This is the documentation for the latest development branch of MicroPython and may refer to features that are not available in released versions.

If you are looking for the documentation for a specific release, use the drop-down menu on the left and select the desired version.

class UART – duplex serial communication bus

UART implements the standard UART/USART duplex serial communications protocol. At the physical level it consists of 2 lines: RX and TX. The unit of communication is a character (not to be confused with a string character) which can be 8 or 9 bits wide.

UART objects can be created and initialised using:

from machine import UART

uart = UART(1, 9600)                         # init with given baudrate
uart.init(9600, bits=8, parity=None, stop=1) # init with given parameters

Supported parameters differ on a board:

Pyboard: Bits can be 7, 8 or 9. Stop can be 1 or 2. With parity=None, only 8 and 9 bits are supported. With parity enabled, only 7 and 8 bits are supported.

WiPy/CC3200: Bits can be 5, 6, 7, 8. Stop can be 1 or 2.

A UART object acts like a stream object and reading and writing is done using the standard stream methods:

uart.read(10)       # read 10 characters, returns a bytes object
uart.read()         # read all available characters
uart.readline()     # read a line
uart.readinto(buf)  # read and store into the given buffer
uart.write('abc')   # write the 3 characters

Constructors

class machine.UART(id, ...)

Construct a UART object of the given id.

Methods

UART.init(baudrate=9600, bits=8, parity=None, stop=1, *, ...)

Initialise the UART bus with the given parameters:

  • baudrate is the clock rate.

  • bits is the number of bits per character, 7, 8 or 9.

  • parity is the parity, None, 0 (even) or 1 (odd).

  • stop is the number of stop bits, 1 or 2.

Additional keyword-only parameters that may be supported by a port are:

  • tx specifies the TX pin to use.

  • rx specifies the RX pin to use.

  • rts specifies the RTS (output) pin to use for hardware receive flow control.

  • cts specifies the CTS (input) pin to use for hardware transmit flow control.

  • txbuf specifies the length in characters of the TX buffer.

  • rxbuf specifies the length in characters of the RX buffer.

  • timeout specifies the time to wait for the first character (in ms).

  • timeout_char specifies the time to wait between characters (in ms).

  • invert specifies which lines to invert.

    • 0 will not invert lines (idle state of both lines is logic high).

    • UART.INV_TX will invert TX line (idle state of TX line now logic low).

    • UART.INV_RX will invert RX line (idle state of RX line now logic low).

    • UART.INV_TX | UART.INV_RX will invert both lines (idle state at logic low).

  • flow specifies which hardware flow control signals to use. The value is a bitmask.

    • 0 will ignore hardware flow control signals.

    • UART.RTS will enable receive flow control by using the RTS output pin to signal if the receive FIFO has sufficient space to accept more data.

    • UART.CTS will enable transmit flow control by pausing transmission when the CTS input pin signals that the receiver is running low on buffer space.

    • UART.RTS | UART.CTS will enable both, for full hardware flow control.

On the WiPy only the following keyword-only parameter is supported:

  • pins is a 4 or 2 item list indicating the TX, RX, RTS and CTS pins (in that order). Any of the pins can be None if one wants the UART to operate with limited functionality. If the RTS pin is given the the RX pin must be given as well. The same applies to CTS. When no pins are given, then the default set of TX and RX pins is taken, and hardware flow control will be disabled. If pins is None, no pin assignment will be made.

Note

It is possible to call init() multiple times on the same object in order to reconfigure UART on the fly. That allows using single UART peripheral to serve different devices attached to different GPIO pins. Only one device can be served at a time in that case. Also do not call deinit() as it will prevent calling init() again.

UART.deinit()

Turn off the UART bus.

Note

You will not be able to call init() on the object after deinit(). A new instance needs to be created in that case.

UART.any()

Returns an integer counting the number of characters that can be read without blocking. It will return 0 if there are no characters available and a positive number if there are characters. The method may return 1 even if there is more than one character available for reading.

For more sophisticated querying of available characters use select.poll:

poll = select.poll()
poll.register(uart, select.POLLIN)
poll.poll(timeout)
UART.read([nbytes])

Read characters. If nbytes is specified then read at most that many bytes, otherwise read as much data as possible. It may return sooner if a timeout is reached. The timeout is configurable in the constructor.

