15 min · Beginner

Tutorial: Blink an LED on a real ESP32.

From zero to a blinking GPIO on a physical chip in our lab — without buying hardware, plugging in a USB cable, or installing a single driver.

Before you start

A free mychipserver account (sign up takes 30 seconds)
arduino-cli or PlatformIO installed locally
A terminal — that's it

1
Install the CLI
The mychipserver CLI is a single static binary. Install it with one curl call (or grab a release from GitHub).
shell
```
curl -fsSL https://get.mychipserver.com | sh
```
2
Log in to your account
This opens a browser tab and stores a short-lived token in ~/.mychipserver/credentials.
shell
```
mychipserver login
```
3
Reserve an ESP32-S3
Reserving gives you exclusive access to a physical board for the duration of your session.
shell
```
mychipserver reserve --board esp32-s3 --duration 30m
# ✓ session  b7f3-4c1e-ae02
# ✓ board   esp32-s3-07 · online
```
Boards are wiped between reservations, so you always start clean.

Write a tiny blink program

We'll use Arduino-style C++ for brevity. Save this as blink.ino in a new folder.

blink.ino

#define LED_PIN 2

void setup() {
  pinMode(LED_PIN, OUTPUT);
  Serial.begin(115200);
}

void loop() {
  digitalWrite(LED_PIN, HIGH);
  Serial.println("on");
  delay(500);
  digitalWrite(LED_PIN, LOW);
  Serial.println("off");
  delay(500);
}

5
Build the firmware
Compile with arduino-cli (or PlatformIO). The CLI doesn't care which toolchain produced the .bin.
shell
```
arduino-cli compile --fqbn esp32:esp32:esp32s3 --output-dir build .
```
6
Flash it to your reserved board
One command — we handle reset, erase, write, and verify on the real chip.
shell
```
mychipserver flash ./build/blink.ino.bin
# ✓ uploaded 412 KB · running
```
7
Watch the live UART output
Stream the board's serial output to your terminal in real time.
shell
```
mychipserver logs --follow
# on
# off
# on
# off
```
Open the Console in the dashboard to also see a live waveform of the LED pin.
8
Release the board
Free the reservation when you're done so others can use it. Or just let your session expire.
shell
```
mychipserver release
```

That's it — you flashed real silicon.

Next up: try a different board, wire the flash step into your CI, or stream sensor data into a live chart.

Pick another board Read the docs

Tutorial: Blink an LED on a real ESP32.

Install the CLI

Log in to your account

Reserve an ESP32-S3

Write a tiny blink program

Build the firmware

Flash it to your reserved board

Watch the live UART output

Release the board

That's it — you flashed real silicon.