Adafruit Sparkle Motion Stick – WLED-Friendly USB Stick

The Adafruit Sparkle Motion Stick is part of our series of ‘Sparkle Motion’ boards, which are our attempt to make the best small WLED-friendly smart LED driving board in the whole world. Our resident mermaid, firepixie makes a lot of projects with WLED, and she loves it! So, how can we make something powerful enough to drive advanced LED projects that need a compact design?

The USB Stick version of the Sparkle Motion is a simpler version of our full-featured Sparkle Motion. We offer it as a USB stick only, or with a simple case (select an option before adding to cart).

• Power via USB Type A for up to 5V 2A input – you can use off-the-shelf USB battery packs for portable operation.
• 2 Amp resetting fuse to protect from over-current drive
• ESP32 mini module with built-in antenna port – the classic ESP32 has the best WLED support, even if we’d prefer the ‘S2 or ‘S3. Comes with 4 MB of flash, dual-core 240MHz Tensilica, WiFi, Bluetooth LE, and Bluetooth Classic support.
• USB-serial converter with auto-reset
• Two output signals plus 5V power and ground – both signal outputs are level shifted to 5V.
• Built-in I2S microphone for audio-reactive projects
• Built-in Infrared receiver on GPIO 10 for easy remote control integration
• User button on GPIO 0 which you can press even when its in the snap-on case
• Red built-in LED on pin 4
• Small built-in NeoPixel on pin 18
• Screw terminal blocks for no-solder connectivity

Compared to our larger Sparkle Motion board, this only supports 5V and doesn’t have a reset button, there are fewer outputs, and no breakout pads of I2C/GPIO connections for external accessories.
Compared to our Sparkle Motion Mini, this has a USB A port so it’s 2A max power. It does have IR and built-in terminal blocks but does not have GPIO breakout pads.

While we recommend it for use with WLED, it will also work just fine as a compact ESP32 board for use with Arduino, ESP-IDF, MicroPython, CircuitPython, or any other ESP32-supported codebase. 

Specifications

• Product Dimensions: 67.5mm x 18.6mm x 11.7mm
• Product Weight: 7.5g

Resources

• Primary Guide: Adafruit Sparkle Motion Stick
• Enclosure Diagram

Package Contents

• 1x Adafruit Sparkle Motion Stick
• [OPTIONAL] 1x Enclosure