Sensors / Touch

FSRs are sensors that allow you to detect physical pressure, squeezing and weight. They are simple to use and low cost. This sensor is an Alpha MF01A-N-221-A01 with 1/2 diameter sensing region. We used to stock the Interlink model 402 FSR - the Alpha version is almost half the price but the same quality and size! FSR's are basically a resistor that changes its...

This rotary encoder is the best of the best, it's a high-quality 24-pulse encoder, with detents and a nice feel. It is panel mountable for placement in a box, or you can plug it into a breadboard (just cut/bend the two mechanical side tabs.) We also include a nice soft-touch knob with an arrow in it, fits perfectly and looks great. This encoder also has a push-button...

This sensor can detect flexing or bending in one direction. They were popularized by being used in the Nintendo PowerGlove as a gaming interface. These sensors are easy to use, they are basically resistors that change value based on how much they're flexed. If they're unflexed, the resistance is about ~10KΩ. When flexed all the way the resistance rises to...

This mini-kit makes it easy to mount a PSP/Xbox-like thumb joystick to your project. The thumbstick is an analog joystick - more accurate and sensitive than just 'directional' joysticks - with a 'press in to select' button. Since it's analog, you'll need two analog reading pins on your microcontroller to determine X and Y. Having an extra digital input will let you...

Punch in your secret key into this numeric matrix keypad. This keypad has 12 buttons, arranged in a telephone-line 3x4 grid. It's made of a thin, flexible membrane material with an adhesive backing (just remove the paper) so you can attach it to nearly anything. The keys are connected into a matrix, so you only need 7 microcontroller pins (3-columns and 4-rows) to...

This breakout board is the simplest way to create a project with a single "momentary" capacitive touch sensor. No microcontroller is required here - just power with 1.8 to 5.5VDC and touch the pad to activate the sensor. When a capacitive load is detected (e.g. a person touches the sensor-pad area) the red LED lights up and the output pin goes high. You can also...

This sensor can detect flexing or bending in one direction. They were popularized by being used in the Nintendo PowerGlove as a gaming interface. These sensors are easy to use, they are basically resistors that change value based on how much their flexed. If they're unflexed, the resistance is about ~25KΩ. When flexed all the way the resistance rises to...

This breakout board is the simplest way to create a project with mutiple capacitive touch sensors. No microcontroller is required here - just power with 1.8 to 5.5VDC and connect up to 5 conductive pads to the 5 left-hand pins. When a capacitive load is detected (e.g. a person touches one of the conductive contacts) the corresponding LED on the right lights up and...

Add lots of touch sensors to your next microcontroller project with this easy-to-use 8-channel capacitive touch sensor breakout board, starring the CAP1188. This chip can handle up to 8 individual touch pads, and has a very nice feature that makes it stand out for us: it will light up the 8 onboard LEDs when the matching touch sensor fires to help you debug your...

Manufactured by Spectra Symbol, these are nice little ribbon controllers (also known as 'soft potentiometers') with an adhesive backing. There is a nominal 10K resistance across the two outer leads. The middle pin resistance with respect to either of the outer pins changes depending on where on the strip one presses. When no pressure is applied, the middle pin...

This breakout board is the simplest way to create a project with a single "toggle" capacitive touch sensor. No microcontroller is required here - just power with 1.8 to 5.5VDC and touch the pad to activate the sensor. This sensor is a toggle output type: touch-on then touch-off. That means that when a capacitive load is detected (e.g. a person touches the sensor-pad...

Add lots of touch sensors to your next microcontroller project with this easy-to-use 12-channel capacitive touch sensor breakout board, starring the MPR121. This chip can handle up to 12 individual touchpads. The MPR121 has support for only I2C, which can be implemented with nearly any microcontroller. You can select one of 4 addresses with the ADDR pin, for a total...

FSRs are sensors that allow you to detect physical pressure, squeezing and weight. They are simple to use and low cost. This sensor is a Interlink model 408 FSR with a massive 1/4-inch x 24-inch sensing region. You can press anywhere along the strip and the pressure will be recognized. Note that this sensor can't detect where on the strip you pressed (for that, check...

Our 2-Axis Joystick can be used to add analog input to your next project. The 2-Axis Joystick contains two independent potentiometers (one per axis) for reporting the joystick's position, with wiring options for voltage or resistance outputs. The modular form-factor allows you to plug the 2-Axis Joystick directly into a breadboard for easy prototyping. The 2-Axis...

Punch in your secret key into this numeric membrane keypad. This keypad has 4 buttons, and since every key has its own wire line, no matrix code is required - just treat these like every day switches. The membrane is soft and has a removable paper backing to expose a strong adhesive so you can stick this on an enclosure and feed the cable through a slot. Its a simple...

