Arduino has shrunk the UNO R4 with the Arduino Nano R4 board equipped with the same 48 MHz Renesas RA4M1 32-bit Arm Cortex-M4F microcontroller, but offered in a much more compact form factor.
It’s closer to the UNO R4 Minima in terms of functionality, since it lacks the ESP32 wireless module and LED matrix found in the UNO R4 WiFi board. The new Nano R4 still features a USB-C port, an I2C Qwiic connector, and two 15-pin GPIO headers with castellated holes for expansion.
Arduino Nano R4 specifications:
- Microcontroller – Renesas RA4M1 Arm Cortex-M4F MCU @ 48 MHz with 32KB SRAM, 256KB flash, 8KB EEPROM
- USB – 1 x USB Type-C port for power and programming
- Expansion
- 2x 15-pin GPIO headers
- 21x digital I/Os
- Analog
- 8x 14-bit analog input pins, 1x Op Amp using A1, A2, and A3 pins
- 12-bit analog DAC
- 6x PWM
- 1x UART, 1x I2C (5V), 1x SPI
- 1x CAN Bus
- I/O Voltage – 5V
- DC Current per I/O pin – 8 mA
- Qwiic I2C (3.3V) connector for expansion modules.
- 2x 15-pin GPIO headers
- Misc
- Reset button
- Power and user LEDs
- RTC built into the RA4M1 MCU
- Input voltage
- 5V via USB-C port
- 6 to 21V via Vin pin
- Dimensions – 45 x 18 mm
- Certifications – CE, FCC, RCM, IC, UKCA, VCCI, RoHS
The Nano R4 board is compatible with Arduino tools and libraries, and sketches made for the Arduino UNO R4 Minima, although you’d still need to adjust those to align with the new board’s pinout. The full technical details can be found on the documentation website. This includes hardware specifications, Altium Designer hardware design files, recommended libraries, a getting started guide, and a tutorial to create a motor anomaly detection demo relying on Edge Impulse.
We’ve written about other small RA4M1 boards compatible with Arduino UNO R4 Mini, such as the Waveshare RA4M1-Zero, WeAct RA4M1, and Seeed Studio XIAO RA4M1, but the Arduino Nano R4 remains relatively affordable, and you’d support the company behind the Arduino IDE.
Two SKUs are offered for the Arduino Nano R4: ABX00143 with headers ideal for breadboard projects ($13.30) and ABX00142 without headers ($12.10) to solder the board to a larger baseboard or space-constrained projects. You’ll find both on the Arduino store along with compatible modules.
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.
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