AbstractThe state‐dependent indirect ‐pseudospectral (SDIHP) method for rigid spacecraft attitude control is presented in this paper. The optimal controller is obtained by the SDIHP method through classifying the attitude optimal control problem as a nonlinear quadratic optimal control problem. In the proposed control scheme, successive state‐dependent coefficient (SDC) parameterization is initially applied to the spacecraft dynamics to derive an available linear system to decrease the calculation cost and speed. Then, the indirect ‐adaptive spectral discretization is developed to convert the resultant optimal control problem into a sequence of linear equations, which can improve the global computational efficiency and guarantee the solving precision. Hence, the optimal control can be efficiently solved using basic matrix operations under the necessary collocation points based on the ‐adaptive features. Considering the inertia uncertainties and external disturbances, a state feedback controller is generated by the receding horizon control (RHC) framework to improve the robustness. Simulation results are included to show the effectiveness and performance of the suggested optimal method.