS/RS)
An Automated Storage & Retrieval System (AS/RS) is computer-controlled machinery that automatically places goods into, and retrieves them from, defined storage locations in a warehouse — without manual driving or picking. Types include crane-based unit-load and mini-load systems, shuttle systems, vertical lift modules and carousels, and cube-based (grid) systems, working within dense, often very tall racking.
AS/RS delivers high storage density, speed, accuracy and labour savings: it uses vertical space efficiently, operates continuously with minimal staff, and virtually eliminates pick errors and misplaced stock. It underpins goods-to-person picking, where the system brings items to a stationary operator (or robot) rather than sending pickers to the goods. The trade-offs are high capital cost and less flexibility to change. AS/RS is a core technology of warehouse automation, increasingly central as e-commerce drives demand for fast, accurate, high-throughput fulfilment, and it is coordinated with the WMS by a warehouse control system. It represents the automated heart of the modern distribution centre.
As e-commerce demanded faster, more accurate fulfilment from scarce, costly warehouse space, AS/RS became the answer — dense vertical storage, near-zero errors, round-the-clock operation with minimal labour. It is the automated core of the modern distribution centre and the foundation of goods-to-person picking, making it central to how high-throughput warehouses now run.
What are the benefits of AS/RS?
High storage density, speed, accuracy and labour savings, using vertical space efficiently with minimal picking errors.
What is goods-to-person picking?
An approach where the AS/RS brings items to a stationary operator or robot, instead of pickers walking to the goods.