$7 Lolin S3 ESP32-S3 board ships with MicroPython firmware

Lolin S3 is the first ESP32-S3 board from the company, but instead of using the more compact D1 mini form factor, the board features a longer design with two rows of 20 pins offering up to 31 GPIOs.

Based on ESP32-S3-WROOM-1 module, the board features 16MB QSPI flash, 8MB SPRAM, two USB Type-C OTG and UART ports, a Lolin I2C port, an RGB LED, as well as Reset and user buttons.

Lolin S3 specifications:

Wireless module – ESP32-S3-WROOM-1 module with:
- Espressif Systems ESP32-S3 dual-core Tensilica LX7 @ up to 240 MHz with vector instructions for AI acceleration, 512KB RAM, 2.4 GHz WiFi 4 and Bluetooth 5.0 LE with support for long-range, up to 2Mbps data rate, mesh networking
- 16MB QSPI flash
- 8MB PSRAM
- PCB antenna
USB – 2x USB Type-C ports, one OTG port, one UART port for programming and debugging
Expansion
- 2x 20-pin headers with up to 31x GPIO, up to 16x ADC, DAC, SPI, UART, I2C, Reset, 5V, 3.3V, and GND
- 1x Lolin I2C Port
Misc – RGB LED, Reset button, user button (IO0)
Power Supply – 5V via USB Type-C port
Dimensions – 65.3 x 25.4mm
Weight – 9 grams

Lolin’s ESP32-S3 board ships with MicroPython by default, but the company also provides instructions for the Arduino IDE in the wiki. If you are inclined you could probably also use the ESP-IDF framework as well since I’m not sure whether MicroPython and Arduino ports can make use of the AI extensions like it is possible with the ESP-DL library. If you have any experience using ESP32-S3 AI extensions in Arduino or MicroPython let us know in the comments.

The Lolin S3 board is fairly similar to Banana Pi BPI-Leaf-S3 except it adds one USB Type-C port and lacks battery support. It’s probably the cheapest ESP32-S3 board we’ve seen so far as well going for $6.9 on Aliexpress excluding shipping (and taxes if applicable). Other ESP32-S3 boards we’ve covered, such as the T-Display-S3 and Maple Eye ESP32-S3, would typically include a display and/or a camera to showcase the microcontroller’s machine learning capabilities.

Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft)

Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.