Even if you've lived your life far from the makers’ field, you have probably heard of Arduino. The open-source electronics developer platform has become especially popular in recent years — and today, you can get in on all the fun even if you have next to none developer experience. All you need is a good starter kit. In this post, we take a closer look at one of the most popular Arduino Uno starter kits and take you through the main advantages of getting into the maker game.

What is Arduino?

Arduino is an open-source developer platform used for a variety of electronics projects. Based on easy-to-use hardware and software, it is intended for makers of all levels — which has made the platform very popular with those just starting out with electronics.

In simple terms, Arduino is a small computer that you can program to read and control electrical components connected to it.

Arduino kits typically come with a variety of components to make that possible: inputs that initiate the action (temperature sensor, a motion sensor, a distance sensor, a switch and so forth), outputs that perform the action (light, a screen, a motor and so forth) and a number of other accessories to connect the dots.

The Advantages of Arduino

Accessibility

One of the biggest advantages of Arduino compared to other circuit boards is that it does not require a separate piece of hardware in order to load new code onto the board – all you need is a USB cable. Thus, you have all the functions of a micro-controller in a very accessible package.

Affordable

The hardware boards are relatively inexpensive.

Openness

Arduino software is free, the software and hardware are open-resource.

Learnability

Both the software and hardware are easy to learn.

Rich resources

There is a huge library of code and project instructions for Arduino-based projects available online.

How does Arduino work?

As we've mentioned above, the Arduino hardware and software were designed with hobbyists, newbies and artists in mind — but there is a surprisingly large amount of projects that you can create with it.

Arduino can interact with LEDs, buttons, motors, speakers, GPS units, cameras, the Internet and even smart gadgets like phones and TVs. So, you have loads of flexibility as to the projects you want to undertake and the functionality you want to achieve — thanks to a number of factors.

Best Arduino board on GearBest: KT002 Arduino Uno R3

The Uno R3 is one of the most popular Arduino boards — and is especially designed for beginners. With it, you basically get everything you need to get started.

Arduino Uno R3 is based on the ATmega328P and comes with 14 digital input / output pins, 6 analog inputs, a 16 MHz quartz crystal, a USB connection, a power jack, an ICSP header and a reset button. You also get everything to support the microcontroller — all you need to do is hook it up to the computer with a USB cable.

What’s more, the Uno is the most used and documented board of the whole Arduino family — so you are sure to find plenty of information and project guides to get started. The best thing: you can tinker with the Uno as much as you want — and even if you do break something, you won’t get into too much trouble — you can easily get a replacement part for just a few bucks.

So, what comes in the Arduino Uno R3 starter kit?

Great Arduino Project Ideas

There are lots of starter kit project ideas and instructions available online.

If this your very first project, you can start with something simple like making a very basic alarm system using a motion detector. Or, a mini traffic light controller using red, yellow and green LEDs to re-create a traffic light on your breadboard.

If you’ve already completed a few successful projects and are ready to move on to something a tad more complicated, consider building one of the old handheld electronic games — for instance, the classic snake game. For this, you will need an UNO, 8×8 LED dot matrix display, shift register component, 16×2 LCD, 1K potentiometer, four push buttons, connecting wires, a breadboard, and a power supply.