Fluid power is one of industry’s quiet workhorses. Its reliable, powerful and adaptable, and it’s evolving fast. The National Fluid Power Association (NFPA) in the USA is currently developing its latest Industrial Technology Roadmap for 2025, showing how hydraulics and pneumatics are changing to meet new industrial demands. This update focuses on where the technology must improve to stay relevant in an era of automation, electrification and intelligent control.
A structured approach to progress
The roadmap is a structured, data-driven guide for research and development. It connects five interdependent elements: customer drivers, customer strategies, capability improvements, research areas and research targets. Each update begins by identifying what machine builders want most − whether it’s better uptime, higher productivity, regulatory compliance or lower total cost of ownership − and then defines what fluid power must do to deliver those results. The 2025 revision, developed through industry surveys and workshops, involved experts from manufacturers, distributors, OEMs and system integrators across the supply chain.
What customers are asking for
The survey revealed that industrial machine builders are chasing nine major technology strategies. They want:
• Automation: Machines that can handle more tasks autonomously.
• Compactness: Higher power density in smaller packages.
• Connectivity: Better data flow between components, systems and the cloud.
• Electrification: More efficient electric actuation and hybrid systems.
• Energy efficiency: Lower energy use and emissions.
• Environmental impact reduction: Cleaner, quieter systems.
• Maintenance and support: Easier service, faster part replacement.
• Precision control: High-accuracy movement and process control.
• Safety: Built-in safeguards for operators and equipment.
In short, they want smarter, cleaner, smaller and safer systems that keep running longer with less attention.
Where fluid power stands today
To see how well fluid power aligns with these goals, the 2025 survey interviewed 119 professionals across hydraulic and pneumatic sectors. From this analysis, the task force singled out six strategic focus areas for 2025. These are safety, precision control, automation, maintenance and support, connectivity and electrification.
Capability improvements
To close the gaps, the NFPA defined nine key capability improvements that fluid power needs in order to advance:
• Data: Build in better sensing, monitoring and data utilisation. Improve the ability to monitor, gather and use data generated from fluid power products and systems.
• Control: Improve the precision, performance and ease of application of fluid power control systems.
• Energy efficiency: Minimise losses and optimise performance by increasing the energy efficiency of fluid power products and systems.
• Environmental impact: Reduce leaks, emissions and waste to minimise the environmental impact of fluid power products and systems.
• Noise: Design quieter components and systems to reduce the level and harshness of the noise generated by fluid power products and systems.
• Power density: Achieve more output per unit mass or volume by increasing the power density of fluid power products and systems.
• Reliability and durability: Extend service life under demanding conditions in order to improve the reliability and durability of fluid power products and systems.
• Safety: Ensure safer operation through smarter control and design for the safe use and application of fluid power products and systems.
• Service: Make parts and maintenance more accessible, improve the availability of replacement parts, and otherwise improve the servicing of the fluid power system on the machine.
These improvements form the technical backbone of the roadmap. Each one is measurable, researchable and tied to real engineering challenges.
Mapping the future
The task force mapped each capability to the strategies it most directly supports. Safety, maintenance and automation all depend on safety improvements; control and data feed precision control, connectivity and electrification; and power density drives compactness. This systematic mapping ensures that future R&D; aligns with customer expectations and market direction.
What comes next
In the coming months, NFPA working groups will turn these capability priorities into concrete research programmes, identifying key technologies, measurable targets and collaborative opportunities between industry and academia. The goal is to push hydraulics and pneumatics further into the age of intelligent manufacturing.
The 2025 NFPA roadmap highlights a technology base that is modernising by connecting data, refining control and driving up reliability. As industries automate and electrify, fluid power will remain a central enabler, combining raw force with smart control. The next few years will see that evolution accelerate, powered by engineering collaboration and guided by the roadmap’s clear direction.
To view the full report visit www.motioncontrol.co.za/ex/nfpa.pdf or www.nfpa.com/technologyreports
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