Raspberry Pi Pico W product image

Raspberry Pi Pico W

Nerd Approved:
(5/5)
Review by Joshua Morris on
View on AmazonAs an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases at no additional cost to you.

Review

The Pico W is still my favorite quick-deploy microcontroller. For $10-ish you get the dual-core RP2040, built-in 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi, and enough RAM to run MicroPython web servers or C++ FreeRTOS projects. I’ve used it for Home Assistant sensors, MQTT air-quality probes, and even a tiny serial console for my Pi cluster. CircuitPython support has matured nicely and the UF2 bootloader makes firmware updates as simple as dragging a file. The official SDK exposes Wi-Fi primitives for C/C++ and there’s now native support in MicroPython 1.22, so you can stand up sockets with a few lines. My only nit: there’s still no BLE radio, so if you need Bluetooth you’ll need an external module or the Pico 2. For Wi-Fi-enabled tinkering and teaching embedded basics, nothing competes at this price.

✓ Pros

  • ✓RP2040 dual-core MCU with Wi-Fi covers most IoT use cases
  • ✓UF2 bootloader and drag-and-drop firmware keep iteration fast
  • ✓Great ecosystem across MicroPython, CircuitPython, and C SDK
  • ✓Tiny footprint and low power draw suit sensor deployments

✗ Cons

  • ✗No onboard BLE radio
  • ✗GPIO are unpopulated—soldering headers required for breadboards

Specifications

MicrocontrollerRP2040 dual-core Cortex-M0+ @ 133 MHz
WirelessInfineon CYW43439 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi
Memory264 KB SRAM, 2 MB QSPI flash
ProgrammingMicroPython, CircuitPython, C/C++ SDK
Gpio26 multifunction GPIO (23 usable with Wi-Fi)
Date First AvailableJune 30, 2022

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