The PiTFT requires some device tree support and a couple other things to make it a nice stand-alone display. If you just want to get going, check out the following for easy-install instructions!

Install Raspberry Pi OS on an SD Card

You'll need to start with Raspberry Pi OS or Raspberry Pi OS Lite.

The last known for-sure tested-and-working version is May 28, 2021 (https://downloads.raspberrypi.org/raspios_lite_armhf/images/raspios_lite_armhf-2021-05-28/) from https://downloads.raspberrypi.org/raspios_lite_armhf/images/

Raspberry Pi OS does often 'break' stuff when new versions come out so to be safe, if you are having problems try this version!

Installer script

This script will do all the work for you, and install both device tree overlay support as well as configure rotation and any HDMI mirroring. PiTFT no longer needs any custom kernels or modules, so you can continue to update/upgrade your Pi and it will work with the most recent releases.

Here's the commands to run. Make sure your Pi has network access, it needs to download the software!

The latest installer script was rewritten in Python, so it can be installed with just a few commands. First, start by installing a few dependencies and downloading the repo:

cd ~
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y git python3-pip
sudo pip3 install --upgrade adafruit-python-shell click
git clone https://github.com/adafruit/Raspberry-Pi-Installer-Scripts.git
cd Raspberry-Pi-Installer-Scripts

cd ~
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y git python3-pip
sudo pip3 install --upgrade adafruit-python-shell click
git clone https://github.com/adafruit/Raspberry-Pi-Installer-Scripts.git
cd Raspberry-Pi-Installer-Scripts

Easy Single Command Install Options

The latest script allows you to specify all of your options within the command so you can sit back and watch the installation. We'll cover interactive installation below if you want to answer each prompt for a customized installation.

“Console Mode” Install Commands

If you just want a Linux text console to appear on the display, use one of the following commands:

For the PiTFT 2.4", 2.8", or 3.2" Resistive touchscreens, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=28r --rotation=90 --install-type=console

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=28r --rotation=90 --install-type=console

For the PiTFT 2.8" Capacitive touchscreen, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=28c --rotation=90 --install-type=console

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=28c --rotation=90 --install-type=console

For the PiTFT 2.2" Display, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=22 --rotation=90 --install-type=console

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=22 --rotation=90 --install-type=console

For the PiTFT 3.5" Resistive touchscreen, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=35r --rotation=90 --install-type=console

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=35r --rotation=90 --install-type=console

For the Mini PiTFT 1.3", BrainCraft HAT, 1.3" Color TFT Bonnet, or 1.5" Display, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=st7789_240x240 --rotation=0 --install-type=console

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=st7789_240x240 --rotation=0 --install-type=console

For the Mini PiTFT 1.14" Display, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=st7789_240x135 --rotation=270 --install-type=console

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=st7789_240x135 --rotation=270 --install-type=console

FBCP Install Commands

If you want to mirror the HDMI output to the display, known as “FrameBuffer Copy” or FBCP for short, use one of the following commands:

For the PiTFT 2.4", 2.8", or 3.2" Resistive touchscreens, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=28r --rotation=90 --install-type=fbcp

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=28r --rotation=90 --install-type=fbcp

For the PiTFT 2.8" Capacitive touchscreen, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=28c --rotation=90 --install-type=fbcp

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=28c --rotation=90 --install-type=fbcp

For the PiTFT 2.2" Display, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=22 --rotation=90 --install-type=fbcp

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=22 --rotation=90 --install-type=fbcp

For the PiTFT 3.5" Resistive touchscreen, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=35r --rotation=90 --install-type=fbcp

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=35r --rotation=90 --install-type=fbcp

For the Mini PiTFT 1.3", BrainCraft HAT, 1.3" Color TFT Bonnet, or 1.5" Display, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=st7789_240x240 --rotation=0 --install-type=fbcp

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=st7789_240x240 --rotation=0 --install-type=fbcp

For the Mini PiTFT 1.14" Display, use the following command:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=st7789_240x135 --rotation=270 --install-type=fbcp

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --display=st7789_240x135 --rotation=270 --install-type=fbcp

Rebooting

When it asks you to reboot, then choose yes because the setting won't take full effect until you do so.

