{"slug": "lvgl", "name": "LVGL", "category": "dev-libs", "category_name": "Libraries and frameworks", "description": "", "recommenders": 4, "commenters": 8, "warners": 1, "score": 3.365, "rising": -1.31, "first": "2026-01-08", "latest": "2026-07-19", "why": "stopped using libraries for anything that isn't LVGL, TinyUSB, compression or cryptography", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 4, "neutral": 3, "compare": 0, "warn": 1}, "spark": [0, 0, 2, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "stopped using libraries for anything that isn't LVGL, TinyUSB, compression or cryptography", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": "github.com/lvgl/lvgl", "official_url": "https://lvgl.io", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["LVGL"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 783563968, "item_id": 48972748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48972748", "by": "Rohansi", "date": "2026-07-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Can make fancy UIs for it with LVGL", "excerpt": "And on the higher end you can get an ESP32 CYD (Cheap Yellow Display) which has a 2.8\" or larger touch screen, SD card slot, LiPo battery connection and charger, speaker port, and maybe more for ~$15. Can make fancy UIs for it with LVGL or install something like MicroPythonOS on it if you have PSRAM. https://lvgl.io/ https://micropythonos.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "Embedded UI graphics library", "switched_from": "", "story": "Clever hacker fits 537,000 domains in a $5 ESP32 ad-blocking dongle"}, {"id": 750792194, "item_id": 46924512, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46924512", "by": "peteforde", "date": "2026-02-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "stopped using libraries for anything that isn't LVGL, TinyUSB, compression or cryptography", "excerpt": "I have been using Cursor w/ Opus 4.x to do extensive embedded development work over the past six months in particular. My own take on this topic is that for all of the chatter about LLMs in software engineering, I think a lot of folks are missing the opportunity to pull back and talk about LLMs in the context of engineering writ large. [I'm not capitalizing engineering because I'm using the HN lens of product develop", "context": "embedded product developer", "use_case": "embedded GUI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Software Engineering Is Back"}, {"id": 744804336, "item_id": 46550271, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46550271", "by": "apitman", "date": "2026-01-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LVGL is awesome.", "excerpt": "I bought one of these on Amazon last week for $25: https://www.waveshare.com/esp32-c6-touch-lcd-1.47.htm I've been really impressed. It's basically a hackable Fitbit with no strap or battery. Full wifi, BLE, 6-axis motion. It's was really easy to get the C demos running. LVGL is awesome. Can't speak to Rust. I get enough of that complexity in my day job. Other brands that look good for beginners are Elecrow and Maker", "context": "", "use_case": "Embedded GUI graphics", "switched_from": "", "story": "Embassy: Modern embedded framework, using Rust and async"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 756479392, "item_id": 47279962, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47279962", "by": "bobmcnamara", "date": "2026-03-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LVGL has begun relicensed and removed the lv_xml module from and moved it under LVGL Pro", "excerpt": "LVGL has begun relicensed and removed the lv_xml module from and moved it under LVGL Pro More discussion here: https://github.com/lvgl/lvgl/issues/9663 Have to read the commit history on this one to see the order things happened - lv_xml appears to have started as MIT licensed with everything else, then license changed last fall, then it was removed with claims of always-been-proprietary.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "LVGL Kft switches to freemium; closes lv_xml module"}]}], "who": [{"by": "peteforde", "context": "embedded product developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46924512", "date": "2026-02-07"}], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["embedded ui graphics library", "embedded gui library", "e-ink ui", "embedded gui", "embedded gui graphics"], "compared": [], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46547740", "title": "Embassy: Modern embedded framework, using Rust and async", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48968348", "title": "Clever hacker fits 537,000 domains in a $5 ESP32 ad-blocking dongle", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48605776", "title": "Cyberdecks, going analog, and convivial technology", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47279961", "title": "LVGL Kft switches to freemium; closes lv_xml module", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47113728", "title": "I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46923543", "title": "Software Engineering Is Back", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-02": {"neutral": 2, "recommend": 1}, "2026-03": {"warn": 1}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-07": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 783563968, "item_id": 48972748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48972748", "by": "Rohansi", "date": "2026-07-19", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Can make fancy UIs for it with LVGL", "excerpt": "And on the higher end you can get an ESP32 CYD (Cheap Yellow Display) which has a 2.8\" or larger touch screen, SD card slot, LiPo battery connection and charger, speaker port, and maybe more for ~$15. Can make fancy UIs for it with LVGL or install something like MicroPythonOS on it if you have PSRAM. https://lvgl.io/ https://micropythonos.