Adafruit IO is the easiest way to stream, log, and interact with your data. It's built from the ground up to be easy to use - we do the hard stuff so you can focus on the fun stuff.
If you want to the best way of bringing your project online - combine Adafruit IO and AirLift! Our ESP32-based AirLift boards and breakouts are the newest way to connect your project to Adafruit IO, our internet-of-things service for everyone!
Before you continue with this guide, you should run through the guide for your connecting specific board or breakout to the Internet. This guide assumes your AirLift hardware is set up, connected to the Internet, and ready to connect to Adafruit IO.
Why use AirLift?
Having WiFi managed by a separate chip means your code is simpler, you don't have to cache socket data, or compile in & debug an SSL library. With AirLift, you can send basic but powerful socket-based commands over 8MHz SPI for high speed data transfer. The ESP32 can handle all the heavy lifting of connecting to a WiFi network and transferring data from a site, even if its using the latest TLS/SSL encryption (it has root certificates pre-burned in).
The firmware on board is a slight variant of the Arduino WiFiNINA core, which works great, and our Adafruit IO Libraries for CircuitPython and Arduino support AirLift!
External AirLift
If you already have a project which uses a popular microcontroller (like the ATMega328 or ATSAMD51), you can easily add WiFi by using an externally connected AirLift module.
Adafruit AirLift – ESP32 WiFi Co-Processor Breakout Board
AirLift all-in-One Boards
Don't want to add extra hardware to your project? Consider grabbing a board which has an ESP32 WiFi co-processor built-in!
Adafruit Metro M4 Express AirLift (WiFi) - Lite
