SparkFun Qwiic Navigation Switch

Product Overview

Meet the SparkFun Navigation Switch, a nifty little addition to your I²C bus that features a 5-way tactile switch akin to a joystick! This compact component allows you to interact with your microcontroller by pushing the switch in any of five directions—up, down, left, right, or centre—adding a new dimension to your project’s input options. Plus, the integrated RGB status LED provides immediate visual feedback for each action.

Onboard, you'll find a 5-way tactile switch where each direction is connected to a momentary switch. These are read by the PCA9554 8-bit I²C I/O expander, which alerts the microcontroller when a switch is pressed. Subsequently, your microcontroller can control the RGB LED for visual indicators. Each LED channel can be individually disconnected from the PCA9554’s GPIO and rerouted to an alternative input if needed. An interrupt pin is also included, enabling your microcontroller to quickly detect state changes. Thanks to our handy Qwiic system, you can connect it to your setup without any soldering. For those who prefer a more traditional approach, we've also provided 0.1"-spaced pins for breadboarding.

If your project requires multiple Qwiic Navigation Switches, worry not—each board comes with a configurable I²C address, allowing you to daisy-chain multiple switches via Qwiic and address each one uniquely.

We’ve crafted a basic example for the Qwiic Navigation Switch available in our GitHub Hardware repository. To interact with the PCA9554’s eight separate I/O pins, you'll need the SparkFun I²C Expander Arduino Library, which can be easily downloaded through the Arduino library manager or directly from GitHub.

Perfect for projects that need extra input control, the Qwiic Navigation Switch can enhance your menu navigation or even serve as a nifty controller for a small robot!

Features & Specs

• Input voltage: 3.3V
• 5-way tactile switch
• PCA9554 8-bit I²C I/O expander
• 2x Horizontal Qwiic connectors
• 2.2kΩ I²C pull-up resistors

• Breakout PTHs

  • GND: Ground
  • 3V3: 3.3V
  • SDA: I²C Data
  • SCL: I²C Clock
  • INT: Interrupt, active low
  • 5: GPIO5
  • 6: GPIO6
  • 7: GPIO7

• LEDs

  • RGB non-addressable status
  • Red power

• Jumpers

  • Power LED: PWR
  • GPIO7/Red LED: 7
  • GPIO6/Green LED: 6
  • GPIO5/Blue LED: 5
  • I²C pull-up resistors: I²C
  • I²C selectable address (ADR2, ADR1, ADR0)
  • 0x20 (Default): 000
  • 0x21: 001
  • 0x22: 010
  • 0x23: 011
  • 0x24: 100
  • 0x25: 101
  • 0x26: 110
  • 0x27: 111

• Board Dimensions: 25.4mm x 25.4mm

• Weight: 2.6g

Documentation

• Schematic
• KiCad Files
• 3D Model
• Board Dimensions
• Hookup Guide

• Datasheets

  • SF303GJ26 5-way Tactile Switch
  • PCA9554

• Arduino Library

• Arduino Example Code

• Qwiic Info Page

• GitHub Hardware Repo