How to program ESP-32 cam using Arduino UNO board

In this article, I am going to describe how to program ESP32 cam module using Arduino IDE & without FDTI & any other USB to ttl converter.

This low price development board has onboard 5volt to 3.3-volt voltage regulator chip, an ESP32 chip with Bluetooth(BLE), wifi, GPIO pins, 2MP camera & a big sized SMD led but unfortunately this cheap board has not any onboard programmer chip like other nodemcu board. Usually, we have to program it using FDTI or USB to TTL converter.

IF you don’t have any USB to TTL converter & have an Arduino UNO then no need to waste money to buy this TTL converter.

You need to program in this method

1. ESP32 cam ( I am using AI thinker)
2. Arduino UNO board
3. Jumper wire
4. Arduino IDE software

Connection ESP32 cam to Arduino UNO

• Connect Arduino 5volt to esp 32 cam 5 volt.
• Arduino GND to GND
• Arduino RX to Cam board RX & TX to TX
• Arduino reset pin to GND
• ESP 32cam D0 to Gnd

Make sure the cam board DO is connected to gnd. It will enable esp 32 flash mode otherwise you can’t program it. after compleat, the programming remove D0 to gnd

Now open Arduino IDE on your PC, go to File > Preferences >

Now paste below link in the board manager URL

https://dl.espressif.com/dl/package_esp32_index.json

esp32cam programming

Now go to Tools > Board > Board manager > & search for ESP 32

You can see esp 32 board Download & install the latest version package

After complete, the installation go to Tools > Select port where arduino UNO is connected

• Now go to board > select board > ESP32 ” Wrover Module”
• Flash Mode > QIO
• Flash Frequency > 40MHZ
• Partition Scheme > Huge App (3mb No OTA)
• Upload speed > 115200
• Programmer > AVR ISP

Now it is ready for uploading sketch

You can test it Go to File > Example > ESP32 > Camera > Camera web server and upload the sample sketch

This is video of esp 32 cam programming