Books / Essentials

We absolutely love The Art of Electronics by Paul Horowitz and Winfield Hill. So much so, our Ladyada (Limor Fried, founder and engineer of Adafruit) scored a review copy and even gives her commendation on the back cover! Here's what she had to say: "Who among us has not kept a cherished copy of AoE on our workbench throughout our careers? Engineers, hackers and...

Have you ever wanted comprehensive information on a diverse amount of subjects in a pocket sized, well-organized format...and not had a cell phone signal or internet connection? Look no further! This pocket reference book is actually incredibly cool - even if you have a smart phone, wear a pair of Google glass, have read all of Wikipedia, etc. It's 864 pages of...

Make: Getting Started with Circuit Playground Express is written by our friend, Anne Barela, author of G.S.W. Adafruit Trinket. Anne is an engineer and Maker with the Adafruit team. We also have a great bundle that includes everything you need to follow along with the projects in the book, no soldering required! This book gives you the low-down on microcontrollers by...

A wristband that teaches you how to use technology for activism! Our black RESIST bracelet has a hidden USB storage drive (64MB) and comes loaded with a copy of the ultimate guide to modern tech-resistance, How to Be A Digital Revolutionary. Use the wristband to store and trade files; the book suggests what to load it with, like emergency contacts, your lawyer's...

If Adafruit were a manga, it would definitely look like this. Wow, wouldn't that be mega-sugoi? Ladyada-sensei, notice me! It's difficult not to feel like an excited otaku while looking at this enchanting cyber-bishoujo cover. New Ada-friend Mitsuharu Aoyama has published a beautiful, thoughtfully designed beginner's book on CircuitPython with Circuit Playground...

The Digi-Key Innovation Handbook is your guide to keeping some of the most highly referenced content from Digi-Key at your fingertips while giving you plenty of room to keep your thoughts, projects, and ideas at hand. They highlight concepts, formulas, components, and electronic staples so you can refer to them at any time. From reference tables and schematic symbols...

HackSpace Magazine is the monthly magazine for the modern maker! Issue #25 highlights the best toys, tools, and trinkets for your hacker Christmas list. This issue is bootloaded (ok, forgive us) with tons of DIY tutorials (how to make beautiful, weird sounds with a NeoTrellis, linking your phone to your CircuitPython-running microcontroller to send data and commands,...

Published by Raspberry Pi Press, Wireframe Magazine is a fortnightly magazine that "lifts the lid on video games", looking at how games are made, who makes them, and guides you through the journey of making your own! We especially dig this issue for their sweet writeup on our very own, PyBadge! Other articles cover the new Afrofuturist game, We Are The Caretakers,...

When the future may appear gloomy and overwhelming, we can look to science and fact-based processes to find our way out of the darkness and conserve our planet's resources for generations to come. Electrify, with 288 pages and 47 black-and-white illustrations, will help galvanize the reader into re-thinking how to collaboratively deter climate change. An...

Science like a girl! Feast your eyes on this super special anniversary edition of Smore Magazine, a science magazine for smart young girls who can't stop wondering about the world around them. We love Smore (or, Science-more!) for their fun and un-intimidating issues and for their dedication towards equal representation of women in STEM. Far more than a stereotypical...

1,000 Incredible Costume and Cosplay Ideas provides a broad and detailed glimpse into the ingenious artistry and attention to detail behind some of the most fabulous costumes you can find. Featuring costumes from popular convention-goers to professional craftsman, this stunning, photo-filled book by Joey Marsocci and Allison DeBlasio of Dr. Grymm Laboratories walks...

Discontinued - you can grab The Book of Cosplay Lights - Getting Started with LEDs - by Svetlana Quindt @KamuiCosplay instead! Cosplay World is filled with striking images of costume play from around the world. This definitive look at the global phenomenon known as “cosplay” examines its evolution from the fringes of society to the spotlight of modern...

The Raspberry Pi User Guide, 4th Edition by Eben Upton and Gareth Halfacree contains everything the reader needs to know to get up and running on the Raspberry Pi. The fourth edition is updated for the latest revision of the Raspberry Pi Model B+! Written by Gareth Halfacree and Eben Upton, the co-creator of Raspberry Pi, this book shows how to: Install software and...

The best notebook on earth, The Maker's Notebook. From the creators of Make Magazine comes the Maker's Notebook. Put your own ideas, diagrams, calculations & notes down in these 150 pages of engineering graph paper. We've also included 20 bonus pages of reference material, from useful stuff like electronics symbols, resistor codes, weights and measures, basic...

Discontinued - you can grab Ladyada's Coloring book - "R is for Robots" instead! Ladyada's "E is for Electronics" is a coloring book adventure with electronic components and their inventors. Makers of all ages can learn, color, and share common parts and historical figures throughout history. Explore the world of electronics with Ladyada as your guide! Here's an...

