Yesterday, I wrote about Ariel OS RTOS for microcontrollers written in Rust, but there’s another interesting open-source operating system for microcontrollers that will be covered at FOSDEM 2026: MicroPythonOS.
While Ariel OS is designed for secure, memory-safe, networked IoT applications on microcontrollers, MicroPythonOS targets applications with graphical user interfaces and is heavily inspired by Android and iOS, with an appstore, an LVGL-based touchscreen and button UI with plenty of widgets, gestures and theme support, and a wifi manager, as well as over-the-air (OTA) firmware updates.
You’ll probably be astonished to learn that MicroPythonOS is written in… MicroPython. It’s comprised of a Thin OS which handles hardware initialization, multitasking, and UI, and everything else is an app, including system features like WiFi configuration and OS updates.
MicroPythonOS highlights:
- Native MicroPython foundation
- Runs on ESP32 microcontrollers, but the FOSDEM 2026 talk mentions that it can run on anything that supports MicroPython, including the Raspberry Pi RP2350.
- Since it’s cross-platform, it can also run on Windows, Linux, and macOS (mostly useful for app development and evaluation)
- Android-like touch screen UI with gestures
- App Store for easy app access
- Over-The-Air (OTA) updates
- Supports touch screens, IMUs, and cameras
- Fast and lightweight performance, suitable for resource-constrained devices
- Quick boot times
Right now, five apps are pre-installed: Launcher, WiFi for wireless configuration, AppStore to install more apps, OSUpdate for OTA system updates, and Settings. The AppStore features various apps, including Hello World, Camera, Image Viewer, and IMU to visualize the motion sensor data, among others, all with source code available.
It can be used to create smart home controllers, educational tools with interactive displays, decentralized payment systems, portable touch screen devices, robotics with IMUs and cameras, smart wearables with gesture controls, and other prototype DIY projects. Hardware support (on ESP32) currently includes WiFi, Bluetooth, several motion sensors, cameras, touch screens, IO expanders, displays, ADC, GPIO, I2C, etc…
You’ll find the source code on GitHub and instructions to get started with app and OS development on the documentation website. For a quick try, installing it on Windows, Linux, or macOS is probably the easiest, but if you prefer to check the performance on actual hardware, ESP32 targets are the way to go, and you can install MicroPythonOS through the web installer. It was specifically tested on the ESP32-S3-Touch-LCD-2 and Fri3d Camp 2024 Badge.
More details can be found on the project’s website, or if you plan to go to FOSDEM 2026 this weekend, you can also attend the 25-minute talk on Sunday, February 1, by Thomas Farstrike.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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