Manufactured by Spectra Symbol, these are nice little ribbon controllers (also known as 'soft potentiometers') with an adhesive backing. This shape is a circular soft potentiometer with a donut-shaped sensing region whose outer diameter is 55.96mm/2.2in and inner diameter is 35.63mm/1.4in. There is a nominal 10K resistance across the two outer leads. The middle pin...

Want to poke at your projects? This resistive touch screen can be used with a stylus or fingertip and is easy to use with a microcontroller. You can put it over a paper overlay for a touch control panel or attach it to an LCD to DIY a touch-activated display. 2.45" x 3" (62mm x 76mm) overall dimensions, 1.2mm thick. 3.7" diagonal active area, 95mm. 600 ohms across X...

Add a tiny joystick to your project with this PSP thumbstick. This is a replacement component for PSP1000's, but we think they'd make for a great little joystick/thumbstick add-on for a wearable, or portable project. The joystick is a 'self-centering' analog-type. That means it basically acts like two 10K potentiometers, one for up/down and another for left/right....

This is a generic Wii Nunchuck controller, we haven't tried it with a Wii but it does work great with the Video Game shield, and all the microcontroller code we tried. May come in white or black. We suggest getting a Nunchucky breakout board if you want to use this with an electronics project. There's a 3-axis accelerometer inside as well as a resistive 2-axis...

Hey, Jenny, I've got your number! And I'm going to dial 867-5309 into this very nice phone-style matrix keypad. This keypad has 12 buttons, arranged in a telephone-line 3x4 grid. It's made of plastic with sturdy plastic buttons. The keys are connected to a matrix so you only need 7 microcontroller pins (3-columns and 4-rows) to scan through the pad. It's basically a...

This is really the fanciest, best-feeling knob we've ever seen. Using this knob sort of reminded us of driving along the Amalfi coast in a perfectly restored '65 Porsche - meaning we really, really liked it. We hand-selected the best knobs for your project in different sizes and varieties. This one's the Solid Machined Metal Knob - 1". It has a nice, weighted feel...

This membrane keypad has a single key, but it does have an embedded surface-mount red LED installed. The flex cable is also extra-long, so we can think of a lot of wearable and portable projects that would use this sort of switch and have an LED as feedback (say, to indicate that an action is occuring or the power is on). Since the keypad is soft plastic, it can be...

This slim and modern potentiometer is small and compact, yet looks good and has a nice feel. We hand-selected the best knobs for your project in different sizes and varieties. This one is the Slim Metal Knob 10mm diameter x 10mm Tall (T18 Splines). It's a brushed aluminum knob with a shiny black (anodized?) coating. It kind of looks like the type of knob you'd find...

Round and round it goes, this nice round "scrubber" knob is the perfect mate to a rotary encoder. It's got a wide 34.7mm diameter with a nice finger groove on its face so it's easy to turn with just one finger. It works best with our rotary encoder, just snap it on, and away you go. Please note: this knob won't work with our potentiometers which have T18 spline...

Oh say can you see By the knob's early light... Sorry - we thought that was clever. And while it wasn't really, this potentiometer knob definitely is. It's a 'soft touch' T18 knob that works great with our Panel Mount 10K, Panel Mount 1K, and Panel Mount 100K potentiometers. The knob is designed to set directly on the potentiometer's ridges so it's an easy &...

This slim and modern potentiometer is small and compact, yet looks good and has a nice feel. We hand-selected the best knobs for your project in different sizes and varieties. This one is the Slim Metal Knob 10mm diameter x 15mm Tall (T18 Splines). It's a brushed aluminum knob with a shiny black (anodized?) coating. It kind of looks like the type of knob you'd find...

Oh say can you see By the knob's early light... Sorry - we thought that was clever. And while it wasn't really, this potentiometer knob definitely is. It's a 'soft touch' T18 knob that works great with our Panel Mount 10K, Panel Mount 1K, and Panel Mount 100K potentiometers. The knob is designed to set directly on the potentiometer's ridges so it's an easy &...

Oh say can you see By the knob's early light... Sorry - we thought that was clever. And while it wasn't really, this potentiometer knob definitely is. It's a 'soft touch' T18 knob that works great with our Panel Mount 10K, Panel Mount 1K, and Panel Mount 100K potentiometers. The knob is designed to set directly on the potentiometer's ridges so it's an easy &...

Sometimes a simple analog control device can be the perfect tactile solution for your project, but they can be surprisingly hard to come by. Luckily we've got a low-cost, quality Mini 2-Axis Analog Thumbstick to fulfill your directional analog input needs! This is a small joystick with a black rocker cap, similar to the PSP joysticks. The joystick is a...

When you need a lot of options, you need a Mini 8-Way Rotary Selector Switch. This is basically a single-pole to 8-throw switch. As you rotate the knob around, the middle pin will make contact with each of the outer pins. Rotary switches are very simple to use and are also nice and compact. This one is easy to panel mount, thanks to the included washer and hex nut....

