In various circumstances, such as human-robot interactions and industrial processes, planning at trajectory level is very useful to produce better movement. In this paper we present a near time optimal approach to plan a trajectory joining via points in real time for robot manipulators. To limit the speed variation, the path is smoothed around via-points in a limited area. The concept of online trajectory generation enables systems to react instantaneously at control level to unforeseen events. Simulation and real-world experimental results carried out on a KUKA Light-Weight Robot arm are presented.