Pickup a copy of Getting Started with Adafruit FLORA and then hit the ground running with everything that you need to become an Adafruit FLORA supreme being! This pack is perfect for somebody interested in the wide world of wearable electronics and Adafruit's tiny FLORA board. Pack includes: 1x Getting Started with Adafruit FLORA book. 1x FLORA - Wearable electronic...

Combine fashion and high tech in your own workshop! What if your clothing could change color to complement your skin tone, respond to your racing heartbeat, or connect you with a loved one from afar? Welcome to the world of shoes that can dynamically shift your height, jackets that display when the next bus is coming, and neckties that can nudge your business partner...

There are hundreds of hackerspaces around the world - teaching, sharing and becoming valuable parts of their local communities. As makers travel from place to place a popular thing to do is to visit a local hackerspace and get your very own hackerspace passport stamped! Adafruit is pleased to have these in stock now! We spent a long time testing different materials...

Getting Started in Electronic - by Forrest M. Mims, III. is a complete electronics course in 128 pages! This famous electronics inventor teaches you the basics, takes you on a tour of analog and digital components, explains how they work, and shows how they are combined for various applications. Includes circuit assembly tips and 100 electronic circuits you can build...

Light, Sound, and Motor Projects On the Low-Cost Mini Microcontroller Arduino's ubiquity and simplicity has led to a gigantic surge in the use of microcontrollers to build programmable electronics project. Despite the low cost of Arduino, you're still committing about $30 worth of hardware every time you build a project that has an Arduino inside. This is where...

Makers, get ready: This is your ultimate, must-have, tip-packed guide for taking your DIY projects to the next level—from basic wood- and metalworking skills to 3D printing and laser-cutting wizardry, plus the entrepreneurial and crowd-sourcing tactics needed to transform your back-of-the-envelope idea into a gleaming finished product. In The Big Book of Maker...

Making Wearables with an Arduino-Compatible Electronics Platform This book introduces readers to building wearable electronics projects using Adafruit's tiny FLORA board: at 4.4 grams, and only 1.75 inches in diameter, and featuring Arduino compatibility, it's the most beginner-friendly way to create wearable projects. This book shows you how to plan your wearable...

Want to know how to use an electronic component? The Encyclopedia of Electronic Components Vol. 2 by Charles Platt includes key information on electronics parts for your projects--complete with photographs, schematics, and diagrams. You'll learn what each one does, how it works, why it's useful, and what variants exist. No matter how much you know about electronics,...

This hands-on guide from Alicia Gibb gives an incredible run down of the world of open source hardware from history, to meaning, to practice. The first part of Building Open Source Hardware focuses primarily on the emergence and evolution of open source and what the term means - both by definition and in practice. In the second half, Building Open Source Hardware...

The Annotated Build-It-Yourself Science Laboratory is a new, updated version of Build-It-Yourself Science Laboratory, the classic 1960′s hands-on science book by Raymond E. Barrett. Raymond E. Barrett's Build-It-Yourself Science Laboratory is a legendary book that took on an audacious task: to show young readers in the 1960s how to build a complete working...

The Art of Electronics 2nd Edition by Paul Horowitz & Winfield Hill HARDCOVER. Considered the best resource, now available at Adafruit. This is the thoroughly revised and updated Second Edition of the hugely successful The Art of Electronics. Widely accepted as the single, authoritative text and reference on electronic circuit design, both analog and digital,...

The Art of Electronics - Student manual with exercises, plastic comb binder by Thomas C. Hayes & Paul Horowitz - this is only for the 2nd Edition, the 3rd edition is not out yet, there is not ETA. This manual is both a guide and aid to users of The Art of Electronics. It is carefully organized to follow the chapters of the main text, providing extra explanatory...

Svetlana Quindt (best known as @KamuiCosplay) is an accomplished cosplayer and author from Germany who uses her powers for the greater good, endowing the cosplay community with LED knowledge! Her guides are chock full of infectious enthusiasm and adorable Corgis, making it very easy for anyone to shine. She puts it best: "Note that this book is written for...

HackSpace Magazine is the monthly magazine for the modern maker! Issue #3 highlights Scrap Heap Hacking, a perfect complement to Adafruit Crickit boards and our Trashbots! From the editor, Ben Everard, "We live in a throw-away society, and it's destroying the planet ... As makers and hackers, we're in a position to change this. This month we're taking a look at how...

Svetlana Quindt (best known as @KamuiCosplay) is an accomplished cosplayer and author from Germany who uses her powers for the greater good, endowing the cosplay community with LED knowledge! Her guides are chock full of infectious enthusiasm and adorable Corgis, making it very easy for non-STEM fans to join the fun. In this volume you’ll learn everything about...