Interactive Installation

For an interactive install, you can just run the script without any options:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py

Once you run it you will be presented with menus for configuration.

Display Selection

Start by selecting the board that best corresponds with your PiTFT. There's lots of options and we will likely be adding more in the future.

Rotation

Next you will be asked for the rotation you want, don't worry if you're not 100% sure which you want, you can always change this later by re-running the script

It will take a few minutes to install the software and download all the things...

Configuring what shows where

You have a few different ways to set up the PiTFT, we ask 2 questions to figure out what you want

PiTFT as Text Console (best for Raspberry Pi OS 'Lite')

This is the simplest to set-up type of use. Its great if you have a simple text based or pygame/SDL based interface. If you want the PiTFT to act as a text console you can expect:

• HDMI will be 'deactivated' - nothing appears on the HDMI output but a black screen
• The login prompt appears on the Pi
• The Pi is all text, not a GUI (no PIXEL desktop)
• Keyboard and mouse are used only by the PiTFT interface
• Framebuffer-capable software (such as fbi for displaying images, mplayer for videos, or pygame software, etc) appear on the PiTFT
• OpenGL accelerated software will not appear on the PiTFT (it is unaccelerated framebuffer only)
• But, non-OpenGL-accelerated graphics software is a bit faster than using HDMI mirroring (not tons faster but you're not running fbcp which will always make it faster)

If you want that, say Yes to the question Would you like the console to appear on the PiTFT display

Then simply reboot. Once rebooted you will not see anything on HDMI, but the console will appear on the PiTFT. That's it!

PiTFT as HDMI Mirror (Best for Raspberry Pi OS with Desktop)

This option is the easiest to understand: whatever appears on the HDMI display will be 'mirrored' to the PiTFT. Note that HDMI is much higher resolution so it's not like it turns the PiTFT into a 1080p display. This is great for when you want to run OpenGL-optimized software, PIXEL desktop software, or really anything. The down-side is its a little slower than drawing directly to the framebuffer. You may not notice it but it's worth us mentioning!

• HDMI will be 'activated' but at a lower resolution - you can change this later but it looks best at 320x240 (PiTFT 2.2", 2.4", 2.8" and 3.2") or 480x320 (PiTFT 3.5")
• The login prompt or GUI appears on both HDMI and PiTFT at the same time
• Keyboard and mouse are shared, since the display is mirrored
• All graphics appear on both HDMI and PiTFT, thanks to fbcp

If you want that, say Yes to the question Would you like the HDMI display to mirror to the PiTFT display?

PiTFT as Raw Framebuffer Device

For advanced users who are comfortable using framebuffer devices, it is possible to have the PiTFT and HDMI graphics be both active and display different data.

• HDMI will be active and act like a normal Pi
• The login prompt or GUI (PIXEL) appears on the HDMI
• PiTFT appears black, nothing appears on it
• Keyboard and mouse are used by the HDMI interface but can, in theory, be captured and used to change graphics on PiTFT through programming
• Framebuffer-capable software (such as fbi for displaying images, mplayer for videos, or pygame software, etc) can appear on the PiTFT if you set it up to display to /dev/fb1
• OpenGL accelerated software will never appear on the PiTFT (it is unaccelerated framebuffer only)

If you want that, say No to both of the configuration questions!

Creating Your Own Automated Command

Under the Easy Single Command Install Options section, there are a bunch of different installation flags that you can choose between. If you want to create your own command, you can find the latest options by typing:

sudo python3 adafruit-pitft.py --help

The main options to pay attention to are the --display, --rotation, and --install-type arguments.

For the display, you can either choose the number you type for the options or the display type, which has the options listed under help. For instance, to us the 2.8" Resisitive display you could use

--display=1 or --display=28r

For the rotation, you can either choose the number you type for the options or the angle, which has the options also listed under help. To use 90 degrees, you could use

--rotation=1 or --rotation=90

For install type, You can either choose fbcp, console or uninstall. To use FBCP, you would simply supply

--install-type=fbcp

Automated Reboot Option

To go with a fully automated installation, you can provide a --reboot flag. To always reboot, use:

--reboot=yes

This is useful if you want to use the display right after running the script. To never reboot immediately, use

--reboot=no

This is useful if you want it as part of a larger script that installs many things.

