# BlenDAgger: Blended Shared Control for Interactive Imitation Learning

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2609.37599 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2609.37599/

## Key facts

- No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Robot manipulation imitation learning, one of 13 directions in Offline RL and imitation learning from data.
- Builds on 28 of its 39 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 29 Sep 2026.

## Placed in

- Offline RL and imitation learning from data / [Robot manipulation imitation learning](https://mlsanity.com/offlinerl/robot-manipulation-imitation-learning/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 28 of 28)

- [Denoising Diffusion Implicit Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2010.02502/) (2020)
- [Diffusion Policy: Visuomotor Policy Learning via Action Diffusion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.04137/) (2023)
- [Learning Fine-Grained Bimanual Manipulation with Low-Cost Hardware](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.13705/) (2023)
- [What Matters in Learning from Offline Human Demonstrations for Robot Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2108.03298/) (2021)
- [Out-of-Distribution Detection with Deep Nearest Neighbors](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.06507/) (2022)
- [RoboCasa: Large-Scale Simulation of Everyday Tasks for Generalist Robots](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.02523/) (2024)
- [Mobile ALOHA: Learning Bimanual Mobile Manipulation with Low-Cost Whole-Body Teleoperation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.02117/) (2024)
- [HG-DAgger: Interactive Imitation Learning with Human Experts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1810.02890/) (2018)
- [Human-in-the-Loop Imitation Learning using Remote Teleoperation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2012.06733/) (2020)
- [ThriftyDAgger: Budget-Aware Novelty and Risk Gating for Interactive Imitation Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2109.08273/) (2021)
- [Robot Learning on the Job: Human-in-the-Loop Autonomy and Learning During Deployment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2211.08416/) (2022)
- [EnsembleDAgger: A Bayesian Approach to Safe Imitation Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1807.08364/) (2018)
- [TRANSIC: Sim-to-Real Policy Transfer by Learning from Online Correction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.10315/) (2024)
- [LazyDAgger: Reducing Context Switching in Interactive Imitation Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.00053/) (2021)
- [Shared Autonomy via Hindsight Optimization for Teleoperation and Teaming](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1706.00155/) (2017)
- [Compliant Residual DAgger: Improving Real-World Contact-Rich Manipulation with Human Corrections](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2506.16685/) (2025)
- [RoboCopilot: Human-in-the-loop Interactive Imitation Learning for Robot Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.07771/) (2025)
- [TidyBot++: An Open-Source Holonomic Mobile Manipulator for Robot Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.10447/) (2024)
- [Situational Confidence Assistance for Lifelong Shared Autonomy](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2104.06556/) (2021)
- [End-to-End Dexterous Arm-Hand VLA Policies via Shared Autonomy: VR Teleoperation Augmented by Autonomous Hand VLA Policy for Efficient Data Collection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2511.00139/) (2025)
- [The Sense of Agency in Assistive Robotics Using Shared Autonomy](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2501.07462/) (2025)
- [HACTS: a Human-As-Copilot Teleoperation System for Robot Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.24070/) (2025)
- [Autonomy Infused Teleoperation with Application to BCI Manipulation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1503.05451/) (2015)
- [Consistency Matters: Defining Demonstration Data Quality Metrics in Robot Learning from Demonstration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.14309/) (2024)
- [SARI: Shared Autonomy across Repeated Interaction](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.09795/) (2022)
- [Incremental Learning for Robot Shared Autonomy](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.06315/) (2024)
- [Hand-in-the-Loop: Improving VLA Policies for Dexterous Manipulation via Seamless Hand-Arm Intervention](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2605.15157/) (2026)
- [A Blended Human-Robot Shared Control Framework to Handle Drift and Latency](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1811.09382/) (2018)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Robot policies are frequently trained from human corrections, yet teleoperating a robot to provide corrections is burdensome, and human demonstrators are not always optimal. We propose Blended DAgger (BlenDAgger), an approach for collecting data to train imitation learning policies by using shared control to blend the policy's and demonstrator's actions during interventions. By blending human and policy actions, we aim to improve the autonomous performance of manipulation policies. We validate our approach across five manipulation tasks, two in the real world and three in simulation. Our approach achieves higher autonomous performance by 30 or more percentage points on two real-world tasks compared to a typical human-gated correction approach (HG-DAgger). We also investigate the advantages of BlenDAgger that allow for higher autonomous performance, finding that BlenDAgger results in 57% smoother transitions between policy control and human interventions, and 14% higher trajectory similarity to the training data. In a user study (n=14) on two real-world tasks, we find that BlenDAgger results in faster data collection (BF=13.32), and we do not find a difference in subjective perceptions. These results show that blended shared control leads to higher autonomous performance compared to typical methods for fine-tuning robot policies from fully teleoperated interventions.