I tried the 3 Cheapest Arduino Alternatives! (That you Suggested)

You can get the shown microcontroller here: (affiliate links)

In this video we will be having a look at 3 of the cheapest Arduino Alternatives you can get. They have all been suggested by viewers and I will test what features they offer for their price and how easy to program and compatible they are with the Arduino IDE. Let's get started!

Websites that were shown during the video:

Thanks to Keysight for sponsoring this video

0:00 Your Cheap uC Suggestions
1:03 Intro
1:55 Creating 2 Test Circuits
3:00 CH32V003 (Cheapest Option)
7:10 LGT8F328P (Arduino Nano "Clone")
9:40 STM8S103 (Middle Ground)
12:38 Verdict

[oberpenneraffe]

I once ordered a single stm32f303 for a few euros. I was pleasantly surprised when I got it because they sent me 100 pieces. That's great value ;)

[tvpanda]

ESP units are also very cheap, the new lineup of the ESP32 series is also seriously awesome, more memory, speed, BLE and WiFi even Zigbee support on some, the ability to just flash ESP-Home and then do OTA updates, it just leaves arduino in the dust

[suchy.chomik]

Love your videos but keysight products are basically an unreachable dream for me... Also good luck on getting two milion subscribers!

[DStageGarage]

So you've skipped the only one that had 3x16bit timers... Something that come really handy when you want nice timings without going nuts with the SW ;-)

[Arduino_Proffesional]

I Love your videos:) By the way when are you doing the glowing stairs Update? I am very interessed :)

[mikehibbett]

"I2C is nearly everywhere" - I worked at Philips in the late 1980s, and I2C was everywhere then too. For cheap cpus on 8 pin soics, the microchip range of processors, pic10f and similar are also very low cost, but utilise relatively low cost programming tools and full supported SDK and IDE. As an aside, my first debug/programming device for the microchip processor cost me over £1000. Times have really changed.

[ExploringNew]

Not gonna lie I was just searching for a cheap thing to control my leds behind the TV. What a coincidence

[kleioscope]

sorry but i have no money to afford keysight They are unreachable dreams to me.... sorry. your vidz are nice though !

[XavierGr]

Unless you want a good quality ADC or low power consumption, then ESPs are the current kings of micro-controllers for DIYers.
1. Super easy to program with just a dirt-cheap serial device, no weird proprietary programmers needed.
2. Bluetooth and WiFi is a game changer. You program once and then if you want to change your program later you do it over the air. This is a must for permanent installations in hard to reach places.
3. For the performance features they provide ESPs are amazingly cheap. Just 1.80 euros for a ESP32-C3 little devboard and around 2 for the ESP32 module.
4. For ESP32 you don't even need a dev board. If you know what you are doing just the ESP32 bare module is enough for prototyping directly on it.
5. Native support for home automations with Home Assistant and ESPhome. These two projects really elevate the ease of use and practical use cases of ESP micro-controllers.

[vojtechadame]

I would probably choose the lgt8f328p, since it's basically an "Arduino on steroids".

[MarioPL]

You should have tried the cheap RP2040 boards. They are cheaper than arduino and much, much more powerful. 2$ version on Ali offers 4MB of SPI storage soldered on the board. Or even ESP32 (less than 3$ for dev board on Ali).

[torchris]

I know the ESP32 family is way more expensive, I find having the onboard Bluetooth & wifi gives a ton more flexibility for IoT projects. Also they fully support Arduino AND MicroPython. Aliexpress prices are around $5 Canadian here.

[mariobv]

The PY32F002A is even cheaper than the CH32V003, has more memory and features, and you can program it with the tools you already have. Jay Carlson did a review of this MCU some time ago as the cheapest replacement for an 8bit microcontroller.

[dcallan]

Great video2x👍
I remember the cost of some of the first microcontroller chips years ago, and its fantastic you can get such good value chips now

[nil]

St links do have RX and TX built in serial

The thing is st link are nothing but modified bootloader/ firmware with stm32 mcu

[bksne]

I used to LGT8F328 three year ago for read PIR sensor and control Fan, light. Currently, it still do work full time.

[PatrickHoodDaniel]

I like that you are showing off some bare-chip alternatives. I like to work with bare chip STM32 with a simple breakout on a few breadboards.

[DuroLabs]

In my opinion STM32F103C8T6 a.k.a the BluePill seems like a good option as it's way more powerful than mega328 and also almost very cheap here at least in India, I get it for less than 1.2$ and is pretty compatible with the existing Arduino Ide (for some of the niche feature you can install libraries). And if we install a USB bootloader to it, it can also be programmed via USB and Serial works too. 12Bit ADCs, 16Bit PWM, enough Analog and Digital GPIOs, CAN bus, and a RTC.
And for its full potential STMCube Ide seems like a good way to extract the most out of it. It also has GUI Configuration.
Not exactly cheap if you want to save every penny but for a Nano Compatible I just buy these instead.

[eugeniusz]

Well, my most beloved board is ESP32C3 Super Mini. It always just works and as a bonus you can have there OTA updates, Wifi and Bluetooth if needed - if not just don't power them up and power consumption will be very low. Not the cheapest option but is super reliable.
Ah, and it works with Arduino IDE just fine :) Including OTA

[_lolucoca_]

Having used the CH32V003 extensively over the last 18 months (only in Mounriver though), it's an amazing little chip for the price. It's way cheaper to pop in one of those compared to a dedicated IC in most cases. The software (especially the given examples) are a bit lacking though, you're going to need to piece a lot of things together for yourself. Once you've got a working codebase of your own examples to turn back to, the CH32V003 is a breeze to work with.