The LightBlue Bean+ is an Arduino-compatible board that you program wirelessly using Bluetooth Low Energy.
The Bean+ is the latest addition to the LightBlue Bean family: a line of easy-to-use, wireless Arduinos. With new Bluetooth Low Energy capabilities, solderless connectors, 16 GPIOs, a rechargeable battery and enough range to program your neighbor’s neighbor’s Beans.
The Bean+ can be programmed from your favorite platforms: OS X, Windows, iOS and Android. All programming is done wirelessly and you can even program multiple Beans at once. No wires; no worries.
The Bean+ comes equipped with five new Bluetooth Low Energy capabilities: beacon, MIDI, HID, ANCS and observer role.
Have the Bean+ receive your Apple notifications during the weekdays, be a MIDI instrument by Friday and work the weekends as a keyboard or a mouse. Then let it spend its holidays socializing with other Beans.
Hardware Features
Built-in accelerometer, temperature sensor and RGB LED
The Bean+ comes with an on-board accelerometer and temperature sensor. Use the accelerometer to make MIDI maracas or receive a notification when your pink-belly short-neck turtle’s terrarium is getting too hot.
Boosted range
With a new RF amplifier, the Bean+ can communicate with other Bean+’s from up to 400 meters (1,300 ft) under ideal conditions, or 250 meters (820 ft) to your smartphone. Upload a new sketch to your tree house Bean+ without having to leave your bed, or turn on epic welcoming music in your house before you even pull into to your driveway.
Rechargeable battery
Every Bean+ has a 600 mAh rechargeable battery, running for over a year on one charge when programmed with a low-power sketch.
The added micro-USB port allows you to charge the Bean+ wherever you go. Or go totally mobile and hook it up to a USB solar charger! Keep in mind that the Bean+ is programmed wirelessly, so the micro-USB connector is just for charging.
The Bean+ is suited for projects requiring higher current draw, such as powering servo motors or high-power LEDs.
Plug and play accessories
The Bean+ comes with two types of connectors: 0.1″ pitch female headers and Grove connectors developed by Seeed Studio. Grove is a new building-block style system, useful for hooking up all different kinds of sensors, input or output devices.
The MEGA and GIGA reward include a Grove starter kit with a potentiometer, buzzer, touch sensor, button and a 10 segment LED bar, ready to be plugged in.
Choose your operating voltage
The Bean+ has a switch that lets you choose between 3.3V or 5V as the operating voltage. So no more voltage level translation to make the Bean+ work with your favorite accessories.
Wireless programming
The Bean+ can be programmed from most iOS, OS X, Windows and Android devices with Bluetooth Low Energy capabilities. Write code at the comfort of your computer using the standard Arduino IDE, or on-the-fly using our iOS and Android Bean Loader apps.
Interacts with your iPhone without iOS programming
The Bean+ is perfect for any smartphone-controlled project. Use our app LightBlue to quickly interact with the Bean+ without having to make your own app. Make a smartphone-controlled hovercraft or use your iPhone to turn the lights on and off in your roommate’s bedroom.
iOS and Android SDKs
We provide official iOS, OS X and Android SDKs that help you develop smartphone apps that interact with the Bean+. These have been been put to the test by our own apps, as well as many built by our community.
Bean to Bean communication
Your Bean+ can talk to other Beans! This feature uses BLE advertisement packets and the observer role to send simple messages between Beans.
Make music with MIDI
With the MIDI profile, the Bean+ can send and receive MIDI data and be used as an instrument with apps like GarageBand.
Receive notifications with ANCS
Apple Notification Center Service (ANCS) allows the Bean+ to receive any of your Apple device’s notifications. Write a sketch that blinks an LED when a special friend sends a text, or rings a bell when your Uber is arriving.
HID
Use the Bean+ as a wireless mouse or keyboard with the Human Interface Device (HID) profile. Works with smartphones, tablets and computers.
Easy web integration
Quickly connect the Bean+ to the Internet using Node-RED or OctoBlu: two visual programming interfaces for the Internet of things.
Beacon
The Bean+ can easily be configured as a Beacon and lets you trigger events in your app whenever your device is close by.
The Bean+ is a new hardware flavor of the LightBlue Bean. Its solderless connectors, boosted range and powerful battery open new possibilities for projects and make it easy for developers to use.
The original Bean is here to stay, as it’s still a compact and low-power prototyping platform. Later this year, it will receive all the new Bluetooth Low Energy capabilities, such as MIDI, ANCS, HID, and observer role.
Both Bean products are software compatible. Our Bean Loaders and SDKs work with both Beans and your Arduino sketches can be used interchangeably.
Pick and choose how you want your Beans! Alone, or with a Grove starter kit consisting of a potentiometer, buzzer, touch sensor, button and a 10 segment LED bar. Or go big with our protoboard shield and a Grove shield that lets you plug in up to 18 Grove accessories to one Bean+.
Want more? Add any of these amounts to your pledge and we’ll send you extra stuff when the campaign has ended. Feel free to add a combination of items; we’ll know which items you picked from the amount. It is as simple as that!
We’re very proud of our customers and the amazing projects they’ve built. Our Bean products have been used by all kinds of people: makers, engineers, students, teachers, entrepreneurs, product developers, designers, NASA (true story) and turtles (also true story).
Buying a Bean+ means joining a family: we already have 25,000 original Beans in the wild and an active forum with over 5,000 posts.
Our community has developed various Bean apps and added Bean support to their existing apps, by using the iOS and Android SDKs.
The Bean Console app allows you to send and receive serial data from the Bean, perfect for debugging or controlling Beans from iOS. Made by our forum superuser Bruce Walker.
Tickle allows you to program real-world objects, including the Bean, with a drag-and-drop block style interface.
Handy allows you to create a custom interface that can communicate directly with the Bean.
The LightBlue Platform is a collection of firmware and app SDKs that make it easier to develop a connected product. It’s hardware agnostic, so you can design for mass production, and use a custom form factor.
After you’ve shipped your product early, you can iterate on your design by releasing firmware updates via the web.
Parakey, UrbnEarth, Wej and Pet Tutor are all products developed using the LightBlue Bean and the LightBlue Platform.
We are the Punch Through team! We like beans, Beans, burritos, beer and EAGLE’s Autorouter. JOKE.
We are also separate human beings and like individual things too. Colin loves surfing. Simone on the other hand is terrified of waves. Matt’s body was built on string cheese, whereas Ray’s body detests all dairy. We have names too. Here they are (from left to right in the photo, kind of):