Installing Mbed OS Nano boards

A step-by-step guide to install the core needed for the Nano 33 BLE, Nano 33 BLE Sense and Nano RP2040 Connect boards.

Installing Mbed OS Nano boards

In this tutorial, we will go through a few simple steps on installing the core needed for Mbed OS Nano boards. This installation is necessary to use your board with the offline Arduino IDE.

This tutorial uses the Arduino IDE. You can download the editor easily from our software page.

If you are using the Web Editor, you can follow the getting started with the Web Editor tutorial.

Boards using the Mbed core

Downloading and installing

  1. First, we need to download the Arduino IDE, which can be done from the software page.

  2. Install the Arduino IDE on your local machine.

  3. Open the Arduino IDE.

Installing the Mbed OS core for Nano boards

After we have downloaded, installed and opened the Arduino IDE, let's continue to install the core needed.

When we open the editor, we will see an empty sketch.

An empty Arduino IDE sketch window.
An empty Arduino IDE sketch window.

Here we need to navigate to Tools > Board > Board Manager.

Selecting board manager.
Selecting board manager.

This will open up a new window, with all available cores. Find the one named Arduino Mbed OS Nano Boards and install it.

List of cores.
List of cores.

This process may take some time, and you may need to accept the installation window that comes up (depending on your operative system). When it is finished, it should say

"INSTALLED"
under the title.

Note: This process may take several minutes.

Exit the board manager, and go to Tools > Board > Arduino > Arduino Mbed OS Nano Boards. Here you can see all the Mbed boards listed, where you can select the board you are using. You have now successfully installed the core.

List of available boards.
List of available boards.

Selecting the port

Now, let's make sure that our board is found by our computer, by selecting the port. Regardless what kind of program we are uploading to the board, we always need to choose the port for the board we are using. This is simply done by navigating to Tools > Port, where you select your board from the list.

Selecting the right board and port.
Selecting the right board and port.

This will look different depending on what kind of operative system you are using.

For Windows users, it could look like this:

  • <COM14> (Arduino Nano BLE)

For MAC users, it could look like this:

  • /dev/cu.usbmodem14112 (Arduino Nano BLE)

Uploading a simple example

You are now ready to start using your board! The easiest way to check that everything is working, is to upload just a simple blink example to your board. This is done by navigating to File > Examples > 01.Basics > Blink.

Selecting the blink example.
Selecting the blink example.

To upload the sketch, simply click on the arrow in the top left corner. This process takes a few seconds, and it is important to not disconnect the board during this process.

Uploading the sketch.
Uploading the sketch.

When the code is uploaded, the text

"Done uploading."
is visible in the bottom left corner.

If you look closely at your board, you will notice an orange LED blink with an interval of one second. This means you have successfully uploaded a program to your board.

Suggest changes

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License

The Arduino documentation is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 license.