Wemos Launches Even More Compact LOLIN C3 Mini Successor, the RISC-V-Powered C3 Pico

Wemos has announced its latest compact development board, shrinking the LOLIN C3 Mini down to size without sacrificing features: the Espressif ESP32-C3-powered LOLIN C3 Pico.

Wemos launched the original C3 Mini back in March, marking its first board design to use Espressif's ESP32-C3 microcontroller. The C3 Pico, brought to our attention by CNX Software, uses the same system-on-chip, running at the same 160MHz speed and with the same 400kB of static RAM and 4MB of flash storage, but in an even smaller form factor — and the original C3 Mini was no behemoth.

The square board includes breadboard-friendly headers in two rows of eight pins, packing 12 general-purpose input/output (GPIO) pins, six of which can be used as analog inputs, an I2C bus, SPI bus, and UART, all operating on non-5V-safe 3.3V logic. There's an additional expansion port offering solder-free I2C connectivity to external devices, a physical reset button, user-programmable RGB LED and push-button switch, and a JST connector for an optional lithium-polymer battery, plus a radio for single-band 2.4GHz Wi-Fi 4 and Bluetooth 5.0 Low Energy (BLE) connectivity.

If you're not using a battery, the C3 Pico has a USB Type-C port, which offers power input as well as data support — allowing for programming using the stock MicroPython firmware or flashing to CircuitPython, an Arduino bootloader, or for programming using Espressif's own ESP-IDF environment.

Despite its smaller size, the pinout of the C3 Pico matches the C3 Mini — that, in turn, matched the earlier D1 Mini — making add-on shield accessories directly compatible. Smaller doesn't mean cheaper, however, with Wemos hiking the price from $4.10 for the original C3 Mini to $5 for the C3 Pico.

More information on the board is available on the Wemos website, while stock is available to buy on AliExpress at $5 per board — including 2.45mm pin headers, supplied loose in the package.