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "Embedded UI graphics library", "switched_from": "", "story": "Clever hacker fits 537,000 domains in a $5 ESP32 ad-blocking dongle"}, {"id": 778231840, "item_id": 48639490, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48639490", "by": "nl", "date": "2026-06-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "One-shotted LVGL UI", "excerpt": "https://imgur.com/a/p7P1WBt One-shotted LVGL UI (which I think it a bit ugly). A Bluetooth gateway has a flat battery so 2 temperature sensors aren't getting relayed. This is a Guition ESP32-S3-4848S040 board with this case https://makerworld.com/en/models/2859961-guition-4-esp32-s3-4848s040-cases About $25 in total I think.", "context": "", "use_case": "Embedded UI graphics library", "switched_from": "", "story": "Cyberdecks, going analog, and convivial technology"}, {"id": 756479392, "item_id": 47279962, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47279962", "by": "bobmcnamara", "date": "2026-03-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "LVGL has begun relicensed and removed the lv_xml module from and moved it under LVGL Pro", "excerpt": "LVGL has begun relicensed and removed the lv_xml module from and moved it under LVGL Pro More discussion here: https://github.com/lvgl/lvgl/issues/9663 Have to read the commit history on this one to see the order things happened - lv_xml appears to have started as MIT licensed with everything else, then license changed last fall, then it was removed with claims of always-been-proprietary.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "LVGL Kft switches to freemium; closes lv_xml module"}, {"id": 753864369, "item_id": 47116523, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47116523", "by": "windexh8er", "date": "2026-02-22", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "There are lots of other eInk devices you can use LVGL with.", "excerpt": "There are lots of other eInk devices you can use LVGL with. ReTerminal and other derivatives from Seeed Studio are two options. Seeed even has a newish color unitfor under $250 [0]. Not trying to diminish all of the thought and work that's gone into OPs project but a lot of this has been available to do in HomeAssistant for quite some time. Glad more people are finally seeing the value in eInk like this. I've been us", "context": "", "use_case": "e-ink UI", "switched_from": "", "story": "I built Timeframe, our family e-paper dashboard"}, {"id": 750792194, "item_id": 46924512, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46924512", "by": "peteforde", "date": "2026-02-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "stopped using libraries for anything that isn't LVGL, TinyUSB, compression or cryptography", "excerpt": "I have been using Cursor w/ Opus 4.x to do extensive embedded development work over the past six months in particular. My own take on this topic is that for all of the chatter about LLMs in software engineering, I think a lot of folks are missing the opportunity to pull back and talk about LLMs in the context of engineering writ large. [I'm not capitalizing engineering because I'm using the HN lens of product develop", "context": "embedded product developer", "use_case": "embedded GUI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Software Engineering Is Back"}, {"id": 749566000, "item_id": 46847875, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46847875", "by": "sintezcs", "date": "2026-02-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "It uses LVGL https://github.com/lvgl/lvgl", "excerpt": "It uses LVGL https://github.com/lvgl/lvgl", "context": "", "use_case": "Embedded GUI library", "switched_from": "", "story": "MicroPythonOS graphical operating system delivers Android-like user experience"}, {"id": 744823552, "item_id": 46551472, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46551472", "by": "5d41402abc4b", "date": "2026-01-09", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "", "excerpt": "https://www.waveshare.com/esp32-s3-touch-lcd-4b.htm This one is nice too, it has an enclosure. You could use this for a smart home dashboard. Be careful with the boards with two USB ports, they will backfeed power.", "context": "", "use_case": "Embedded GUI library", "switched_from": "", "story": "Embassy: Modern embedded framework, using Rust and async"}, {"id": 744804336, "item_id": 46550271, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46550271", "by": "apitman", "date": "2026-01-08", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "LVGL is awesome.", "excerpt": "I bought one of these on Amazon last week for $25: https://www.waveshare.com/esp32-c6-touch-lcd-1.47.htm I've been really impressed. It's basically a hackable Fitbit with no strap or battery. Full wifi, BLE, 6-axis motion. It's was really easy to get the C demos running. LVGL is awesome. Can't speak to Rust. I get enough of that complexity in my day job. Other brands that look good for beginners are Elecrow and Maker", "context": "", "use_case": "Embedded GUI graphics", "switched_from": "", "story": "Embassy: Modern embedded framework, using Rust and async"}]}