Vision-Language Memory for Spatial Reasoning
On the map: LLM reasoning → Spatial and embodied reasoning
Abstract (arXiv)
Spatial reasoning is a critical capability for intelligent robots, yet current vision-language models (VLMs) still fall short of human-level performance in video-based spatial reasoning. This gap mainly stems from two challenges: a semantic-geometric misalignment that prevents consistent 3D understanding, and the absence of persistent memory to retain 3D representation and understanding across frames. To address these limitations, we present VLM2, a Vision-Language Model with persistent Memory for spatial reasoning with a view-consistent, 3D-aware representation purely from 2D videos. Specifically, we incorporate a dual-memory module consisting of a working memory that operates as a sliding window to focus on immediate context, and an episodic memory that consolidates and stores critical information across frames. This design enables bounded and efficient spatial reasoning under a fixed computational cost. Extensive experiments on multiple benchmarks show that VLM2 achieves state-of-the-art performance among video-based models, significantly advancing the frontier of visual-spatial intelligence.
Key facts. Cited by 5 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026). Placed in Spatial and embodied reasoning, one of 17 directions in LLM reasoning. Builds on 76 of its 87 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 25 Nov 2025.
Builds on
76 of 87 references.
Closest ancestors · 9
Same direction, newest first
- 2025Reasoning in Space via Grounding in the World15 Oct
- 20253DRS: MLLMs Need 3D-Aware Representation Supervision for Scene Understanding2 Jun
- 2025SSR: Enhancing Depth Perception in Vision-Language Models via Rationale-Guided Spatial Reasoning18 May
- 2024Thinking in Space: How Multimodal Large Language Models See, Remember, and Recall Spaces18 Dec
- 20243DSRBench: A Comprehensive 3D Spatial Reasoning Benchmark10 Dec
- 2024SpatialRGPT: Grounded Spatial Reasoning in Vision Language Models3 Jun
- 2024SpatialVLM: Endowing Vision-Language Models with Spatial Reasoning Capabilities22 Jan
- 2023LL3DA: Visual Interactive Instruction Tuning for Omni-3D Understanding, Reasoning, and Planning30 Nov
- 2022SQA3D: Situated Question Answering in 3D Scenes14 Oct
Other references · 67
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- 2023MovieChat: From Dense Token to Sparse Memory for Long Video Understandingcited by 542
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- 2021ARKitScenes: A Diverse Real-World Dataset For 3D Indoor Scene Understanding Using Mobile RGB-D Datacited by 454
- 2023An Embodied Generalist Agent in 3D Worldcited by 365
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- 2021ScanQA: 3D Question Answering for Spatial Scene Understandingcited by 346
- 2024LongVILA: Scaling Long-Context Visual Language Models for Long Videoscited by 309
- 20243D Reconstruction with Spatial Memorycited by 277
- 2024MA-LMM: Memory-Augmented Large Multimodal Model for Long-Term Video Understandingcited by 229
- 2025EmbodiedBench: Comprehensive Benchmarking Multi-modal Large Language Models for Vision-Driven Embodied Agentscited by 221
- 2025Spatial-MLLM: Boosting MLLM Capabilities in Visual-based Spatial Intelligencecited by 217
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- 2023Chat-Scene: Bridging 3D Scene and Large Language Models with Object Identifierscited by 175
- 2024Flash-VStream: Memory-Based Real-Time Understanding for Long Video Streamscited by 169
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- 2025Context as Memory: Scene-Consistent Interactive Long Video Generation with Memory Retrievalcited by 163
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- 2024Video-3D LLM: Learning Position-Aware Video Representation for 3D Scene Understandingcited by 138
- 2025From Flatland to Space: Teaching Vision-Language Models to Perceive and Reason in 3Dcited by 138
- 2024RoboSpatial: Teaching Spatial Understanding to 2D and 3D Vision-Language Models for Roboticscited by 136
- 2025Video World Models with Long-term Spatial Memorycited by 136
- 2023Chat-3D: Data-efficiently Tuning Large Language Model for Universal Dialogue of 3D Scenescited by 129
- 2025Learning from Videos for 3D World: Enhancing MLLMs with 3D Vision Geometry Priorscited by 120
- 2024GOAT-Bench: A Benchmark for Multi-Modal Lifelong Navigationcited by 94
50 most cited of 67 All 67 (JSON)
Built on by
Citing papers per year: 2026: 5.
5 papers.
- 2026Vesta: A Generalist Embodied Reasoning Modelcited by 5
- 2026Q-GeoMem: Question-Guided Geometric Memory for Video Spatial Reasoningcited by 1
- 2026SPATIOROUTE: Dynamic Prompt Routing for Zero-Shot Spatial Reasoningcited by 0
- 2026Probing Collision Grounding in Vision-Language Models for Safe Human-Robot Collaborationcited by 0
- 2026Dual-Latent Memory Routing for Vision-Language Reasoningcited by 0
- 2026Dual-Latent Memory Routing for Vision-Language Reasoning2 Sep 2026
- 2026Vesta: A Generalist Embodied Reasoning Model18 Jun 2026
- 2026Probing Collision Grounding in Vision-Language Models for Safe Human-Robot Collaboration29 May 2026
- 2026Q-GeoMem: Question-Guided Geometric Memory for Video Spatial Reasoning26 May 2026
- 2026SPATIOROUTE: Dynamic Prompt Routing for Zero-Shot Spatial Reasoning18 May 2026
Similar, not cited
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- 2026Chain of Spatial Thoughts: Modality-Agnostic Spatial Grounding for Vision Language Models
- 2025Mind the Gap: Benchmarking Spatial Reasoning in Vision-Language Models
- 2026The Spatial Blindspot of Vision-Language Models
- 2025Spatial Understanding from Videos: Structured Prompts Meet Simulation Data
- 2026ViSRA: A Video-based Spatial Reasoning Agent for Multi-modal Large Language Models
- 2025Imagine in Space: Exploring the Frontier of Spatial Intelligence and Reasoning Efficiency in Vision Language Models
- 2026Reasmory: 3D Reconstruction as Explicit Memory for VLMs Spatial Reasoning
- 2026Linear Mechanisms for Spatiotemporal Reasoning in Vision Language Models