Custom User Directory

By default, it is installed under the current user directory, but you can provide the -u or --user flag along with the folder that you want to install to.

Uninstalling The Driver

To uninstall, you would either run the script interactively and choose Uninstall or you can provide the uninstall flag:

--install-type=uninstall

Unsupported Full Images

Historically, we provided full 'images' of Raspbian, which is now called Raspberry Pi OS. This worked OK until Raspbian started doing releases every few months. These are no longer supported, and won't even boot on Pi 3B+, so we recommend the script above.

There's the larger 'classic Jessie' image that will boot into X by default, and requires a 8G image, it has a lot more software installed. There's also the smaller 'Jessie Lite' that will boot into the command line, and can be burned onto a 2G card! Click below to download and install into a new SD card. Unzip and follow the classic SD card burning tutorials

PiTFT 2.2" Images

• Raspbian Jessie 2016/10/23-based image
• Raspbian Jessie Lite 2016/10/23-based image
• Raspbian Jessie 2016/03/25-based image
• Raspbian Jessie Lite 2016/03/25-based image
• Raspbian Jessie 2015/09/24-based image
• Raspbian Wheezy 2015/09/09-based image

PiTFT 2.4"/2.8"/3.2" Resistive Images

• Raspbian Jessie 2016/9/23-based image
• Raspbian Jessie Lite 2016/9/23-based image
• Raspbian Jessie 2016/03/25-based image
• Raspbian Jessie Lite 2016/03/25-based image
• Raspbian Jessie 2015/09/24-based image
• Raspbian Wheezy 2015/09/09-based image
• Raspbian 2014/06/20-based image
• Raspbian 2014/09/09-based image

PiTFT 2.8" Capacitive

• Raspbian Jessie 2016-09-23-based image
• Raspbian Jessie Lite 2016-09-23-based image
• Raspbian Jessie 2016-03-25-based image
• Raspbian Jessie Lite 2016-03-25-based image
• Raspbian Jessie 2015/09/24-based image
• Raspbian Wheezy 2015/09/24-based image
• Raspbian 2014/09/18-based image
• Raspbian 2014/06/20-based image
• Raspbian image from 2015/03/03

PiTFT 3.5" Images

• Raspbian Jessie 2016/9/23-based image
• Raspbian Jessie Lite 2016/9/23-based image
• Raspbian Jessie 2016/03/25-based image
• Raspbian Jessie 2016/03/25-based image
• Raspbian Jessie 2015/09/24-based image
• Raspbian Wheezy 2015/09/24-based image
• Raspbian 2014/09/09-based image
• Raspbian 2015/03/12 image

One fun thing you can do with the display is have it as your main console instead of the HDMI/TV output. Even though it is small, with a good font you can get 20 x 40 of text. For more details, check out https://github.com/notro/fbtft/wiki/Boot-console

First up, we'll update the boot configuration file to use the TFT framebuffer /dev/fb1 instead of the HDMI/TV framebuffer /dev/fb0

sudo nano /boot/cmdline.txt

you can also edit it by putting the SD card into a computer and opening the same file.

At the end of the line, find the text that says rootwait and right after that, enter in:
fbcon=map:10 fbcon=font:VGA8x8 then save the file.

On the next boot, it will bring up the console.

Note that the kernel has to load up the display driver module before it can display anything on it so you won't get the rainbow screen, a NooBs prompt, or a big chunk of the kernel details since the module is loaded fairly late in the boot process.

I think the VGA8x8 font is a bit chunky, you probably want 12x6 which is what is shown in the photo above. To change the font, run sudo dpkg-reconfigure console-setup and go thru to select Terminus 6x12

Turn off Console Blanking

You may notice the console goes black after 30 minutes, this is a sort of 'power saving' or 'screensaver' feature.