Return value: a bytes object containing the bytes read in. Returns None on timeout.

UART.readinto(buf[, nbytes])

Read bytes into the buf. If nbytes is specified then read at most that many bytes. Otherwise, read at most len(buf) bytes. It may return sooner if a timeout is reached. The timeout is configurable in the constructor.

Return value: number of bytes read and stored into buf or None on timeout.

UART.readline()

Read a line, ending in a newline character. It may return sooner if a timeout is reached. The timeout is configurable in the constructor.

Return value: the line read or None on timeout.

UART.write(buf)

Write the buffer of bytes to the bus.

Return value: number of bytes written or None on timeout.

UART.sendbreak()

Send a break condition on the bus. This drives the bus low for a duration longer than required for a normal transmission of a character.

UART.flush()

Waits until all data has been sent. In case of a timeout, an exception is raised. The timeout duration depends on the tx buffer size and the baud rate. Unless flow control is enabled, a timeout should not occur.

Note

For the esp8266 and nrf ports the call returns while the last byte is sent. If required, a one character wait time has to be added in the calling script.

Availability: rp2, esp32, esp8266, mimxrt, cc3200, stm32, nrf ports, renesas-ra

UART.txdone()

Tells whether all data has been sent or no data transfer is happening. In this case, it returns True. If a data transmission is ongoing it returns False.

Note

For the esp8266 and nrf ports the call may return True even if the last byte of a transfer is still being sent. If required, a one character wait time has to be added in the calling script.

Availability: rp2, esp32, esp8266, mimxrt, cc3200, stm32, nrf ports, renesas-ra

UART.irq(handler=None, trigger=0, hard=False)

Configure an interrupt handler to be called when a UART event occurs.

The arguments are:

  • handler is an optional function to be called when the interrupt event triggers. The handler must take exactly one argument which is the UART instance.

  • trigger configures the event(s) which can generate an interrupt. Possible values are a mask of one or more of the following:

    • UART.IRQ_RXIDLE interrupt after receiving at least one character and then the RX line goes idle.

    • UART.IRQ_RX interrupt after each received character.

    • UART.IRQ_TXIDLE interrupt after or while the last character(s) of a message are or have been sent.

    • UART.IRQ_BREAK interrupt when a break state is detected at RX

  • hard if true a hardware interrupt is used. This reduces the delay between the pin change and the handler being called. Hard interrupt handlers may not allocate memory; see Writing interrupt handlers.

Returns an irq object.

Due to limitations of the hardware not all trigger events are available on all ports.

Availability of triggers

Port / Trigger

IRQ_RXIDLE

IRQ_RX

IRQ_TXIDLE

IRQ_BREAK

CC3200

yes

ESP32

yes

yes

yes

MIMXRT

yes

yes

NRF

yes

yes

RENESAS-RA

yes

yes

RP2

yes

yes

yes

SAMD

yes

yes

yes

STM32

yes

yes

Note

  • The ESP32 port does not support the option hard=True.

  • The rp2 port’s UART.IRQ_TXIDLE is only triggered when the message is longer than 5 characters and the trigger happens when still 5 characters are to be sent.

  • The rp2 port’s UART.IRQ_BREAK needs receiving valid characters for triggering again.

  • The SAMD port’s UART.IRQ_TXIDLE is triggered while the last character is sent.

  • On STM32F4xx MCU’s, using the trigger UART.IRQ_RXIDLE the handler will be called once after the first character and then after the end of the message, when the line is idle.

Availability: cc3200, esp32, mimxrt, nrf, renesas-ra, rp2, samd, stm32.

Constants

UART.RTS
UART.CTS

Flow control options.

Availability: esp32, mimxrt, renesas-ra, rp2, stm32.

UART.IRQ_RXIDLE
UART.IRQ_RX
UART.IRQ_TXIDLE
UART.IRQ_BREAK

IRQ trigger sources.

Availability: renesas-ra, stm32, esp32, rp2040, mimxrt, samd, cc3200.