The TFT FeatherWing is basically a combination of our 3.5" TFT Breakout with the STMPE610 resistive touch-screen breakout attached.

Before you continue, make sure the FeatherWings's ENABLE switch is turned ON! If it's OFF, the Feather won't work and you will be very confused :)

Install Libraries

You'll need a few libraries to use this FeatherWing!

From within the Arduino IDE, open up the Library Manager...

Install Adafruit HX8357D TFT Library

We have example code ready to go for use with these TFTs.

Two libraries need to be downloaded and installed: first is the Adafruit HX8357 library (this contains the low-level code specific to this device), and second is the Adafruit GFX Library (which handles graphics operations common to many displays we carry). If you have Adafruit_GFX already, make sure its the most recent version since we've made updates for better performance

Search for HX8357 and install the Adafruit HX8357 library that pops up!

Next up, search for Adafruit GFX and locate the core library. A lot of libraries may pop up because we reference it in the description so just make sure you see Adafruit GFX Library in bold at the top.

Install it!

If using an earlier version of the Arduino IDE (pre-1.8.10), locate and install Adafruit_BusIO (newer versions handle this prerequisite automatically).

Repeat the search and install steps for the Adafruit_ImageReader library.

For more details about this process, we have a tutorial introducing Arduino library concepts and installation.

Basic Graphics Test

After restarting the Arduino software, you should see a new example folder called Adafruit_HX8357 and inside, an example called graphicstest_featherwing.

Upload that sketch to your Feather. You should see a collection of graphical tests draw out on the TFT.

If you're having difficulties, check the serial console. The first thing the sketch does is read the driver configuration from the TFT, you should see the same numbers as below. That will help you determine if the TFT is found, if not, check your Feather soldering!

Once you've got the demo working, check out the detailed documentation over at http://learn.adafruit.com/adafruit-gfx-graphics-library for more information on how to use the GFX library to draw whatever you like!

This guide was first published on Oct 25, 2017. It was last updated on Mar 28, 2024.

This page (TFT Graphics Test) was last updated on Mar 08, 2024.

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