The friendly Operating System for IoT!
RIOT is an open-source microcontroller operating system, designed to match the requirements of Internet of Things (IoT) devices and other embedded devices. It supports a range of devices that are typically found in the Internet of Things (IoT): 8-bit, 16-bit and 32-bit microcontrollers.
RIOT is based on the following design principles: energy-efficiency, real-time capabilities, small memory footprint, modularity, and uniform API access, independent of the underlying hardware (this API offers partial POSIX compliance).
RIOT is developed by an international open source community which is independent of specific vendors (e.g. similarly to the Linux community). RIOT is licensed with LGPLv2.1, a copyleft license which fosters indirect business models around the free open-source software platform provided by RIOT, e.g. it is possible to link closed-source code with the LGPL code.
RIOT provides features including, but not limited to:
- a preemptive, tickless scheduler with priorities
- flexible memory management
- high resolution, long-term timers
- MTD abstraction layer
- File System integration
- support 200+ boards based on AVR, MSP430, ESP8266, ESP32, RISC-V, ARM7 and ARM Cortex-M
- the native port allows to run RIOT as-is on Linux and BSD. Multiple instances of RIOT running on a single machine can also be interconnected via a simple virtual Ethernet bridge or via a simulated IEEE 802.15.4 network (ZEP)
- IPv6
- 6LoWPAN (RFC4944, RFC6282, and RFC6775)
- UDP
- RPL (storing mode, P2P mode)
- CoAP
- OTA updates via SUIT
- MQTT
- USB (device mode)
- Display / Touchscreen support
- CCN-Lite
- LoRaWAN
- UWB
- Bluetooth (BLE) via NimBLE
- Ariel OS is an offspring of RIOT written in Rust following RIOT's goals and vision.
- Contiki(-NG) was an inspiration for starting RIOT, an operating system for constrained devices with a focus on networking.
- NuttX is another general purpose microcontroller OS with a focus on bringing POSIX to MCUs
- RT-Thread is a microcontroller operating system with strong roots in China and a large community there, it has extensive support for MCUs from Chinese vendors, but also for western ones.
- Zephyr is a general-purpose operating system for microcontrollers, shepherded by the Linux foundation.
The most convenient way to get RIOT is to clone it via Git
$ git clone https://github.com/RIOT-OS/RIOTthis will ensure that you get all the newest features and bug fixes with the caveat of an ever changing work environment.
If you prefer things more stable, you can download the source code of one of our quarter annual releases via Github as ZIP file or tarball. You can also checkout a release in a cloned Git repository using
$ git pull --tags
$ git checkout <YYYY.MM>For more details on our release cycle, check our documentation.
- You want to start the RIOT? Just follow our quickstart guide or try this tutorial. For specific toolchain installation, follow instructions in the getting started page.
- The RIOT API itself can be built from the code using doxygen. The latest version of the documentation is uploaded daily to doc.riot-os.org.
Using Windows? Use this guide to setup the development environment.
You can ask for help on the Forum or on Matrix. Please send bug reports and feature requests to our GitHub issue tracker
- forum is the default place to start asking for help. Our Forum provides an archive of prior questions and answers.
- For chat, we use #riot-os:matrix.org on the Matrix chat network.
- GitHub Issue tracker for issues with the code and documentation.
Please include as much detail as you can that is relevant to your question, not only "this isn't working". These details include:
- What you want to achieve.
- What have you tried so far (for example the commands you typed).
- What happened so far.
To contribute something to RIOT, please refer to our contributing document.
- RIOT commits: commits@riot-os.org
- Github notifications: notifications@riot-os.org
- Most of the code developed by the RIOT community is licensed under the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL) version 2.1 as published by the Free Software Foundation.
- Some external sources, especially files developed by SICS are published under a separate license.
All code files contain licensing information.
For more information, see the RIOT website: