WiFi provisioning
Sending WiFi credentials and and Auth Token to your device
Remember going to a coffee shop and asking for the name and password for their WiFi network to connect your smartphone or laptop to? Familiar situation, right?
Now imagine your ESP32 or other hardware wants to connect to the Internet. It would also need the wifi network name and password. Good news, Blynk can do it for you.
A complete WiFi provisioning solution from Blynk includes both a firmware code and a mobile app UI to guide you through the WiFi setup. It's called Blynk.Inject
Currently, WiFi provisioning with Blynk.Inject works on ESP32, ESP8266, WiO Terminal by Seeed, Arduino MKR1010, Arduino Nano 33IoT, and Texas Instruments CC3220.
Raspberry Pi will be supported soon.
How WiFi provisioning works
You can skip this part as this is something you don't have to think about because Blynk does everything for you. But it might be helpful to understand how it works under the hood.
In the beginning, your hardware will act as an Access Point (AP). It means that your device will broadcast its own WiFi network with an SSID (name) similar to
Blynk Device-1234Your smartphone will connect to this AP with the Blynk app (or from smartphone settings) and they will start communicating directly with each other
Blynk app will ask you for the name (SSID) and password of the WiFi network you would like to connect this device to
WiFi information (SSID and password) will be sent to the device
Also, Blynk app will request an Auth Token from the server and then send it to the device
Your device will store all of these items in Flash/EEPROM memory
After that, the device will automatically reboot. The AP mode will be turned off.
The device will use the WiFi credentials you provided to connect to your home or office WiFi network
After the successful authentication, the device is added to your account and is ready to use
If you later need to connect this device to a different network, WiFi credentials can be changed using Blynk app, by resetting the device with a physical button (you would need to plan it into your electrical circuit design)
Now let's make it work for your devices.
To enhance the end-user experience it's highly recommended that you plan certain components into device's electrical design. Especially if you are working on a commercial product!
Plan a physical button which will allow resetting the device to its default settings. E.g.: Holding this button for N seconds will erase the AuthToken and WiFi credentials.
Plan an LED to indicate different statuses of device (AP, connected, etc.). It can be RGB or one-color LED.
You can find references to handling reset and statuses indication in Blynk.Edgent examples
Setting up your sketch to enable WiFi Provisioning
Install Blynk Library in Arduino IDE (or download the latest release as a .zip file and install the library as a zip file)
Open Arduino IDE
After that, you should see Blynk folder under the File > Examples
Select Blynk.Edgent > Edgent_ESP32
In the sketch variables BLYNK_TEMPLATE_ID and BLYNK_TEMPLATE_NAME are empty. They must be filled in with the values from your template. Read below on where to find them.
Log in to your Blynk.Console developer account
Go to Templates -> Create New Template or open an existing template
Copy the Firmware Configuration code lines
Go back to your sketch and replace the configuration lines with what you copied.
The Template Name is the name that you provide when you create the template, and the Edgent sketch then adds additional characters that are derived from the Chip ID of the device to form the SSID name which is used when the app connects to the device.
The template name + Chip ID should not exceed 32 characters for the provisioning process to complete successfully. You can edit the template name if the resulting SSID name proved too long.
Press the Upload button to flash the code to your device. If the upload process went successfully you should see the output in the serial monitor:
Now your device is ready to be activated using Blynk app.
Activating the device using Blynk app
Open Blynk App
Open the MENU icon in the upper right corner
Tap on +Add New Device
The app will scan the WiFi networks around you and offer to connect to your device. In our example, the device name will be: Blynk Root Template-FAD8F
Once the connection is established, the Blynk app will guide you through the provisioning process.
When the process is over, you will be prompted to name the device. At this stage, the device is ready to use.
Here is an example of how it works in the app:
For debugging and troubleshooting check the serial monitor output. There you will see how the provisioning process is happening on the device.
Re-provisioning new WiFi credentials
If you’re having problems provisioning a device, or you’ve accidentally entered the wrong WiFi credentials, then press and hold the physical button (the one defined in Settings.h for your board type) for 10 seconds. This will clear the stored credentials and the LED will start flashing quickly and allow you to either repeat the provisioning process, or if the device has already been created in the app you can re-provision it.
To re-provision an existing device, tap on the device in the app, then tap the three dots in the top right-hand corner of the app screen. This will bring up the device information/timeline screen.
Tap on the three dots in the top right-hand corner once more, and this will pop up a dialog that allows you to “Reconfigure”, “Erase all device data”, “Delete Device” or “Cancel”.
Choose “Reconfigure” and this will take you back into the provisioning process described in the earlier section.
If the wrong SSID was selected and/or the password was entered before then take care to enter the correct information rather than using the credentials stored in the app.
Troubleshooting
If the LED on the board isn’t doing anything, then ensure that the LED and switch are defined correctly and that you don’t have any peripherals also using the LED or Switch pins. If the LED is pulsing slowly then the board thinks it’s already provisioned. Follow the instructions in the “Re-provisioning new WiFi credentials” section. If the LED is flashing quickly, but the device doesn’t show up in the app when you tap the “Ready” button in the app then check the following:
The Template name isn’t too long (see the restrictions for BLYNK_TEMPLATE_NAME above)
The template ID and device name in the sketch are EXACTLY as they appear in the web console
The app is signed in to the same user account as the web console, or
The user has permission to provision new devices.
ESP32/ESP8266-specific issues
If you cannot configure the device, and the log displays AP IP: 0.0.0.0 , please ensure you're using the latest stable Arduino Core version (i.e., not an outdated, beta, or rc version).
In some rare cases it could be a hardware issue of a specific module, so if you have any issues please also try using a new (unused) module.
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