IAES International Journal of Robotics and Automation (IJRA) Vol. 14, No. 2, June 2025, pp. 191~203 ISSN: 2722-2586, DOI: 10.11591/ijra.v14i2.pp191-203  191 Journal homepage: http://ijra.iaescore.com Comparative insights into nonlinear PID-based controller design approaches for industrial applications Syed Najib Syed Salim 1 , Mohd Fua’ad Rahmat 2 , Lokman Abdullah 3 , Shamsul Anuar Shamsudin 4 , Khairun Najmi Kamaludin 3 , Mazree Ibrahim 1 1 Fakulti Teknologi dan Kejuruteraan Elektrik, Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka, Durian Tunggal, Melaka, Malaysia 2 Fakulti Kejuruteraan Elektrik, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia 3 Fakulti Teknologi dan Kejuruteraan Industri dan Pembuatan, Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka, Durian Tunggal, Melaka, Malaysia 4 Fakulti Teknologi dan Kejuruteraan Mekanikal, Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka, Durian Tunggal, Melaka, Malaysia Article Info ABSTRACT Article history: Received Aug 30, 2024 Revised Mar 4, 2025 Accepted Mar 18, 2025 Proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controllers are established in manufacturing due to their simple design, robustness, and wide-ranging industrial applications. However, traditional PID controllers often struggle with the complexity and nonlinearity behaviors inherent in many control systems. As a result, ongoing and future research is focused on developing more stable PID controllers that function efficiently without heavily depending on exact mathematical models, by fine-tuning controller parameters. This study explores several PID-based controllers, including non-linear PID (N- PID), multi-rate non-linear PID (MN-PID), and self-regulating nonlinear PID (SN-PID), assessing and contrasting their performance. The efficacy and robustness of these control mechanisms are substantiated through comparative analyses with the sliding mode control technique, employing experimental data from a pneumatic actuator system to assess performance across varying load scenarios. SN-PID outperforms sliding mode controller (SMC) by 90.97% and PID by 89.90%, followed by MN-PID (85.58% over SMC, 83.86% over PID) and N-PID (78.08% over SMC, 75.49% over PID), while PID offers only 10.63% improvement over SMC. These findings provide valuable insights and recommendations for enhancing controller performance. These insights aim to guide control engineers in selecting the most appropriate N-PID design strategy for specific applications, ultimately improving system performance and operational efficiency in industrial environments. Keywords: Comparative analysis Enhanced PID controller Nonlinearity Performance analysis Robustness This is an open access article under the CC BY-SA license. Corresponding Author: Syed Najib Syed Salim Fakulti Teknologi dan Kejuruteraan Elektrik, Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka Hang Tuah Jaya Street, 76100 Durian Tunggal, Melaka, Malaysia Email: syednajib@utem.edu.my 1. INTRODUCTION In the field of industrial control systems, proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controllers have long been recognized for their stability and efficiency, consistently proving reliable across numerous industrial sectors [1]–[8]. Their popularity in industrial use is owed to their simplicity and effectiveness. However, traditional ways of designing PIDs may not always deliver the best outputs, especially when a complex non-linear system is involved [9]–[14]. PID controllers need improvement to sustain their robustness under dynamic conditions as industrial automation advances rapidly. This was highlighted by the research works of [15]–[21] As indicated in [22]–[24], recent studies have shown how important PI-based controllers are in dealing with disturbances, parameter uncertainties, and inherent nonlinearities encountered in a wide range of industrial processes, thus enhancing their efficiency and reliability.