Seeed Drops New ESP32-Audio Development Kit for Audio-Related IoT Projects

With all the attention going toward ESP32 boards with camera integration as of late, it’s nice to see the SoC getting some love for audio applications with the ESP32-Audio-Kit. Earlier this year, Espressif unveiled their ESP32 LyraTD MSC HDK designed for smart speakers and appliances. Shortly afterward, the company dropped a similar board — the ESP32-LyraT for voice recognition projects, and now we have access to a third option for IoT audio projects with the latest release.

The ESP32-Audio-Kit is based on Ai-Thinker’s ESP32-A1S with most of the interfaces located at the edge of the development board for easy access. As far as hardware goes, the ESP32-Audio-Kit is outfitted with a dual-core Xtensa LX6 CPU (520Kb SRAM, 8Mb of PSRAM), micro SD slot (up to 64Gb of storage), and 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi + Bluetooth 4.2 LE. Audio ports are many and include 3.5mm headphone jack, 3.5mm line-in jack, a pair of 2-pin headers for left/right speakers (up to 4Ω/3W output), and a couple of built-in microphones.

Expansion options include headers for I2C, UART, SPI, PWM, and an unpopulated header for JTAG with micro USB port for UART access. It also features six user buttons, as well as 5V/2A via micro USB, and support for 3.7V Li-ion battery via 2-pin header for power options.

The ESP32-Audio-Kit is compatible with Espressif’s ESP-ADF framework, which offers support for Google’s Assistant and Amazon’s Alexa, and costs just $16.90 (currently on backorder). Seeed also supplies plenty of documentation on their product page, where you’ll find schematics, demos, and user guides.