Make: Volume 57 features a familiar face on its cover... it's LadyAda with one of her Circuit Playgrounds, of course! This is Make Magazine's annual boards blowout issue, an examination of the latest from the world of microcontrollers and single-board computers! These prototyping devices are more powerful than ever, with the latest crop now capable of...

Flux? Tinning? Reflow?? When you think of electronic engineering, soldering may be one of the first associations that come to mind. Many of our Adafruit boards are fabricated through a bulk soldering process called wave soldering or go through our Adafruit selective soldering machine. But there are several special boards that we personally hand solder additional...

Can we find a more concise, more colorfully illustrated handbook than Make: Easy Electronics by Charles Platt? Doubtful. We carry a number of his more advanced guidebooks, but this 50-page volume really simplifies the building blocks of maker fundamentals. The illustrations are amazing, and make it a really fun read. Get acquainted with the basics of electronics in...

2600: The Hacker Quarterly is an American quarterly journal specializing in issues surrounding hacking, telephone switching systems, internet protocols, telecommunications in general, the politics around high technology, and its impact on society. With origins in the phreaking community and late 20th century counterculture, 2600 and its associated conference...

Discontinued - you can grab HackSpace Magazine Issue #25 - Maker Christmas - December 2019 instead! Make: Volume 61 features one of our absolute favorite makers, Naomi Wu, better known online as @RealSexyCyborg! We are so thrilled she's getting this exposure that we want everyone to have a copy of the magazine! Considering that Naomi is the creator of China's first...

Reinvented Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that aspires to break barriers and aid the movement to get more girls involved in STEM by creating the nation's first print magazine for women in STEM. They have a single mission in mind: to reinvent the general perception of women in STEM fields while inspiring interest in STEM for young women nationwide. Their...

Want to know how to use an electronic component? The Encyclopedia of Electronic Components Vol. 3 by Charles Platt and Fredrik Jansson includes key information on electronics parts for your projects--complete with photographs, schematics, and diagrams. You'll learn what each one does, how it works, why it's useful, and what variants exist. No matter how much you know...

Author Gordon Williams writes, "We humans have endless imaginations. 'Making' -- whether that's painting, designing, building, or programming -- can be one of the most satisfying human experiences. Standing back from a creation and thinking, 'I made that,' is one of the best feelings I know." Whether you're into robotics or other forms of electromechanics, Make:...

Hubs has published what may be the bible for 3D printing. The 3D Printing Handbook is intended for all skill levels, and it's an essential book for makers wanting to dip their toes in the ever-growing pool of 3D printing design and application. The wealth of practical advice and guidelines come from first-hand experience from machine operators and industry experts....

Put USB to work in your designs with USB Complete: The Developer's Guide! This book bridges the gap between the technical specifications and the real world of designing and programming devices that connect over the Universal Serial Bus. This is Ladyada's favorite protocol book, and is great at explaining USB at a low level. As the most versatile computer interface...

Do you want to learn maker skills but are overwhelmed and unsure where to dive in? Have no fear! This book is your introduction to physical computing with the Arduino microcontroller platform! Start with building simple circuits on a breadboard to setting up the Arduino IDE and downloading and writing sketches to run on the Arduino. Readers will be introduced to...

"That girl thinks she's the queen of the neighborhood She's got the hottest trike in town That girl she holds her head up so high I think I want to be her best friend, yeah Rebel girl, rebel girl Rebel girl, you are the queen of my world" Girl CEO is an illustrated collection to inspire and motivate rebel girls, young entrepreneurs, and other trailblazing tweens and...

Discontinued - you can grab Python for Kids - A Playful Introduction to Programming instead! Alright, the Adafruit CLUE is ready for its close-up...And what an incredible cover image shot by Adafruit's in-house photographer, Andrew Tingle! Welcome to Make:’s 2020 Guide to Boards! This year brings powerful new releases from Adafruit, Arduino, BeagleBoard,...

The Essential Guide to Electronics in Shenzhen is now sold out. An electronic version of the book can be found here. Did you ever play Myst? Did you ever play Myst without the guide? We tried for about an hour and then realized that it was much better, and a lot more fun, if there were tips and tricks to help us along our journey. This guide does to the Shenzhen...

"Take a byte of the micro:bit!" This book is for everyone! It's for kids (and parents) who want to learn how to program their own simple games and gadgets using the BBC micro:bit. It's also for serious hardware hobbyists who want an inexpensive microcontroller with a built-in LED display. Or for Internet of Things nerds who want an inexpensive, remote programmable...

Discontinued - you can grab the HackSpace Magazine Issue #25 - Maker Christmas - December 2019 instead! HackSpace Magazine is the monthly magazine for the modern maker! Issue #34 highlights the Adafruit Feather, one of our most popular and well-known flagship ecosystem of microcontrollers, single board computers, and add-on boards (FeatherWings). "… The big...