WeAct ESP32-C6-Mini is a small development board based on Espressif Systems ESP32-C6 WiFi 6, Bluetooth, and 802.15.4 wireless SoC that’s the cheapest we’ve seen so far selling for just $3.86 on Aliexpress.
WeAct was one of the first companies to launch a third-party ESP32-C6 development board year with the price starting at just $6. I still remember the excitement around the first $5 ESP8266 WiFi 4 module when we first covered it in 2014, and ten years later, we can get a full $4 development board with a more powerful 160 MHz RISC-V microcontroller, WiFi 6, Bluetooth 5.0, and an 802.15.4 radio for Thread, Zigbee, and Matter.
WeAct ESP32-C6-Mini specifications:
- Wireless SoC – ESP32-C6-N4
- CPU
- Single-core 32-bit RISC-V clocked up to 160 MHz
- Low-power RISC-V core @ up to 20 MHz
- Memory – 512KB SRAM, 16KB low power SRAM
- Storage – 320KB ROM, and 4MB flash
- Wireless – 2.4 GHz WiFi 6, Bluetooth 5.0 LE, 802.15.4 radio for Zigbee 3.0 and Thread. Matter compatible. PCB antenna
- CPU
- USB – 1x USB Type-C port
- I/Os – 2x 16-pin headers with GPIO, UART, SPI, ADC, SDIO, USB, I2S, etc…
- Misc – RESET and BOOT buttons, RGB LED
- Power Supply (mutually exclusive options)
- 5V via USB-C port (recommended)
- 5V and GND pins
- 3V3 and GND pins
- Dimensions – 45.1 x 20.6mm
WeAct focuses on designing and manufacturing cheap hardware, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen documentation from the company. They only say the board can be programmed with the ESP-IDF v5.1 and greater framework. However, considering it’s basically a cost and features-down version of the ESP32-C6-DevKitC-1 development kit people can use the official documentation from Espressif, and the Arduino IDE should also be supported as long as you install ESP32 Arduino Core 3.0.0 or greater.
The $3.86 price tag does not include a $0.99 shipping fee, but in my case at least (shipping to Thailand), it’s possible to get free shipping by ordering at least three boards making the order over $10.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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> I don’t think I’ve ever seen documentation from the company.
They tend to put up some of their docs in github. e.g. Their previous esp32-c6 board ( which you covered here: https://www.cnx-software.com/2023/07/02/weact-launches-6-esp32-c6-development-board-esp-idf-5-1-framework-released/ ) has the docs over at https://github.com/WeActStudio/WeActStudio.ESP32-C6-A/ with schematics and such.
I guess they haven’t gotten around to uploading the docs for this board yet? Their gitee doesn’t seem to have it yet either: https://gitee.com/WeAct-TC
As already mentioned they put their documentation on GitHub and usually have a link to it on the product page. They generally always have a schematic and sometimes have some examples but all you really need are the schematics due to how simple the Dev boards are.
Some boards (i.e. stm32f4x1 blackpills) also have the bootloader in github, so definitely one of the better supporting board manufacturers
To europe shipping is usually 1.99 but free above 10$/€/9£/CHF. Free shipping is across all select items not limited to one seller and usually quite fast, around 10 days in my case.
Shows as no longer available now.
It’s still available here, and the price is down to $3.36 ($4.26 with shipping), but they only allow one piece per user, so the free shipping option is not available anymore unless you buy other boards from the same company I suppose.
Maybe it’s just the USA that’s not working. “Sorry, this item is no longer available!” “This product can’t be shipped to your address.
Select another product or address.”
Same here, it’s not just the US
I’ve got the same now.
And now it’s available at 3.92.
LoL. $3.84 for me with only six in stock.
There had been 9, but I ordered three. 🙂
it’s unavailable here too
here is one with similar price range: https://s.click.aliexpress.com/e/_DdIZFzZ