Raspbian Jessie

 Add the following line to /etc/rc.local

sudo sh -c "TERM=linux setterm -blank 0 >/dev/tty0"

on the line before the final exit 0

Raspbian Wheezy

You can disable this by editing /etc/kbd/config and looking for 

BLANK_TIME=30

and setting the blank time to 0 (which turns it off)

BLANK_TIME=0

How To Play Videos

You can play many types of videos on the screen, using mplayer you don't even need to run X and you can script the movies to play using Python. We'll show you how to just play one video for now.
To demo, we'll use an mp4 of Big Buck Bunny for 320 pixel wide screens. Below we show you how to create/resize videos, but to make it easy, just download our version with:

wget http://adafruit-download.s3.amazonaws.com/bigbuckbunny320p.mp4

If you don't have mplayer yet, run

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install mplayer

to install it. It may take a few minutes to complete

OK now you just have to run:

sudo SDL_VIDEODRIVER=fbcon SDL_FBDEV=/dev/fb1 mplayer -vo sdl -framedrop bigbuckbunny320p.mp4

If your video is not sized for 320 wide, you may need to add a -zoom after -framedrop so that it will resize - note that this is quite taxing for the Pi, so it may result in a choppy or mis-synced video!

Converting/Resizing Videos

It's possible to play full length videos on the TFT plate, but since the screen is small and the Pi cant use hardware accelleration to play the videos its best to scale them down to 320x240 pixels. This will be easier for the Pi to play and also save you tons of storage space. For this demo, we'll be using the famous Big Buck Bunny video, which is creative commons and also very funny!

You can download it from the link above, we'll be using the 720p AVI version.

To do the conversion itself, we suggest HandBrake which works great and is open source so it runs on all operating systems! Download and install from the link. Then run the installed application and open up the AVI file from before. The app will pre-fill a bunch of information about it.

Under Destination click Browse... to select a new MP4 file to save. Then under Picture change the Width to 320 (the height will be auto-calculated)

Click START to begin the conversion, it will take a minute or two.

That's it! You now have a smaller file. Don't forget to play it on your computer to make sure it plays right before copying it to your Pi

You can display every day images such as GIFs, JPGs, BMPs, etc on the screen. To do this we'll install fbi which is the frame buffer image viewer (not to be confused with the FBI agency!)

sudo apt-get install fbi will install it

Grab our lovely wallpapers with

wget http://adafruit-download.s3.amazonaws.com/adapiluv320x240.jpg
wget http://adafruit-download.s3.amazonaws.com/adapiluv480x320.png

For 320x240 PiTFTs (2.2", 2.4", 2.8" or 3.2") view it with

sudo fbi -T 2 -d /dev/fb1 -noverbose -a adapiluv320x240.jpg

or for 3.5" PiTFTs:

sudo fbi -T 2 -d /dev/fb1 -noverbose -a adapiluv480x320.png

That's it!

The Ideal: Adafruit’s PiTFT displays are razor sharp. Whereas small composite screens on the Raspberry Pi usually require some video scaling (resulting in blurriness), PiTFT uses the GPIO header, digitally controlled pixel-by-pixel for a rock steady image. Though not a lot of pixels, it works great for retro gaming (and the display neatly stacks above the board, no side protuberances for video cables).

The Downside: this GPIO link entirely bypasses the Pi’s video hardware, including the graphics accelerator. Many games and emulators depend on the GPU for performance gains. So the PiTFT has traditionally been limited to just a subset of specially-compiled emulators that can work and run well enough without the GPU.

The Solution: our latest PiTFT drivers, along with a tool called fbcp (framebuffer copy), careful system configuration, and (optionally) the more potent Raspberry Pi 2 board open the doors to many more gaming options. Existing emulator packages (such as RetroPie, with dozens of high-performance emulators and ports) — previously off-limits to the PiTFT — can run quite effectively now!

