A novel polarization sensor based on the mechanism of Sahara ant Cataglyphis was developed. To acquire the navigation performance of the sensor outside, several tests which used the output navigation angle of the sensor to control the mobile robot to move along a designed map was conducted. First, the structure and function prototype of the polarization sensor was presented. To improve the performance of polarization sensor, the optic integrating sphere was used as the polarized light source to replace the sky light, and the precision rotating table was taken as the standard angle to compensate the output angle of the sensor. After the compensation process, the angle output error of polarization sensor is within ±0.2°. Then, the mobile robot and how to use the polarization sensor to control the robot were briefly introduced. Finally, the process of navigation tests and the navigation performance comparison of the optical encoder and the polarization sensor were given.Results show that the latter method is better than the first one, and their average navigation position errors are 1.17 cm and 31.6 cm,respectively. According to the tests, the error of the polarization sensor doesn′t ac-cumulate with the time and can give the navigation message independently.In conclusion, it wouldplay an important role in the automation navigation systems in further way.