Punch in your secret key (or Jenny's number) into this numeric matrix keypad. This keypad has 16 buttons, arranged in a telephone-line 4x4 grid. The keys are connected into a matrix, so you only need 8 microcontroller pins (4-columns and 4-rows) to scan through the pad. Check the tutorials tab for links to an Arduino library and example code. We include some header...

Most low cost soil sensors are resistive style, where there's two prongs and the sensor measures the conductivity between the two. These work OK at first, but eventually start to oxidize because of the exposed metal. Even if they're gold plated! The resistivity measurement goes up and up, so you constantly have to re-calibrate your code. Also, resistive measurements...

Rotary encoders are soooo much fun! Twist em this way, then twist them that way. Unlike potentiometers, they go all the way around and often have little detents for tactile feedback. But, if you've ever tried to add encoders to your project you know that they're a real challenge to use: timers, interrupts, debouncing... This Stemma QT breakout makes all that...

A new tiny squishy delight! This Black Rubber Joystick Nubbin Cap is the perfect add-on to any of your projects with a 5-way navigation joystick, like our Adafruit Mini Color TFT with Joystick FeatherWing or Adafruit 128x64 OLED Bonnet for Raspberry Pi. Fits perfectly on classic 5-way navigation joysticks like this one. It's solid, sturdy, and presses on firmly. We...

This funky user interface element is reminiscent of the original clicking scroll wheel interface on the first iPods. It's a fancy mechanical kit but has an intuitiveness that is hard to argue with - everyone knows how to use this kind of rotary encoder to scroll and select. This product is just the encoder/button wheel element. The pin-out is a little odd, we really...

Sometimes a simple analog control device can be the perfect tactile solution for your project, but they can be surprisingly hard to come by. Luckily we've found a low-cost, quality Mini Analog Joystick to fill your directional analog input needs! Unlike most arcade-style joysticks which come with four clicking switches, this product has two 10KΩ potentiometers...

The ANO rotary encoder wheel is a funky user interface element, reminiscent of the original clicking scroll wheel interface on the first iPods. It's a nifty kit, but the pin-out is a little odd - and there's a ton of pins needed to connect to the rotary encoder and 5 button switches. This Stemma QT breakout makes all that frustration go away - solder in the ANO...

Are you itching for an easy way to mount a PSP-like thumb joystick to your project? This Analog Mini Thumbstick Breakout Board will help you do just that! This is a neat little PCB, on which you can mount a joystick/thumbstick -- we recommend this one. Since it's analog, you'll need two analog reading pins on your microcontroller to determine X and Y. We designed the...

Add lots of touch sensors to your next microcontroller project with this easy-to-use 12-channel capacitive touch sensor breakout board, starring the MPR121. This chip can handle up to 12 individual touchpads with plug-and-play STEMMA QT connector and large alligator/croc-clip friendly pads, its a no-solder solution to capacitive touch sensing. The MPR121 has support...

FSRs are sensors that allow you to detect physical pressure, squeezing and weight. They are simple to use and low cost. FSR's are basically a resistor that changes its resistive value (in ohms Ω) depending on how much its pressed. These sensors are fairly low cost, and easy to use but they're rarely accurate. They also vary some from sensor to sensor perhaps...

The ANO rotary encoder wheel is a funky user interface element is reminiscent of the original clicking scroll wheel interface on the first iPods. It's a nifty kit, but the pin-out is a little odd, so we made a handy breakout board that converts the funky pin set into a straightforward, breadboard-friendly header strip. This is just the PCB for the ANO encoder, the...

Sometimes a simple analog control device can be the perfect tactile solution for your project, but they can be surprisingly hard to come by. Luckily we've got a low-cost, quality Mini Analog Thumbstick (Joycon Style) to fulfill your directional analog input needs! This is a small joystick with a black rocker cap, similar to the ones used in Nintendo joycons. Note it...

Here's a new addition to our rotary-potentiometer-knob family. This knob has a nice soft-touch feel with an arrow on it, and its much 'slimmer' than the skirted knob we have been using, so good for compact layouts. Note: This is just the knob. We have a breadboard-friendly rotary encoder here. Rotary encoders are useful as rotation sensors or selectors and look...

Getting touchy performance with your screen's touch screen? Resistive touch screens are incredibly popular as overlays to TFT and LCD displays. Only problem is they require a bunch of analog pins and you have to keep polling them since the overlays themselves are basically just big potentiometers. If your microcontroller doesn't have analog inputs, or maybe you want...

Punch in your secret key (or Jenny's number) into this numeric matrix keypad. This keypad has 12 buttons, arranged in a telephone-line 3x4 grid. The keys are connected into a matrix, so you only need 7 microcontroller pins (3-columns and 4-rows) to scan through the pad. Check the tutorials tab for links to an Arduino library and example code. We include some header...