Making it easier to click icons in X

If you want to double-click on icons to launch something in X you may find it annoying to get it to work right. In LXDE you can simply set it up so that you only need to single click instead of double.
From LXDE launch the file manager (sorry these pix are grayscale, still figuring out how to screenshot the framebuffer!)

Then under the Edit menu, select Preferences

Then select Open files with single click and close the window (you'll need to drag it over to get to the X button

Right-click on a touchscreen

Obviously if you have a touchscreen, it cannot tell what finger you are pressing with. This means that all 'clicks' are left clicks. But if you want a right-click, you can do it.

Just add the following lines into your InputClass of /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/99-calibration.conf after the calibration section

Option "EmulateThirdButton" "1"
Option "EmulateThirdButtonTimeout" "750"
Option "EmulateThirdButtonMoveThreshold" "30"


So for example your file will look like:

Section "InputClass"
   Identifier      "calibration"
   MatchProduct    "stmpe-ts"
   Option  "Calibration"   "3800 120 200 3900"
   Option  "SwapAxes"      "1"
   Option "EmulateThirdButton" "1"
   Option "EmulateThirdButtonTimeout" "750"
   Option "EmulateThirdButtonMoveThreshold" "30"
EndSection

This makes a right mouse click emulated when holding down the stylus for 750 ms.

(Thx adamaddin!)

With the PiTFT touchscreen and xstroke you can enter text in applications by drawing simple character gestures on the screen! Check out the video below for a short demonstration and overview of gesture input with xstroke:

Installation

Unfortunately xstroke hasn't been actively maintained for a few years so there isn't a binary package you can directly install. However compiling the tool is straightforward and easy with the steps below. Credit for these installation steps goes to mwilliams03 at ozzmaker.com.

First install a few dependencies by opening a command window on the Pi and executing:

sudo apt-get -y install build-essential libxft-dev libxpm-dev libxtst-dev

sudo apt-get -y install build-essential libxft-dev libxpm-dev libxtst-dev

Now download, compile, and install xstroke by executing:

cd ~
wget http://mirror.egtvedt.no/avr32linux.org/twiki/pub/Main/XStroke/xstroke-0.6.tar.gz
tar xfv xstroke-0.6.tar.gz
cd xstroke-0.6
./configure
sed -i '/^X_LIBS = / s/$/ -lXrender -lX11 -lXext -ldl/' Makefile
make
sudo make install

cd ~
wget http://mirror.egtvedt.no/avr32linux.org/twiki/pub/Main/XStroke/xstroke-0.6.tar.gz
tar xfv xstroke-0.6.tar.gz
cd xstroke-0.6
./configure
sed -i '/^X_LIBS = / s/$/ -lXrender -lX11 -lXext -ldl/' Makefile
make
sudo make install

If the commands above execute successfully xstroke should be installed. If you see an error message, carefully check the dependencies above were installed and try again.

Once xstroke is installed you will want to add a couple menu shortcuts to start and stop xstroke. Execute the following commands to install these shortcuts:

wget https://github.com/adafruit/PiTFT_Extras/raw/master/xstroke.desktop
wget https://github.com/adafruit/PiTFT_Extras/raw/master/xstrokekill.desktop
sudo cp xstroke*.desktop /usr/share/applications/

wget https://github.com/adafruit/PiTFT_Extras/raw/master/xstroke.desktop
wget https://github.com/adafruit/PiTFT_Extras/raw/master/xstrokekill.desktop
sudo cp xstroke*.desktop /usr/share/applications/

Usage

To use xstroke I highly recommend using a plastic stylus instead of your finger. Also calibrate the touchscreen for X-Windows so you have the best control over the cursor possible.

Start X-Windows on the PiTFT and open the LXDE menu by clicking the icon in the lower left corner. Scroll up to the Accessories menu at the top and notice the new XStroke and XStroke Kill commands.

Click the XStroke menu option to start xstroke. You should see a small pencil icon appear on the bottom right side of the screen. The pencil icon means xstroke is running, however by default it's not yet looking for gesture input.

Open an application that takes text input, such as LXTerminal. To enable gesture input click the xstroke pencil icon. You should see the pencil turn green and the text 'abc' written over top of the icon. You might need to click the icon a few times to get the click to register in the right spot.

