Chinese firm DFRobot’s ESP32 is a low-power system-on-chip (SoC) with integrated wifi and dual-mode Bluetooth, making it suitable for designing and prototyping IoT systems.

At its heart is a dual-core or single-core Tensilica Xtensa LX6 microprocessor with a clock rate of up to 240MHz. Engineered for mobile devices, wearable electronics and IoT applications, it achieves low power consumption through power-saving features.

The FireBeetle ESP32 IoT series is designed for IoT projects. It has two versions – ESP32 and ESP32-E.

The ESP32, a low-power consumption microcontroller, integrates a dual-core ESP-Wroom-32 module, which supports MCU and wifi and Bluetooth dual-mode communication. The electric current is 10μA in deep-sleep mode. The main controller supports two power supply methods: USB and 3.7V external lithium battery. Both USB and external DC can charge the Lipo battery directly.

The ESP32-E is an ESP-Wroom-32E-based main controller board with dual-core chips. It supports wifi and Bluetooth dual-mode communications and features a small size, low power consumption, onboard charging circuit and easy-to-use interface, which can be used for industrial IoT applications, smart home and wearable devices. It supports Arduino programming and will support Scratch graphical programming and MicroPython programming soon. The stamp hole design lets it be embedded in a PCB, saving costs and time to build and test a prototype.

The ESP32-E smart water meter is an IoT project that carries out data acquisition and transmission. The meter can realise these requirements by combining the FireBeetle Board-ESP32-E with the HuskyLens AI machine-vision sensor. Thanks to Huskylens’ built-in object recognition function, the meter can automatically and accurately read data regardless of what kind of dial plate. By connecting HuskyLens with Board-ESP32-E, the data can be uploaded and read on a phone through the Bluetooth and wifi function.

The ESP32 smart home hub is a modular platform to make it easier to construct IoT-connected sensors and outputs. The main feature is a FireBeetle Board-ESP32 that handles all communication, sensor readings and outputs. Two stepper motor drivers control two bipolar stepper motors. The hub works well for simple home automation and data collection tasks. It can be used for setting the colour of an LED strip, monitoring the temperature of a room, checking if a light’s on, and a host of other projects.

The ESP32 IoT cat litter box can measure the weight of its users (the cats), check cleaning conditions, save the data online, and send reminders and alerts. The cat litter box with wifi, using an ESP32, can measure the weight of cats using weight sensors and HX711 amplifiers, monitor the general cleaning conditions of the cat litter box, and even store all the data in the cloud using the ThingSpeak platform. The device can generate notifications by email, Twitter and so on. The FireBeetle Board-ESP32 makes it easy to programme using Arduino IDE.

DFRobot is a robotics and open-source hardware provider. The company was founded in 2008 and is headquartered in Shanghai, China. Its catalogue includes more 2000 electronics products such as sensors, robotic platforms and communication modules, which are compatible with controllers such as Arduino and Raspberry Pi.