Abstract: A high-resolution compliant tactile sensor based on total internal reflection(TIR)technique ispresented. The sensor uses a clear rubber as waveguide plate with both high resolution and compliance andlow force sensing threshold in constrast with solid waveguide plate (glass, acrylic).It is suitable for the sen-sor incorporated in the finger of a robot gripper to efficiently acquire parameters about the shape,positionand orientation of an object for the grasping and recognition tasks.