When xstroke is looking for gesture input you can drag the mouse cursor in a gesture anywhere on the screen to send specific key strokes. Here's a picture of the possible gestures you can send:

(credit to Carl Worth for the image above)

To draw a gesture from the above image, press anywhere on the screen, start from the circle in the gesture, and follow the gesture pattern towards the arrow. As you draw a gesture you should see a blue line displayed that shows what you've drawn. Lift up the stylus when you get to the end of the gesture at the arrow. If xstroke recognizes the gesture it will send the appropriate key press to the active window. Try drawing a few characters from the image above to get the hang of writing gestures.

A few very useful gestures are backspace (which deletes a character), return/enter, and space. To draw a backspace gesture just draw a line going from the right side of the screen to the left side. The gesture for return/enter is a diagonal line from the top right to bottom left. Finally a space is a straight line from the left to the right.

Note that when xstroke is looking for gestures you might not be able to click or control the cursor as you normally would expect. To stop xstroke's gesture recognition carefully press the xstroke pencil icon again until the 'abc' text disappears. I've found this process can be a little finicky as the icon is very small and any movement will be interpreted as a gesture. Use a light touch and try a few times to click the icon.

If you get stuck completely and can't disable xstroke by clicking the icon, connect to the Raspberry Pi in a terminal/SSH connection and run 'killall xstroke' (without quotes) to force xstroke to quit. The normal way to stop xstroke is to navigate to the Accessories -> XStroke Kill command, but you might not be able to do that if xstroke is listening for gesture input.

Have fun using xstroke to control your Pi by writing gestures on the PiTFT screen!

Since the PiTFT screen is fairly small, you may need to write custom UI programs. Pygame is the easiest way by far to do this.

Jeremy Blythe has an excellent tutorial here on getting started. 

However, before you follow that link you'll want to set up pygame for the best compatibility:

Install pip & pygame

Install Pip: sudo apt-get install python-pip

Install Pygame: sudo apt-get install python-pygame

(this will take a while)

Ensure you are running SDL 1.2

SDL 2.x and SDL 1.2.15-10 have some serious incompatibilities with touchscreen. You can force SDL 1.2 by running a script. (Thanks to heine in the forums!)

Edit a new file with sudo nano installsdl.sh
and paste in the following text:

#!/bin/bash

# enable wheezy package sources
echo "deb http://legacy.raspbian.org/raspbian wheezy main
" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/wheezy.list

# set stable as default package source (currently buster)
echo "APT::Default-release \"stable\";
" > /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/10defaultRelease

# set the priority for libsdl from wheezy higher then the buster package
echo "Package: libsdl1.2debian
Pin: release n=buster
Pin-Priority: -10
Package: libsdl1.2debian
Pin: release n=wheezy
Pin-Priority: 900
" > /etc/apt/preferences.d/libsdl

# install
apt-get update
apt-get -y --allow-downgrades install libsdl1.2debian/wheezy

#!/bin/bash

# enable wheezy package sources
echo "deb http://legacy.raspbian.org/raspbian wheezy main
" > /etc/apt/sources.list.d/wheezy.list

# set stable as default package source (currently buster)
echo "APT::Default-release \"stable\";
" > /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/10defaultRelease

# set the priority for libsdl from wheezy higher then the buster package
echo "Package: libsdl1.2debian
Pin: release n=buster
Pin-Priority: -10
Package: libsdl1.2debian
Pin: release n=wheezy
Pin-Priority: 900
" > /etc/apt/preferences.d/libsdl

# install
apt-get update
apt-get -y --allow-downgrades install libsdl1.2debian/wheezy

run

sudo sh ./installsdl.sh

it will force install SDL 1.2

OK now you can continue with pygame

Using the Capacitive touch screen in PyGame

The 2.8" Capacitive touch screen driver may not work by default in pygame, but this handy script shows how you can capture the device messages in python to create a UI

• https://github.com/nift4/pigame
  For examples:
  https://github.com/nift4/Raspberry-Pi-Testing