Raspberry Pi Pico ILI9341 display tutorial using CircuitPython

In this video I am going to show you how to connect this 2.8” colour TFT display with a Raspberry Pi Pico board. I will also show you how to use it with CircuitPython and I will share with you 3 useful projects to help you get started and save you a lot of time. Let’s start.

This Colour TFT display is one of my favourite displays of all time. I have used it in many Arduino projects in the past and I really like it because it is big, inexpensive, it costs around $9, it is easy to use, it also has an SD card slot at the back, and it is a touch screen. I won’t show you how to use touch in this video, but I will create a detailed tutorial about it in the future.

The display has a resolution of 320x240 pixels and it uses the SPI interface to communicate with the microcontroller. The connection with the Raspberry Pi Pico board is very easy. All we have to do is to connect power and 6 more wires. Let’s see how to do it.

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[Educs]

I hope you took away lots from this video. Let me know below!

[rivia]

Thanks for tutorial.
For those who watching and trying these examples in 2024 you have to do some changes in examples' codes as CircuitPython now is v9 and you maybe using a clone of Pico.
1) In line "if 'Pico' in board_type:" you may need to change Pico to your board name, my board name (chinese clone) is "VCC-GND Studio YD RP2040 with rp2040", so I changed that line to "if 'RP2040' in board_type:". Use import os; os.uname().machine in console to check board name.
2) lines "display.show(group)" change to lines "display.root_group = group"

[saydiy]

good job. you shown a head at 5:10, can you show a jpeg image in that shape same as? thanks.

[Anime_watchers]

What about the Touch Interface tutuorial?

[andrewgarfield]

can I use arduino uno for the slideshow display?

[keralagamingbuddy]

bro can i use the same library to work with micro-python code, I am also using thonny ide, but i don't get the difference between the circuit python and micro-python, please help!!

[steviewde]

Thanks for the tutorial.
Please allow me one question: Will the "analog" gauges work with a backgroud image? And how?

[ahmedmoustafa]

Did you try to use the sd card with the display? Did it work?

[luisfersanz]

Please, can you do a tutorial with raspberry pi pico W, tft display and makecode arcade? I would like build my own handheld game console, but I haven't the skills. Thanks for your time

[tmz]

thanks a lot for the tutorial! does this work also for a display with a different size, such as 3, 5", still 14 pin ILI9341? and, does it work with pico w or only with pico?

[chouuul]

Hi i search on internet but i found nothing ...
I bought a 2" TFT LCD Screen but there is no SDI or SCK pin but SDA and SCL...
It's the same thing ? Do you have a tutorial for this ?

[hippie-io]

Nice video! What is the power draw of this setup?

[stephenmartinez]

Code for this isn't available with the link.

[ohadduman]

this tutorial work whit raspberry pi 4 or only with pico ?