This Square Silicone Button PWM Controller is a satisfyingly-squishy, easy-to-wire PWM output button controller with three color power-adjustment statuses in red, blue, and green. A simple way to add a three-cycle power/PWM button and a colorful universal power symbol to your project. These were originally designed for controlling heating pad modules in wearable...

This thin silvery ribbon is an interesting sensor. It's made of 2mm wide by 600mm long piezoelectric film sandwich. Piezo film can be used to detect motion or vibration - when shifted around or touched, it creates a small current pulse across the terminals. If a 1 Mega-ohm resistor is placed across the two terminals you will see the current converted into a voltage...

Sometimes a simple analog control device can be the perfect tactile solution for your project, but they can be surprisingly hard to come by. Luckily we've found a low cost, quality PSP 3000 2-Axis Analog Thumb Joystick to fulfill your directional analog input needs! This is a replacement component for the PSP 3000, but we think they'd make for a great little...

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. The quick brown fox - sorry! We were practicing our typing ON THIS NEW AWESOME KEYBOARD. With 88 dedicated keys and 12 function keys, totaling 100 keys altogether, this 'standard size' keyboard is the perfect on-the-go accessory to your Pi or everyday computer when your project...

We've had a foot pedal switch in the store for a while but some people have contacted us asking if there was a way to retrofit it to perform variable speed control, like a potentiometer. And here it is! This is a Foot Pedal Potentiometer (a.k.a Sewing Machine Speed Controller). This is a really nice quality one, very sturdy, with a friendly 3.5mm 'audio' connector on...

FSRs are sensors that allow you to detect physical pressure, squeezing and weight. They are simple to use and low cost. This sensor is an Alpha MF02A-N-221-A01 FSR with a 38mm square sensing region. Note that this sensor can't detect where on the square you pressed (for that, check out our ribbon soft pots or capacitive touch pad ). FSRs are basically a resistor that...

Your friends probably tell you that you are "good with your hands," but now you can also be good with your feet! This foot switch is made of rubbery plastic, is plenty strong to put up with any amount of stomping, and contains a snap switch. You can use the switch as either a "normally open" or "normally closed" type. Attached to the switch is a 2 meter long cable so...

The thirst is real! Keep your flora (plants, not the board *wink*) happy and hydrated with the Circuit Playground Express Soil Sensor Mini Kit. This kit will teach you all about how to keep your plants in good condition, by measuring the soil moisture content using a nail and alligator clip, then display red or green LEDs on the Circuit Playground Express to tell you...

The Sensor Film Kit is a great new way to make custom-sized sensors out of force sensitive material. This kit includes one piece of black plastic sensor film (it's thicker and more durable than Velostat but similar in function), two pieces of heavy aluminum foil, and two pieces of clear adhesive polyester film. The sensor film is super durable and changes its...

Add a cool touch interface with your project with this microcontroller-friendly track-pad. We found an easy to use PS/2 track-pad that is easy to use and interface with. This track-pad is two-in-one: you can use it either in relative 'mouse mode', where it spit out finger movements as they change OR you can put it into 'tablet mode', where it give the absolute X and...

Turn your paintings into touch sensors. Say what? Yes! And that's only some of the amazing things this Bare Conducitve Touch Board can do. This board is designed to be integrated with the Bare Conductive Paint, though you can use many other conductive tools (it has 12 electrodes which can have any conductive material connected to it). But if you can paint your own,...

Discontinued - you can grab Thru-hole 5-way Navigation switch instead! This SMT 5-Directional Joystick is an intuitive way to add 5 buttons worth of interfacing with a single component. Inside are 5 switches: left, right, up, down, and 'select' (pressing down), all with a common ground pin. It's sturdy metal with 6 SMT mounting tabs that provide both electrical and...

Add precise capacitive touch, distance sensing and high quality audio to your Raspberry Pi A+, B+, Zero and later (any Raspberry Pi with a 40 pin GPIO connector) with the Pi Cap from Bare Conductive! Connect Electric Paint or anything conductive to one of the 12 electrodes to control sounds, video and more. Connecting the physical world to the digital world is easy...

The pIRkey adds an IR remote receiver to any computer, laptop, tablet...any computer or device with a USB port that can use a keyboard. This little board slides into any USB A port, and shows up as an every-day USB keyboard. The onboard ATSAMD21 microcontroller listens for IR remote signals and converts them to keypresses, mouse movements, or even USB serial output....

From the folks at Solder Party comes the Keyboard FeatherWing, an easy way to add a handheld QWERTY keyboard and a 2.6” color display (+ more) to your project! Nice hand-held size and great for typing with your thumbs, early 2000s-style. The keyboard itself does not contain an MCU/CPU/SoC that you can program; you will need a board compatible with the Adafruit...