Espressif ESP Thread Border Router board combines ESP32-H2 & ESP32-S3 wireless chips

Espressif Systems has launched the ESP Thread Border Router/Zigbee Gateway board based on ESP32-H2 (802.15.4) and ESP32-S3 (WiFi + BLE) modules following the contention of the Thread Interoperability Certificate V1.3 for the board and associated ESP Thread Boarder Router SDK built on top of the ESP-IDF framework and the open-source OpenThread protocol stack.

The ESP Thread Border Router supports the protocol functions of the 1.3 Thread standard such as bidirectional IPv6 connectivity, Service Discovery Delegate, Service Registration Server, Multicast Forwarding, NAT64, and more, as well as product-level features such as a Web GUI for device configuration, automatic RCP (Radio Co-Processor) upgrade, RF coexistence, and so on.

ESP Thread Border Router/Zigbee Gateway board specifications:

Wireless modules
- ESP32-S3-WROOM-1 wireless module
  - SoC – ESP32-S3 dual-core Tensilica LX7 microcontroller @ 240 MHz with
    - 2.4 GHz 802.11n WiFi 4 and Bluetooth 5.0 LE connectivity
    - Memory – 2MB PSRAM
    - Storage – 4MB SPI flash
  - PCB antenna
  - Dimensions – 25.5 x 18 x 3.1 mm
- ESP32-H2-MINI-1 (D4N2)
  - MCU – Espressif Systems ESP32-H2 32-bit RISC-V microcontroller at up to 96 MHz with 320 KB SRAM, 128 KB ROM, 4 KB LP memory, Bluetooth 5.2 LE/Mesh and 802.15.4 (Zigbee/Thread/Matter) radios.
  - Storage – 2MB flash storage
  - PCB antenna
  - Dimensions – 13.2 x 16.6 x 2.4 mm
ESP32-S3 <->ESP32-H2 interfaces
- UART and SPI for serial communication
- RESET and BOOT pins for RCP Update
- 3-wire PTA for RF coexistence
USB – 2x USB Type-C ports one for ESP32-S3, the other for ESP32-H2
Expansion
- ESP32-S3 – 26-pin GPIO header
- ESP32-H2 – 8-pin GPIO header
Misc
- ESP32-S3 – Reset and Boot buttons
- ESP32-H2 – Reset and Boot buttons, 3x user LEDs

Espressif Systems also offers sub-boards to further enhance its functionality with an Ethernet interface, a Human-Machine Interface (HMI), and voice control. This development board is primarily made for the development of Thread Border Routers, but it’s also possible to use it for Zigbee Gateway products. If you’re not quite sure what a Thread Border Router does, you can check out our getting started guide for the GL.iNet GL-S200 Thread Border Router kit.

The ESP Thread Border Router SDK can be found on GitHub together with a sample for a basic Thread Border router, and there’s also documentation on Espressif’s website. While Zigbee is supported by the hardware, the company does not seem to have released an SDK for it just yet.

Espressif Systems is selling the ESP Thread Border Router/Zigbee Gateway board on Aliexpress for just $10 plus shipping, and the Ethernet Sub Board is listed there for $8 as well but is currently out of stock. A complete evaluation kit with Thread sensor nodes would have been nice, but you’d need to get your own to evaluate the platform such as a few ESP32-H2-DevKitM-1 development boards, but other Thread certified devices should probably work too.

Via Espressif’s announcement and Hackster.io.

Thanks to Hedda for the tip.

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.