Canada-based Moddo has designed the Pinch board, which it claims is the world’s smallest 32-bit Arduino-compatible board so far, measuring just 10.9 x 10.5 mm.
The board is powered by a Microchip SAMD11 Cortex-M0+ microcontroller with 4 KB SRAM and 16KB flash, features an RGB LED, reset/bootloader button, 3.3 V LDO, a USB-C port, and a total of 12 GPIOs.
Moddo Pinch specifications:
- Microcontroller – Microchip SAM D11 (ATSAMD11D14A)
- MCU core – Arm Cortex-M0+ processor running at up to 48 MHz
- RAM – 4 KB SRAM
- Storage – 16 KB Flash (12 KB for sketches, 4 KB bootloader)
- USB – 1x USB Type-C port for power, programming (CDC serial), and HID
- Expansion – 16-pin header (1.27mm pitch)
- 12x GPIO (D0–D11)
- 5x analog input (A0–A4)
- 11x PWM
- 1x DAC
- 1x I2C, 1x SPI, 2x UART(multiplexed with USB & D5/D6)
- Debug – SWD on D5 (SWCLK) and D6 (SWDIO)
- Misc
- RGB LED (connected to D12–D14)
- Reset button
- Power
- 5V via USB-C @ 500 mA max output
- 3.3V LDO @ 300 mA max output
- Dimensions – 10.9 x 10.5 mm
- Weight – TBD
The board is compatible with the Arduino IDE. Simply add the following URL to the “Additional Boards Manager URLs” list in the preference window.
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https://raw.githubusercontent.com/moddoio/moddoBoards-SAMD/main/package_moddo_index.json |
After that, install the moddo SAMD Boards package, and select the pinch board. There’s some issue with the package, and it wouldn’t install when I tried, but that should be an easy fix… [update: it’s fixed!]
The company provides more technical details and Arduino board options on GitHub. Moddo says the board is small enough for tight builds and suitable for HID devices like keyboards and mice over native USB.
While a small size is great for deployment, it’s not so nice during development, especially when having to use a 1.27mm pitch GPIO header. So the company also provides a kit that adds a breakout board with 2.54mm pitch through holes and three headers.
Every so often, we write about the world’s smallest Arduino-compatible board, and this obviously changes over the years. The previous record holder was the ATTO board, measuring just 11.5mm x 10.3 mm, and it’s based on an 8-bit Microchip ATmega32U4 AVR microcontroller rather than a more powerful 32-bit Arm Cortex-M0+ MCU found in the pinch. There’s actually a smaller one with the Raspberry Pi RP2040-based RPDot board that’s just 10x10mm, but it lacks a USB-C port, and it’s never been commercialized, so does that even count?
Justin Kim, Design & Hardware Lead at moddo inc, told CNX Software they were currently in the final testing and mass production stage. Having said that, pre-orders are now open for the pinch PCB kit, going for $15.90 and scheduled to start shipping sometime in September 2026.
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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If they would leave out the gpios they could squeeze it into 10x8mm
No GPIOs, you say? Now I know which board I forgot: the ESP32-S3-based f32 at just 9.85 x 8.45 mm
https://www.cnx-software.com/2025/11/21/ridiculously-tiny-esp32-c3-board-features-usb-c-one-led-and-a-ceramic-antenna/
Only one GPIO connected to an LED…
Definitely a fun board! 😁
Jokes and trolling aside, often im just using USB, radios, button and rgb led on an esp board, so why not…
This is pretty cool, except the ratio perf/price. But the idea and design are very clever imho.
I do not have experience with such a chip. Would it be capable enough for running some MIDI hardware application ? With additional I2C devices like ADC, GPIO extender ? Driving a SPI display ?
@itchy n scratchy
I have asked myself “why didn’t they use castellated holes ?”
But as it is, the product is much more versatile. It is usable for prototyping and for integration in a product without too much hassles and still keeping it really small.
@luc for prototyping there are bigger boards with all ressources accesible at a nominal price.
Im often using esp32c6 boards for a hand full of $
However if you need many i/o adc etc. maybe a more traditional micro controller might suit you better, maybe a black-pill based on an stm32f4 or something like an Arduino uno R4, also available with an esp32 radio module as a second chip on board.
All of them are fun and can be programmed with arduino ide or other programming environments from simple compilers to scripting languages to real time os.
IMHO the these tiny boards are a solution chasing a non-existent problem (board size) for most use cases and creating other problems. If production cost and size are an issue, there are better ways:
A good tiny design would replace the USB-C connector with a small female header that connects an auxiliary board with the USB-C connector. nice-sized reset button, power LED, charge LED, a battery charger, and battery isolation circuit and any other non-runtime stuff, leaving room on the main board for a nice-sized boot/user button, user LED, LiPo connector, a FET-controlled voltage divider for battery measurement, and a few more through-hole I/O. The other stuff spends most of its time doing nothing when the devices are in use. I also prefer an on-board PCB antenna over an external PCB antenna using the tiny fragile U.FL connectors with a very low number of connection cycles, and I won’t use boards with chip antennas
You only need one auxiliary board to support many tiny battery-powered boards. I charge LiPo batteries on a separate board or using a dedicated LiPo charger, not by stringing usb cables to the devices or taking them out of service for charging. I swap out low batteries for charged batteries.
The USB-C connector, reset button, power LED, charge LED, battery charger, and battery isolation circuit are useless when running your projects on battery. Why hasn’t somebody else thought of this having-your-cake-and-eating-it-too solution?
It depends. This tiny board offers the possibility to have all the electronics entirely located inside the USB connector. For some applications it might count. It could also become a JTAG probe for a small device that is installed in a super tight corner. It could possibly be inserted inside a headphone along with a tiny amp chip. So I would say that it’s not that the size matters, rather that it’s what the size permits to do with it.
Three words: Just say no.
Oh yeah?
gimme a version with no rgb led and I’m game. should be $10.
In Nov 2025 you had a story about an ESP32C3 board that was smaller (9.85mm x 8.45mm) but DIY assembly. It had wifi and bluetooth, plus USB-C and much more memory (400k ram, 4mb flash).
https://www.cnx-software.com/2025/11/21/ridiculously-tiny-esp32-c3-board-features-usb-c-one-led-and-a-ceramic-antenna/